Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (Aus.) a newly arrived British immigrant.

1862		C. Stretton Memoirs II 40: Twig that new chum; he’s a real pea-souper [AND].
1906		E. Dyson In Roaring Fifties 66: ‘Pea-souper!’ trumpeted a horseman through his hands. There were sarcastic references to ‘lime juice.’ [Ibid.] 68: They’ve been hazing you properly, mate. Pea-soupers and lime juicers are strangers off shipboard.

2. (also peasoup) a very dense fog; also attrib. [orig. the pollution-based London fogs, but since the Clean Air legislation of 1950s, any exceptionally impenetrable fog].

[1837		W. Kidd London and all its Miseries 33: A London fog is like pea-soup].
1849		Melville Journal of Visit to London and Continent 24 Nov. (1949) 41: Upon sallying out this morning encountered the oldfashioned pea soup London fog – of a gamboge color.
[1852		F.E. Smedley Lewis Arundel 466: Country air suits you better than the pea-soup-coloured atmosphere of London].
1884		W.C. Russell Jack’s Courtship II 311: What! a pea-soup within a stone’s throw of the equator!
1887		South Aus. Advertiser 8 Jan. 4/7: A month or two ago London experienced a succession of ‘pea-soup fog’ days .
1890		J. Payn Notes from ‘News’ 8: The fogs we have had this year have been made too much of [...] You could see something in them if you looked long enough, which is not the case of a genuine Peasouper.
1903		A. Binstead Pitcher in Paradise 155: Dodging the chilly blasts and peasoup skies of January in southern climes.
1907		Daily Chronicle 30 Nov. 4/4: A country cousin who wishes to see and breathe and mingle in a metropolitan pea-souper .
1921		D.L. Sayers Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club (1977) 69: I can find one blindfold in a pea-souper with both hands tied behind me.
1930		(con. 1915) ‘W.W. Windstaff’ ‘A Flier’s War’ in Longstreet Canvas Falcons (1970) 270: The taxi went slowly along in a pea soup mist.
1937		X. Petulengro Britain Through Gipsy Eyes 30: In spite of the thick pea-soup fogs, I’ve covered quite a lot of ground.
1947		H. Brush 21 Jan. diary in Garfield Our Hidden Lives (2004) 340: The BBC news at one o’clock said there was a pea-soup fog in some parts of London.
1953		H. Kurtzman Inside Mad (2002) 160: Gad! ... even the boats are lost in this dratted pea-soup fog!
1953		P. Closterman (trans.) Big Show 89: We were about to leave for the orkneys. There was a regular pea-souper.
1955		R. Bissell High Water 92: I walked out in the pea soup.
1966		C. Stead Cotters’ England (1980) 36: Caroline laughed, ‘Then she would be handsomer in a peasouper.’.
1971		N. Armfelt Catching Up 124: If you prefer your London, go back and get lost in your peasoup fog.
1986		S. King It (1987) 739: Looks like a pea-souper to me, Watson, Ritchie thought, and for a moment he imagined himself as Sherlock Holmes.
1992		D. Jarman diary 9 Feb. Smiling in Slow Motion (2000) 79: When I was a kid it would have been a thick pea-souper from all the coal fires.
2008		London Lite 28 Jan. 5: Peasouper across the Capital.
2024		J. Meades Empty Wigs (t/s) 190: [N]inety. At which age no title, no thousand-hectare Berrichonne estate [...] can exempt us from the peasouper in the bonce.

3. (N.Z.) a teetotaller [? their preferred diet].

1893

H.C. Jacobson Tales of Banks Peninsula 246: The Chaplain said [to the Publican] ‘I’ll take a glass of water.’ ‘We don’t sell that here [...] and if you ever come in again don’t expect any bunting, because we don’t fly it for peasoupers.’ [DNZE].

4. see peasoup n.¹