Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(UK Und.) imprisoned.

c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Coup’d up, Imprisoned, Environ’d, Surrounded, Pent up.
1725		New Canting Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1823		‘Jon Bee’ Dict. of the Turf, the Ring, the Chase, etc.
1835		G. Kent Modern Flash Dict.
1848		Flash Dict. in Sinks of London Laid Open 103: Cooped in durance vile, to lock up in a goal.
1865		Columbia Phoenix (SC) 20 Apr. 4/2: It warn’t pleasant to think of being cooped up in jail.
1888		Arizona Sentinel (Yuma, AZ) 27 Oct. 3/2: Several drunks and ‘discords’ were copped up in jail in the past week.
1900		Flynt & Walton Powers That Prey 247: The Pen does change you. I’m sure ’t I’d been a bigger man ’f I hadn’t been cooped up so much.
1910		‘Doss Chiderdoss’ ‘A Derby Bet’ Sporting Times 28 May 1/2: The judge dished me out all those ‘stretches,’ and I was cooped up in the ‘jug’.
1991		O.D. Brooks Legs 49: For them it was a big deal and broke the monotony of being cooped up.