Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (Aus./N.Z.) a collector and seller of used bottles; also of ‘rags and bones’.

1887		Telegraph, St Kilda [...] S. Yarra Guardian 15 Oct. 4/6: BOTTLE OH, BOTTLE O-OH! it is nearly a year ago since we recommended in these columns, that all persons engaged in gathering bottles, bones, and rags, should not only be registered, but should also wear a badge indicating their calling.
1900		Bulletin (Sydney) 13 Oct. 11/1: A Melbourne suburban resident who had fought the subtle bottle-ho-man for years, and had been beaten badly every time, recently derived an idea from how the nigs of Central Africa trap big game.
[1901		Sydney Sportsman (Surry Hills, NSW) 25 Sept. 3/2: When I’m horse from yellin’ bottle oh! / And business is snide] .
1901		W.A. Sun. Times (Perth) 17 Nov. 1/1: One of these was recently taken possession of by a ‘bottle-O! man’ and taken away for sale!
1901		Sydney Sportsman (Surry Hills, NSW) 6 Feb. 1/3: Men who ‘10 minutes’ ago were ‘bottle-o’ merchants living on ‘the best ’.
1906		E. Dyson Fact’ry ’Ands 217: Half-a-dozen of them would have died for the bibulous comp. despite the bottle-o’s stock garnered in the trouser fringe.
1907		J.H. Lawson ‘Mateship’ in Lone Hand (Sydney) Sept. 511/2: ‘Boko Bill’ (bottle-ho!) and ‘Three-Pea Ginger’.
1911		Kalgoorlei West. Argus (WA) 7 Mar. 41/2: The pulsating personage with the highly developed rabbit-o or bottle-o voice.
1914		Truth (Melbourne) 24 Jan. 11/6: Cunningham said he was a ‘bottle-oh’ and stacked his bottles in Cook’s yard.
1915		H. Lawson ‘Warner’s Horrors’ in Roderick (1972) 791: My friend Benno, the bottle-o, had drawn up alongside me.
1919		N.Z. Observer 16 Aug. 17/1: [caption] White Bottle-oh: There ye’ are; a blasted nigger goes and offers ’er money fer er empty bottles and she takes it.
1926		Traralgon Record (Vic.) 18 June 5/2: Smith [...] was calling out ‘Bottle-O’ in a voice which could be heard a mile away.
1926		Sydney Morn. Herald 3 Apr. 7/6: The Bottle-Oh! Man Old Bones-and-Bottles is a raggedy man.
1937		Argus (Melbourne) 21 Dec. 10/4: Almost the only street cry to be heard is that of the ‘bottle-o’.
1941		K. Tennant Battlers 211: Miss Phipps in the back of a bottle-oh’s van.
1952		J. Waten Alien Son! (1965) 74: In the streets and back lanes I met the bottle-ohs [...] and rubbish collectors.
1965		W. Dick Bunch of Ratbags 36: We sold it to a bottle-o and scrap-metal dealer.
1973		J. Waten Bottle-O! 2: Jacob was a bottle-o, And he had a horse and cart.
1982		N. Keesing Lily on the Dustbin 118: ‘Bottle-os’ had regular rounds and pre-‘rotary’ housewives recall the clothes-prop man.
1988		McGill Dict. of Kiwi Sl. 19/2: bottle-oh dealer in empty bottles, c.1900s, known from his or her cry.
1996		J. Byrell Lairs, Urgers & Coat-Tuggers 282: Then the thought hits me that, if I can’t nosh royally tonight then I can maybe get classy pissed so I bowl across the road to the local bottleoh.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. [as cit. 1988].
2011		R. Plant Life’s a Blur n.p.: Some of us can remember the horse and cart used by the bottle-o, the milko, the ice-man [etc.].

2. attrib. use of sense 1.

1905		Sun. Times (Perth) 19 Nov. 4/7: Teacher: What will happen when the sea gives up its dead? Bright Youth: Please, father’ll be able to start a bottle-oh business.
1908		H. Lawson ‘The Bath’ in Roderick (1972) 788: Van of the bottle-ho variety.
1913		Sport (Adelaide) 1 Feb. 12/2: They Say [...] Joe G. [...] wants to look out [...] when he takes Jennie D. out again, or else qualify for the bottle-ho trade.

3. an off-licence (attached to a public house), a liquor store.

1983		J. Byrell (con. 1959) Up the Cross 26: After a visit to the Prince Charles bottleoh.
1997		Sydney Morning Herald 24 June Good Living 2: A bottle-o par excellence has opened, making the suburb an increasingly groovy address for the food and wine-minded.
2002		Age (Melbourne) 10 Sept. Epicure 1: No wineries of note down this way so pick up some bottles of the Bellarine’s finest from your favourite bottle-o.
2015		Aussie Home Brewer 24 June 🌐 When I lived in Sydney I used to enjoy the occasional longneck of Rech’s Pilsenser [sic] from my local bottle’o.