Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (boxing) a heavy blow.

1824		Pierce Egan’s Life in London 28 Nov. 352/3: [H]e met with a stopper that would have spoilt the upper works of the best Chancery Lawyer in the kingdom.
1827		Egan Anecdotes of the Turf, the Chase etc. 272: Savage [...] met with a stopper in the middle of his nob.
1834		(con. 1737–9) W.H. Ainsworth Rookwood (1857) 258: Vile Jem, with neat left-handed stopper, / Straight threatened Tommy with a topper.

2. anything that causes events to come to a halt; esp. as put a/the stopper on/put on stoppers v., to bring to a halt (cite 1829 refers to stopping talking).

1821–6		‘Bill Truck’ Man o’ War’s Man (1843) 135: Will you clap a stopper on that old muzzle of yours.
1829		Pierce Egan’s Wkly Courier 22 Mar. 4/1: ‘Let’s do the thing rummy; put on the stoppers — give your red rags a holiday’.
1830		J.B. Skillman N.Y. Police Reports 31: Jonathan would remind one of the Marshal Turenne. Turenne stopped Condé — Jonathan put a stopper on Pat.
1831		Navy at Home II 75: Mr Shroud put a stopper on some of their wants, declaring he would give no leave to any of them until the masts were got in.
1832		Egan Bk of Sports 25: Perkins endeavoured to plant a rum one, but the stopper was put on. [Ibid.] 297: He did not possess the authority to put on the stopper ! in the calf country.
1842		Whip & Satirist of NY & Brooklyn (NY) 8 Jan. n.p.: [H]e met with a stopper on his konk.
1849		Thackeray Pendennis I 305: The Docthor would have liked a turn, for he says it’s such easy writing [...] but the governor put a stopper on him.
1854		‘Cuthbert Bede’ Adventures of Mr Verdant Green (1982) II 198: His beastly hammering used, of course, to put a stopper on my going to sleep again.
1865		Leaves from Diary of Celebrated Burglar 57/2: Black Charley had the misfortune to break the bridge of his fiddle. This put a stopper on the shin-dig.
1876		G. Lander Little Gerty I i: If you don’t leave off ill-treating this poor child, I’ll have you put before a magistrate, and see if he can’t put a stopper on you.
1881		Nottingham Eve. Post 28 Jan. 4/5: The Mendicity blokes [...] has put the stopper on anybody doing much with a ‘stiff’ in London.
1882		Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 21 Oct. 10/2: A stopper was put upon our operation in the French capital, it being unlawful for any one, save a regular medical practitioner, to sell medicines.
1890		Sporting Times 18 Jan. 1: Portugal is, of course, a little twopenny-halfpenny fool of a place that we once had to look after so as to put the stopper on Boney.
1897		Worker (Brisbane) 4 Sept. 8/4: But when he puts the ‘stopper’ on, because he finds he's broke, / He swears that he was ‘raddled’ by that shanty-keeper ‘bloke’.
1903		Truth (Sydney) 23 Aug. 3/3: For I sees as how such business / Puts a stopper on my game.
1905		Sporting Times 11 Mar. 2/5: All would have been well had not, during the lunch interval, black clouds come gathering from the eastward, followed by a drenching downpour and a cutting wind, that fairly put a stopper on any outdoor fun.
1910		‘Doss Chiderdoss’ ‘Scandal and the Weather’ Sporting Times 16 July 1/4: [It] helped beyond a doubt / On our pleasant afternoon to put a stopper.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 144: Polygamy. His wife will put the stopper on that.
1947		J. Maclaren-Ross Of Love And Hunger 131: I thought that’d put the stopper on his trying anything with me.
1960		Wodehouse Jeeves in the Offing 82: That would rather put a stopper on keeping the human race going.
1971		T. Lewis Plender [ebook] The sex act itself was the final necessary stopper to an ever increasing bag of tricks.
1975		L. Rosten Dear ‘Herm’ 135: This is a real stopper, kids, so brace yourselfs.
1989		J. Morton Lowspeak 134: Stoppers – to be forbidden [...] as in ‘The missus has put me on stoppers’.

3. the penis.

c.1850

Peeping Tom (London) 9 32: [cartoon caption] Lady’s Maid. ‘Oh! Master Charles, if Missis comes I shall be ruined.’ Charles. ‘Never mind, my dear, I’ll put a stopper to that’.

4. (UK Und.) a policeman.

1869

J. Greenwood Seven Curses of London 91: And when I get out into the street, how long am I safe? Why, only for the straight length of that street, as far as I can see the coast clear. I may find a stopper at any turning, or at any corner.

5. the last drink of a session.

1891

Sporting Times 17 Jan. 7/2: Having disptached this [i.e. ‘half a gallon of good Bureton ale’] he called for a bumper of brown brandy as a ‘stopper over all’.