Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(a) (Aus./Can.) the cheapest red wine, methyl alcohol.

1900		Cornhill Mag. June 778: His capital consisted of a yoke of oxen, a waggon, six four-gallon kegs of pink-eye and a Winchester rifle .
1941		K.S. Prichard ‘Marlene’ in Mann Coast to Coast 25: If the trooper comes round somebody’ll be getting into trouble for selling Charley pinkeye again.
1964		B. Hesling Dinkumization or Depommification 239: Two Abos wandered in – they wanted a drink. [...] The glasses were big ones, the liquid dark like blood. I was curious to know what sot of pink-eye an Abo would knock back.
1977		J. Doughty Gold in Blood 251: Like a lot of bloody niggers on pink-eye.

(b) (Aus.) a regular drinker of methylated spirits or ‘pinkie’.

1941

Baker Popular Dict. Aus. Sl. 54: Pink-eye, [...] an addict of the noxious drink called ‘pinky’, the constituents of which are either red wine and methylated spirits or methylated spirits and Condy’s crystals.

(c) (Aus./Can.) a drinking bout, a party; thus go pink-eye v., to get drunk.

[1919		Smith’s Wkly 10 May 11/2: Pearlers crowd away for a holiday — known as a ‘pink-eye’ in nor-west slang — in the off-season, when the boats cannot operate].
1929		K.S. Prichard Coonardoo 34: The white people feasted, and sang and went mad with the whisky they drank at this time. It was Christmas they called their pink-eye. [Ibid.] 300: That’s the worst of abos [...] They’ve got to go bush or pink-eye every now and then.
1955		F.B. Vickers Mirage (1958) 247: He reckoned we’d been havin’ a pink-eye—layin’ up on the grog.
1968		D. O’Grady A Bottle of Sandwiches 35: We fellas been on pink-eye, boss.

(d) (US) cheap, ‘rotgut’ bourbon.

1941

E.T. Seton Trail of an Artist Naturalist 365: After a coupla mugs of pinkeye, nothin’ would suit him but he wants to play the game [DA].