Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a Bolshevik.

1918		Eve. Public Ledger (Philadelphia, PA) 19 Sept. 17/1: [cartoon captionb] ‘Job for Bolshevik’ — Fritz (with loot) — Why don’t you go and push them out, Bolshy?
1919		Yorks Eve. Post 8 Oct. 4/6: Father: Aren’t you going to wear the nice red tie your auntie gave you? Bobby: No [...] I’m not going to have all the boys calling me a ‘Bolshy’.
1919		C. Sandburg letter 14 Apr. in Mitgang (1968) 157: He considers the bolshies ‘economically impossible and morally wrong in social theory’.
1920		‘Sapper’ Bulldog Drummond 181: He’s in with the big financiers: and he’s using the tub-thumping Bolshies as tools.
1923		P. MacGill Moleskin Joe 188: The way some coves stuff their bellies and the way others haven’t a bite. It’s enough to make a man a Bolshy.
1934		S. Beckett More Pricks than Kicks 91: He called me a bloody Bolshy.
1937		R. Westerby Wide Boys Never Work (1938) 11: What the hell are you wearing a red tie for? [...] You’re no bloody Bolshie.
1940		N. Mitford Pigeon Pie 57: Aristocrats are inclined to prefer Nazis while Jews prefer Bolshies.
1950		(con. 1936–46) K.S. Prichard Winged Seeds (1984) 245: We’ve got to line up with the Bolshies, if we get into this war.
1965		L. Haylen Big Red 3: They laughed in front of him and called him an ‘old Bolshie’ behind his back.
1984		(con. WW2) T. Jones Heart of Oak [ebook] Shit in it, you bloody Bolshie.

2. in weak use of sense 1, a left-winger, a socialist.

1923		Kipling ‘The Janeites’ in Debits and Credits (1926) 158: One o’ them blue-bellied Bolshies of postwar Police (neglectin’ point-duty, as usual) asked us to flirt a little quieter.
1930		Aberdeen Jrnl 29 Nov. 7/3: The men’s complainmts were discussed [...] ‘We hiv a genuine kick. It’s nae a case o’ Bolshies at work or onything like that,’ a spokesman declared.
1937		Jennings & Madge May the Twelfth: Mass-Observation Day-Surveys 3:58: He remarked that of course there would always be a few ‘of that sort’ but that they had more or less weeded them out and that now there wasn’t ‘one bolshie’ amongst them.
1947		J. Maclaren-Ross Of Love And Hunger 117: I’m not a bolshy.
1956		J. Curtis Look Long Upon a Monkey 145: No sense stopping here and being insulted by disloyal, un-English, sentimental Bolshies.
1973		B.S. Johnson All Bull 122: You’re not a Bolshie, are you?

3. an unconventional person (judged by a conservative), an opponent of the status quo.

1927		(con. 1925) ‘J.H. Ross’ Mint (1955) 193: Against these few bolshies [i.e. ‘complainants’], the fellows of my kidney would struggle fiercely, preaching submission.
1958		H.E. Bates Darling Buds of May (1985) 52: That Bolshie Fortescue had a God-awful row with the committee Friday.
1972		P. Fordham Inside the Und. 155: A sour ‘bolshie’, intent only upon bringing down the ‘Men from the Ministry’ in flames.