Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(a) an act of sexual intercourse.

1697

Art of Cuckoldom in Mish Restoration Prose Fiction (1970) 190: Strephon has opened the Blooming-Rose, done his aged Rival that Favour, that the Bridal Night Drudgery is not like to be too hard a tug for his Fifty eight.

(b) (Irish) the breaking out of someone from prison.

1965

(con. 1940s) B. Behan Confessions 93: The thoughts of visiting England [...] to give a fellow what we call in I.R.A. slang a tug, a pull out.

(c) an arrest.

1988		A. Payne ‘The Last Video Show’ in Minder [TV script] 31: Why don’t we give him a tug, guv? We could take him down the nick and strip-search him.
1990		J. Healy Streets Above Us (1991) 30: ‘Even out the weight, Jack, ‘fore you get a tug.’ (Tug is slang for pull, like in arrest, by over-zealous Transport Police).
2004		N. ‘Razor’ Smith A Few Kind Words and a Loaded Gun 13: We could ill afford a tug for tax [car tax] when we were tooled up.
2007		N. ‘Razor’ Smith Raiders 65: Maybe Ronnie could have gone through his whole life as a working robber and never got a tug from Old Bill or a long stretch of porridge.

(d) the act of picking up, meeting, introducing oneself.

1970

G.F. Newman Sir, You Bastard 186: I could probably have given her a tug.

(e) a warning.

1975

Bulletin (Sydney) 26 Apr. 44: You’d think th’ lousy scum would give a battler a go, wouldn’t you? I should’ve jerried when the guy gave me the tug.

(f) an act of masturbation; also as used in phrs. below.

1991		R.G. Barratt ‘I’m Pulling for Ya, Pee Wee’ in What Do You Reckon (1997) [ebook] Pee Wee’s tug in the South Trail Adult Theatre, 6700 Block Street, made headlines.
2005		L. Redhead Rubdown [ebook] What about massage, then? [...] all you gott to do is a bit of a rub, a bit of a tug. Hand shandy.
2012		M. McBride Frank Sinatra in a Blender [ebook] He’d break out the Peruvian nasal therapy and he was guaranteed a blow job. Or at least a quick tug.
2015		I. Welsh Decent Ride 46: If ma wee boaby felly gits hard ah jist gie it a sly wee tug till the funny stuff aw spurts oot.

(a) (Aus.) a racecourse tipster, presumed to be fraudulent.

1901		Sydney Sportsman (Surry Hills, NSW) 27 Feb. 1/1: The red-raw rascality practised [...] by their tale-tellers, tip-slingers and tugs.
1903		Sun. Times (Perth) 9 Aug. 4/8: And the welshers and the whisperers, the tic-tacs and the tugs.
1907		Sun. Times (Perth) 11 Aug. 4s/8: The tipster, tug and tattler / [...] / Damning and blasting Creation’s eyes / Are the Mob who Maced the Rattler.
1911		Truth (Brisbane) 22 Jan. 6/5: [headline] Tugs, Tattlers, and Take-downs / Growling Grab-alls, and the Multitudinous Mug.
1914		Sport (Adelaide) 30 Oct. 5/1: [of a man who makes introductions] Maurice K. is a good tug for the middies.

(b) a confidence trickster.

1906		E. Dyson Fact’ry ’Ands 104: Take everythin’ I’ve got. Take ther earth. You’re ther king tug.
1924		G.H. Lawson Dict. of Aus. Words And Terms 🌐 TUG — A rogue.

(c) a gullible fool.

1897		W.T. Goodge ‘Great Aus. Slanguage’ in Baker Aus. Lang. (1945) 117: And a sharper is a spieler, / And a simpleton’s a tug.
1904		Sun. Times (Perth) 17 Jan. 1/1: He is now confronting a large book deficit until his tug returns, and (perhaps) pays.
1906		Sun. Times (Perth) 26 Aug. 1/1: A wobblesome goldfields Labor M.P. has tracked down a new tug [and] a Nor’-West numbskull is allowed to shout for the man who shows him the ropes.

(d) (chiefly Aus.) a dirty, uncouth, repellent person [? generalized use of Etonian public school jargon tug, a scholar, a clever person, a (too) hard worker; itself abbr. SE tug-mutton, a ref. to their meals (E.S. Mott in A Mingled Yarn suggests tug as SE tough) but ? also to masturbation. Such figures are disdained by their aristocratic peers].

[1866		Letters by an Odd Boy 74: Then we all rode in the family coach, and Len told the story of Timothy Tugmutton].
1895		Coburg Leader (Vic.) 17 Aug. 1/6: The Duchless has given up parties as too many tugs go.
1901		Bulletin (Sydney) 20 July 14/4: THEY ALWAYS DO. // Mug: ‘How did you get on over that last race?’ / Tug: ‘Oh, lost, as usual.’.
1909		Sun. Times (Perth) 26 Dec. 1s/1: Perth is rapidly filling up with tugs, mugs and thugs.
1914		C.J. Dennis ‘The Play’ in Bulletin (Sydney) 16 July 47/1: A tug named Tyball (cousin to the skirt) / Sprags ’em an’ makes a start to sling off dirt.
1924		(con. WWI) A.G. Pretty Gloss. Sl. [...] in the A.I.F. 1921–1924 (rev. t/s) n.p.: tug. A rude or disorderly person.

(e) a card-sharp [? they tug cards from the bottom of the pack].

1999

G. Seal Lingo 147: a tug was a con man prepared to be violent and a welsher was one who took bets without any hope of covering them – then made himself scarce.