Green’s Dictionary of Slang

a stew, esp. pease pudding; also bully-beef.

1818		‘A. Burton’ Adventures of Johnny Newcome II 76: I’ll get you the Dog’s-body Squeezer. [Ibid.] 111: Salt Junk and Pork, Pillaws of Rice, Lob’s Cowse, Dog’s Body, and Sea-pies.
1831		Navy at Home I 38: By the time any given fid, or morsel, of said pudding, dog’s body, twice laid, or junk (salt beef) got to the further end of the table [etc.].
1831		Navy at Home I 139: [He] darted his pate into the remains of some dog’s-body or pease pudding.
1842		Leeds Times 12 Mar. 4/4: The opressed poor [...] itinerate from batile to bastile, guaging water-gruel, testing dog’s-body and gathering up rags.
1850		(con. 1843) Melville White-Jacket (1990) 133: Hence the various sea-rolls, made dishes, and Mediterranean pies, well known by man-of-war’s-men — Scouse, Lob-Scouse, Dog’s-Body, and lastly, and least known, Dunderfunk; all of which come under the general denomination of Manavalins.
1864, 1867, 1870		Hotten Sl. Dict.
1873		Sl. Dict.
1883		W.C. Russell Sailors’ Lang. xii: Out of his sea fare [...] Jack nevertheless manages to manufacture several dishes, of which the names are worthy of the contents and flavour [...] ‘dogsbody,’ ‘seapie,’ ‘choke-dog.’ [Ibid.] 42: Dogs-body — A mess made of pea-soup, powdered biscuit, and slush.
1887		Independent (Footscray, Vic.) 21 May 3/4: Dog’s body is pea soup (made with invisble peas) and broken biscuits mixed together.
1902		Bulletin (Sydney) 13 Dec. 21/2: She earned her pea-soup making ‘dandie funk,’ ‘dog’s body’ and ‘cracker hash,’ and doing tailor’s work on our clobber as wanted mending.
1905		Queenslander (Brisbane) 19 Aug. 45/3: Hash of salt beef and pounded biscuit is dandy-funk [...] the same with some potatoes added is dog’s body, or hash-ma-gandy.
1920		P.L. Waldron Afloat and Ashore 155: The very food consumed [...] and wonderfully concocted messes of whatever edible ingredients are procurable, described as ‘dandyfunk,’ ‘dog’s body,’ ‘Harriet Lane,’ ‘bubble and squeak’.
1925		(con. WWI) Fraser & Gibbons Soldier and Sailor Words 80: Dogsbody: [...] Also a bluejackets’ name for peas boiled in a cloth.
1933		M. Marshall Tramp-Royal on the Toby 66: In the morning, after a tasty breakfast of dog’s body and kill-me-dead washed down on lashings of Tancy Lee, the Cockney and I quitted the university town.