Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a fashionable, smart person, a sophisticate.

1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.
1898		E.E. Morris Austral Eng. 472/2: Toe-ragger, n. In the bush a term of abuse; though curiously in one or two parts of New South Wales the word ‘toey,’ which is derived from it, is a term of praise, a ‘swell.’.
1955		N. Pulliam I Travelled a Lonely Land (1957) 240/2: toey – one who puts on airs.

2. (Aus.) an infantryman.

1896		Regiment 18 Apr. 37: [cartoon caption] Militiaman: ‘Say, matey, I'm thinkin’ of exchangin’ from the toeys into your bloomin’ corps’.
1902		J.H.M. Abbott Tommy Cornstalk 11: To be a ‘toey’ seems to him almost to amount to degradation. He thanks God that he is not an infantryman [...] because it is in his nature to look down upon the man who walks.

3. (Aus.) Australian Rules football.

1939

Williamstown Chron. (Vic.) 15 Apr. 2/3: [They say] That today is the opening of the football season. Town of course meet Yarraville. Years come and go but the same old fixture goes on. Last week I took in a spot of ‘toey’.