Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a side of salted pork; bacon.

1863		T.F. Upson diary 4 Jan. in Winther With Sherman to the Sea (1958) 39: It seems that General Grant had a full supply of ‘hard tack’ and ‘sow belly’.
1867		W.L. Goss Soldier’s Story 205: My captor presented to me a generous slice of ‘sow-belly’.
1887		F. Francis Jr Saddle and Mocassin 148: Corn-meal mash [...] and bacon (known to the ranchero as ‘sow-belly’).
1902		O. Wister Virginian 65: I was likely to find nothing but the eternal ‘sowbelly,’ beans, and coffee.
1905		R. Beach Pardners (1912) 55: ’Bout to-morrer evening we’ll be eating hog-bosom on Uncle Sam.
1907		J. London Road 159: She gives you a slice of sow-belly an’ a chunk of dry ‘punk’.
1917		Sun (NY) 21 Oct. 2/4: ‘Blackstrap’ is army for hot coffee. [...] Sometimes the lads get ‘sowbelly’ or bacon for breakfast.
1925		G.H. Mullin Adventures of a Scholar Tramp 125: I’d [...] choke down rye bread greased with sow-belly. Sow-belly with buttons on too!
1927		C.M. Russell Trails Plowed Under 129: I eat raw sow bosom.
1936		Mencken Amer. Lang. (4th edn) 304: I am informed by a correspondent that in 1933 the pious Los Angeles Times printed sow-bosom instead of sow-belly.
1937		Z.N. Hurston Their Eyes Were Watching God (1998) 32: The sow-belly in the pan needed turning.
1943		W. Guthrie Bound for Glory (1969) 373: Sow bosom and beans!
1948		J.M. Cain Moth (1950) 152: The three of us [...] were in the cook shack, putting away sow belly, beans, flapjacks.
1950		Reader’s Digest Mar. 41/2: I don’t think either of them ever saw more than a peck of black-eyed peas and a side of sowbelly [DA].
1961		‘M.B. Longman’ Power of Black (1962) 195: It isn’t fair living off hominy grits, sowbelly, long sweetnin’ all your life.
1971		J. Simon Sign of Fool 181: Soul food: chitlins and grits, kidney stew, sow belly.

2. a fat person.

1961

(con. 1945) G. Forbes Goodbye to Some (1963) 281: Ready to roll, but one big sow belly always holds up the task force.