Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (US) New York City prison; also attrib.

1840		N.Y. Herald 20 Feb. 1/5: Our report would be but a dull record of assaults and petty larcenies, but for the following gross case of neglect and inattention to the suffering of the wretched inmates of ‘the tombs’ which we were called on to investigate [DA].
1842		C. Mathews Career of Puffer Hopkins 161: I wish they’d send out the green wagon, and treat me to a ride to the Tombs. [Ibid.] 295: ‘Why, old fellow, you’re in the Tombs, Centre-street,’ answered the turnkey.
c.1858		J.H. Green Reformed Gambler 73: Upon this charge I was re-arrested, and again taken to the Tombs.
1868		J.D. McCabe Secrets of the Great City 98: His attention is at once attracted by a large, heavy granite building, constructed in the style of an Egyptian temple. This is the Tombs. The proper name of the building is ‘The Halls of Justice,’ but it is now by common consent spoken of simply as the Tombs.
1876		A.B. Sedgwick Circumstances Alter Cases 12: Is this some antiquated antediluvian or a ‘Tomb’s lawyer?’.
1886		J. Miller Destruction of Gotham Prologue: The janitor of the Tombs sprinkled carbolic acid about the room.
1895		E. Townsend Chimmie Fadden Explains 33: I says, sober as a judge in de Tombs, I says [...] I could get you in dere for a plunk each.
1904		‘Number 1500’ Life In Sing Sing 3: Nothing was easier to get in the Tombs than dope and whisky.
1917		F. Packard Adventures of Jimmie Dale (1918) I ix: Stangeist [...] was himself now in the Tombs with the certainty of the electric chair before him.
1928		M.C. Sharpe Chicago May (1929) 68: For this I was pinched, and saw the inside of the Tombs for the first time.
1933		J. Spenser Limey 8: The Tombs is to New York what Brixton [Prison] is to London.
1949		I. Bolton Christmas Tree in N.Y. Mosaic (1999) 319: They had taken Larry off to the Tombs; that was, if she recollected correctly, the name of the city prison.
1952		I, Mobster 23: I’m slammed in the Tombs.
1964		Larner & Tefferteller Addict in the Street (1966) 45: I spend three weeks in the Tombs, and was sentenced to go to Lexington.
1975		E. Torres Carlito’s Way 37: They hold me in the Tombs. Tombs is right — couldn’t take a shower, smells bad, food worse.
1989		(con. 1920) Courtwright & Des Jarlais Addicts Who Survived 91: I got arrested one time. They took me to the flats in the old Tombs.
1998		L. Stringer Grand Central Winter (1999) 68: If he was headed for Rikers or the Tombs [...] he was going to have a problem.
2002		J. Lerner You Got Nothing Coming 280: I spent that night in the Manhattan jail known as the Tombs.
2008		R. Price Lush Life 26: Tristan had never been to either juvie or [...] the Tombs .

2. used generically, with lower-case ‘t’, a prison.

1936		F.A. Waterhouse Gun Running 47: ‘Say, Lassy, when do they lock us in the tombs?’ ‘Your day's imprisonment will take place to-morrow,’ Lassenfeld answered sourly.
1987		G.W. Clemente Cops are Robbers 127: [of Boston, MA] If she were not bailed she would have to be brought, with the infant, to the ‘tombs,’ the city jail cells downtown.