Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a Methodist.

c.1770		A. Mac Cumhaidh ‘Tagra an Dá Theampall’ in A. Carpenter Verse in Eng. in 18C Ireland (1998) 325: New Lights nó Seceders Old Presbyterians, Swaddlers nó Quakers leofa.
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1790		‘Bumper Allnight. Esquire’ Honest Fellow 149: When Squintum* first mounted the clerical tub, / He had little or nothing to say to the mob *Whitefield the swaddler.
c.1805		‘A Sup of good Whisky’ in Jovial Songster 135: Some Preachers will tell you to drink is bad, / I think so too – if there’s none to be had: / The Swadler will bid you drink none at all, / But while I can get it, a fig for them all.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1820		Cornwall Gaz. (Truro) 27 May 4/2: Wesley was first well received in Ireland [...] They soon became objects of persecution, and got the nickname of swaddler.
1831		Freeman’s Jrnl (Dublin) 9 June 3/1: Papists and swaddlers [...] A complaint against two persons [...] whose exterior bespoke them to be of the sect of Primitive Wesleyans.
1835		G. Kent Modern Flash Dict. 32: Swaddler – a pitiful fellow, a methodist preacher who preaches on the high road, when a number of people are assembled, his accomplices pick their pockets.
1845		Coke & Moore Life of Wesley 288: Butler and his mob were now in higher spirits than ever; they scoured the streets day and night, frequently hallooing as they went along, ‘Five pounds for a swaddler’s head!’ [F&H].
1859		Matsell Vocabulum 88: swaddler A fellow who pretends to be anxious for the salvation of every body, and harangues crowds of gaping knaves and fools in the parks, or any other public place. The pickpockets generally pay him well for his efforts.
1865		G.A. Sala A Trip to Barbary 136: Pudding-head may be either a Papist or a ‘Swaddler’.
1870		Mercury (Hobart, Tas.) 17 Jan. 3/2: Cardinal Dillon [...] speaks of ‘Swaddlers’ a term which has been hitherto used in the most offensive sense, by the very lowest of Irish, for Episcopal Protestants.
1873		Sl. Dict. 315: Swaddler a Wesleyan Methodist; a name originally given to members of that body by the Irish mob; said to have originated with an ignorant Romanist, to whom the words of the English Bible were a novelty, and who, hearing one of John Wesley’s preachers mention the swaddling clothes of the Holy Infant, in a sermon on Christmas-day at Dublin, shouted out in derision, ‘A swaddler! a swaddler!’ as if the whole story were the preacher’s invention ? Southey’s Life of Wesley, II/109.
1889		Gazette (Cedar Rapids, IA) 20 Apr. 4/2: ‘The Swaddlers’ [...] journeyed over England preaching this Gospel [...] Yes, John Wesley’s was a great day in which to do and dare for God .
1895		Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 83: Swaddlers, a sort of gospel preachers.

2. any type of Protestant, thus adj. Swaddling, Protestanrt.

1835		Athlone Sentinel (West Meath) 24 Apr. 3/4: The Swaddlers [...] Itinerant preachers are now going about town [...] who, not content with dealing forth their thunders on religious subjects, denounce [...] the Reform Bill.
1854		Catholic Teleg. (Dublin) 5 Aug. 4/5: [headline] Presbyterian Swaddlers in the North [...] Some of the Presbyterian ministers in that part of Ireland are desirous to act the part of ‘Swaddling‘ preachers [...] by insulting their Catholic fellow countrymen.
1855		Tipperary Free Press 10 Aug. 2/5: A powerful Catholic Sovereign would maintain [...] the administration of the laws of his realm even though their violator were a coroneted swaddler.
1869		Dublin Eve. Mail 13 Sept. 2/5: The twerm ‘Swaddler,’ used by the Roman Catholics of Ireland to describe Protestants.
1869		Home News for India 10 Sept. 16/2: Dr. CULLEN declares that the sacraments shall be refused to those who send their children to the godless [i.e. Protestant] schools [...] calling the poor children who go thither [...] ‘swaddlers’.
1889		Academy 11 May 317: To revive Sir W. Petty’s Colony by importing Northern Presbyterians and Cornish swaddlers [F&H].
1914		Joyce ‘An Encounter’ Dubliners (1956) 20: We walked on, the ragged troop screaming after us ‘Swaddlers! Swaddlers!’ thinking that we were Protestants.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 323: Is he a jew or a gentile or a holy Roman or a swaddler or what the hell is he? says Ned.
1930		J. Lait Gangster Girl 160: You s’pose, Annie, that the swaddler smells somethin’.
1939		(con. 1880–90s) S. O’Casey I Knock at the Door 242: They had boohed him, called him a swadler, or sent stones flying at his heels.
1961		(con. 1890–1910) ‘Flann O’Brien’ Hard Life (1962) 34: You won’t find Quakers or swaddlers coming out with any of this guff about suffering.
1970		C. Brown Down All the Days 81: I’m no bloody swaddler!