Green’s Dictionary of Slang

methylated spirits, usu. as drunk by alcoholic tramps or meth(s)-drinkers, meths-men or -women; also attrib.

1933		M. Marshall Tramp-Royal on the Toby 352: Man, you ought to know better than drink meth.
1938		R. Hyde Nor the Years Condemn 152: Two of them were drinking methylated spirits, which they called ‘metha’ and ‘Johnny Gee’.
1943		R. Llewellyn None But the Lonely Heart 100: She’d had half a bottle of meth to keep her quiet.
1956		B. Behan Quare Fellow (1960) Act II: I thought it was as good a drop of meths as ever I tasted.
1961		B. Crump Hang On a Minute, Mate (1963) 31: What I put up with for six months [...] was enough to send a man fair round the screamin’, meth-drinkin’ bend.
1965		F. Norman in Sun. Times 21 Mar. in Norman’s London (1969) 167: I know as soon as he gets out he will go down the East End and get hold of some red wine or meths.
1966		G. Fletcher Down Among the Meths Men 20: Cable Street, where the meths men have a doss house.
1966		G. Fletcher Down Among the Meths Men 28: Clothes are of no interest to the meths women.
1975		A. Bleasdale Scully 200: He must have been on the old meths.
1980		J. McClure Spike Island (1981) 21: Merchants and money-lenders, beggars and meths-drinkers lying about legless.
1992		D. Jarman diary 7 Nov. Smiling in Slow Motion (2000) 249: The alcoholic who lurched out at me in a meths haze on the doorstep.
2000		Guardian Rev. 25 Feb. 27: Willis has the tastebuds of a meths connoisseur.