Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a braggart, an aggressive person always spoiling for a fight.

1804		Morning Herald (N.Y.) in Spirit of Public Journals (1805) VIII 249: The Sieur W-d-m, fire-eater in ordinary to the troop .
1808		J.P. Hurstone Piccadilly Ambulator I 25: This fiery gentleman was no other than the celebrated fire-eater, or duellist .
1827		(ref. to 1777) J. Barrington Personal Sketches II 8: About the year 1777, the ‘Fire-eaters’ were in great repute in Ireland .
1831		Navy at Home I 181: I see, Taffy has given you the worst of it — you did not know, I suppose, that he is the fire-eater of the set?
1843		Bellew Memoirs of a Griffin I 29: The affair was becoming serious — the colonel was a known fire-eater.
1846		Quincy (IL) Whig 10 Jan. 2/3: Let Mr. Polk, father Richie, Judge Douglass, little Walker, and the other fire-eaters, be obliged to do their share of the fighting, and who does not know that the matter would be more likely to be amicably arranged without an appeal to arms [DA].
1854		F. Smedley Harry Coverdale’s Courtship 371: Gently there – take it coolly! why, you’re becoming quite a fire-eater.
1860		White Cloud Kansas Chieftain 11 Oct. 1/6: He had his sycophants vote for a fire-eater for Speaker.
1864, 1867, 1870		Hotten Sl. Dict.
1867		Sportsman 24 Oct. 2/1: Notes on News [...] Farina [...] says that he thrashed Mr Labouchere, who says he thrashed him. This Italian fire-eater now falls foul of some writers on the English press.
1872		Arizona Sentinel 16 Nov. 5/3: A Yankee by birth, a fire-eater by compulsion and a rebel by choice.
1873		Sl. Dict.
1885		C.F. Lummis letter 5 Jan. in Byrkit Letters from the Southwest (1989) 228: The Georgia fire-eater is nowhere, the New York plug-ugly not a marker beside this chap.
1894		G.A. Sala Things I Have Seen II 32: [He] had been [...] both a lady-killer and a fire-eater in his youth.
1900		Bulletin (Sydney) 10 Nov. 12/4: I fancy that the fire-eater who ordered pistols for two and coffee for one usually felt sure of being able to sip the Mocha after the event.
1903		A. Kleberg Slang Fables from Afar 35: One dreary eve a boy chum, a Fire-Eater, of hers brought around a chap who liked her sort.
1910		O. Johnson Varmint 118: There, there, you fire-eater! [...] Go easy. You’ve had enough blood for one afternoon.
1916		Joyce Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man 106: I can remember even your greatgrandfather, old John Stephen Dedalus, and a fierce old fireeater he was.
1921		Mt Sterling Advocate (KY) 20 Jan. 8/4: he is a veritable fire-eater where his wife is concerned.
1937		E.V. Mitchell Horse and Buggy Age 147: Chief Eaton was a veteran of the Civil War, a fire-eater if there ever was one [DA].

2. a noticeably courageous person, with the supposed daring of the performer.

1869		‘Ouida’ Under Two Flags 235: A soldier who irritated and annoyed him, but [...] was one of the most brilliant fire-eaters of his regiment.
1879		H. Hartigan Stray Leaves (2nd ser.) 233: ‘By Jove! fire-eaters, your fellows, sir [...] Let them have an extra dram when they return to camp!’.
1900		Bulletin (Sydney) 10 Feb. 12/3: The story goes that a brush occured at [...] Smellbourne’s most swaggah boarding-house. After the wine and chestnuts had passed round, somebody swung up to a popular officer [...] and insulted him. The professional fire-eater told him summarily and simply to ‘shut-up.’.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).
1953		R. Bissell A Gross of Pyjamas (1954) 36: The old boy he’s quite a fire-eater, ain’t he?

3. (US) a firefighter.

1928		cited in J.A. Weingarten Amer. Dict. Sl.
1939		Howsley Argot: Dict. of Und. Sl.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).