Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a street seller, a hawker.

1823		‘Jon Bee’ Dict. of the Turf, the Ring, the Chase, etc. 133: Hawkers of small wares use it [i.e. patter]; ‘a good patterer,’ and ‘no patterer,’ showing the degree of qualification. ‘Tom Kinnersley was the very best book-patterer in all England.’.
1851		Reynolds’s Newspaper 7 Sept. 7/3: Petterers, i.e. people who dispose of their wares by the aid of a speech.

2. a street seller who specializes in last dying speeches, true confessions and similar melodramas.

1837		Westmorland Gaz. 21 Jan. 3/4: White-headed Bob, the patterer, running about the streets [...] proclaiming‘ latest news’.
1850		Cork Examiner 6 Feb. 4/3: ‘I mixed with astreet patterers (men who make speeches in the streets on [the] destitute mechanics’ lark’.
1852		Launceston Examiner (Tas.) 24 Dec. 862/1: [W]e should from his volubility have inferred that he had followed the calling of ‘public patterers,’ who affect to be ministers, and preach in the open air to collect crowds for the benefit of those whose ‘mawleys’ dip deep into the ‘cly’.
1859		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc. 73: patterers a man who cries last dying speeches, &c., in the streets; and those who help off their wares by long harangues in the public thoroughfares. These men, to use their own term, ‘are the haristocracy of the street sellers,’ and despise the costermongers for their ignorance, boasting that they live by their intellect. The public, they say, do not expect to receive from them an equivalent for their money ? they pay to hear them talk.
1863		Story of a Lancashire Thief 9: Brummagen Joe was [...] a patterer; and he could likewise screeve a fakement with any one.
1871		C. Hindley Curiosities of Street Lit. n.p.: The artist who paints the patterers’ boards, must address his art plainly to the eye of the spectator.

3. a mouth, a voice.

1832

Egan Bk of Sports 160: What tho’ each tombstone they allow / To totter on their graves (gums — Egan’s gloss) from rattling blow, / And make their patt’rers mum.

4. a beggar who delivers a set speech.

1882

Sydney Sl. Dict. (2 edn) 7: Patterers - Persons who beg on the ‘blow,’ or by word of mouth.

5. (Aus.) a master of ceremonies, an announcer.

1901

Sydney Sportsman (Surry Hills, NSW) 21 Aug. 3/4: A little Sheeny, a well-known Yiddisher, acted as ‘patterer’ [...] ‘Genelmen, we are about to give a hexibition of boxin’ by the best talent out of Hingland’.