Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (US) to beg, to ask for a loan, to accost.

1899		J. Flynt Tramping with Tramps 271: You can’t hit a bloke for a dime in the streets without a bull seein’ you and chuckin’ you up for fifty-nine days in Utica jail.
1907		J. London Road 28: I uttered the barbaric phrase, ‘two-bits.’ You see, I was trying delicately to hit them for a ‘light piece.’ [Ibid.] 124: I ‘hit’ some firemen I found in the round-house. They fixed me up with the leavings from their lunch-pails.
1913		Lincoln Daily News 23 Jan. in DN IV:ii 121: Vag Gets Pinched when He Hits Cap for Square Meal [Headline].
1922		S. Lewis Babbitt (1974) 67: How to hit a bank for a loan.
1930		C.R. Shaw Jack-Roller 94: I ‘hit’ him for a cigarette.
1943		J. Mitchell McSorley’s Wonderful Saloon (2001) 121: He slips me a sawbuck every time I hit him for dues.
1953		Kramer & Karr Teen-Age Gangs 171: I got to hit my old lady or my sister for some dough.
1962		R. Cook Crust on its Uppers 72: Ginny-the-bird comes in to squawk over how much she hit Bathwarpe for.
1968		N. Heard Howard Street 29: His little brother would be sure to hit him for a ‘loan’.
1975		E. Torres Carlito’s Way 60: He would drop in on him and hit him for five hundred or so.
1989		C. Hiaasen Skin Tight 226: How much are we hitting him for?
1993		I. Welsh Trainspotting 35: All she had been waiting for was an opportune moment to hit her mother for cash. [Ibid.] 73: He pure resents being hit for info [...] about claim procedures.
1995		C. Hiaasen Stormy Weather 139: Your crew of gypsy fakers hit my wife for seven grand.
2000		Indep. Rev. 13 Jan. 1: I thought, here we go, they’re going to hit me for quarter of a million or something.
2013		D. Whish-Wilson Zero at the Bone [ebook] Swann had hit Dickson for a job as soon as he’d resigned his commission.

2. (US) to travel towards, to leave for.

1908		L.W. Payne Jr ‘Word-List From East Alabama’ in DN III:v 320: hit, v. [...] 2. To go, travel. ‘I must hit it for home.’.
1917		Boy’s Own Paper XL:3 148: Tomorrow we’ll hit for Ten Bow.
1921		‘Max Brand’ Seventh Man 176: He’ll hit for the tall pines.
1937		‘Boxcar Bertha’ Sister of the Road (1975) 40: They were hitting for a town where the one in the trousers had an aunt.
1940		W.R. Burnett High Sierra in Four Novels (1984) 320: You could hit for the High Sierras if things got hot.
1950		‘Hal Ellson’ Tomboy (1952) 168: I’d like to hit for the pool but I feel too lazy.
1957		M. Shulman Rally Round the Flag, Boys! (1959) 152: How about hittin’ for New York State?

3. to purchase, esp. drugs.

1953		‘William Lee’ Junkie (1966) 22: Roy sent me to see a doctor [...] to hit him for a morphine prescription.
1971		D. Goines Dopefiend (1991) 156: Just so you can hit for some stuff.

4. to cost.

2000

P. Beatty Tuff 218: How much them things hit you for anyway?