Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. used in the British Army to denote a private soldier’s account-book.

1835		Naval & Military Gaz. 15 Aug. 10/3: The soldiers’ small account-books (which they call their ‘Tommy Atkins’) [...] contain [...] extracts from the Articles of War.
1898		Harrisburgh Teleg. (PA) 31 Aug. 4/5: ‘Tommy Atkins’ [...] I never heard the account book called by any other name.
1909		Yorkville Enquirier (York, SC) 26 Mar. 4/2: The account book or soldiers’ pocket ledger was generally know [as] a ‘Tommy Atkins’.
1915		Reading Obs. 12 June 7/6: He started a book in which he entered and balanced his accounts monthly [...] a ‘Tommy Atkins’.

2. a generic for a typical private soldier in the British army.

1857		H. Tytler in Sattin Memoirs of Harriet Tytler 1828-1858 (1986) 144: A poor little man, a Mohammedan baker [...] dangling from the branch of an acacia tree. From what we could gather, this poor man had been late for several days with his bread for the men’s breakfast, so Tommie Atkins threatened to hang him if it happened again and so they did.
1866		Belfast News Letter 22 Nov. 4/3: The Ten Years Act was [...] unjust to the soldier. Whenever Tommy Atkins gets into trouble, he says, ‘As soon as the ten years are up, I’ll be off’.
1874		Dly News (London) 20 July 5/2: Tommy Atkins, of the Guards, takes off his tunic with the Crimean medals on it.
1884		Sporting Times 20 Sept. 1/5: Tommy Atkins had got into a carriage with some Baboos.
1888		Kipling ‘The Madness of Private Ortheris’ in Plain Tales from the Hills (1890) 265: I’m a Tommy — a bloomin’, eight-anna, dog-stealin’ Tommy, with a number instead of a decent name. [Ibid.] 273: I [...] thought a good deal over Ortheris in particular, and my friend private Thomas Atkins whom I love, in general.
1888–94		‘Walter’ My Secret Life (1966) X 2042: Tommy’s women are medically well cared for.
1889		B. Mitford Fire Trumpet II 283: I suspect he’s drawn a bead with effect many a time on poor Tommy Atkins.
1890		Kipling ‘In the Matter of a Private’ in Soldiers Three (1907) 77: Nobody understands Thomas except Thomas, and he does not always know what is the matter with himself.
1891		F. Remington letter 2 Nov. in Splete Sel. Letters (1988) 124: I like Tommy Atkins but he won’t be in it.
1892		Kipling ‘Tommy’ in Barrack-Room Ballads (1893) 146: Oh it’s Tommy this, an’ Tommy that, an’ ‘Tommy, go away’; / But it’s ‘Thank you, Mister Atkins,’ when the band begins to play.
1894		Truth (Sydney) 14 Oct. 1/7: In Plymouth (England) a private soldier is not allowed to walk in the streets with a lady on his arm. Fact! Happy Tommy Atkins, how his country loves him.
1894		J. Astley Fifty Years (2nd edn) I 51: Tommy Atkins nowadays wastes a terrible sight of cartridges.
1896		Regiment 9 May 86/1: [I]t is possible to [...] help Thomas Atkins to get a crust when he shall have cast off the mantle of soldiering.
1896		Regiment 22 Aug. 320/1: [headline] ‘t.a.’ on the grumble [...] The charge for grocery rations (i.e., potatoes, tea, etc.) to ‘T. A.’ is a good grumble, and one which, if removed, would be hailed with delight. ‘T.A.’ is promised a certain amount but never gets it.
1900		Bulletin (Sydney) 10 Mar. 3/1: The origin of the term ‘Tommy Atkins’ for the British army ‘private’:– ‘In the small book in which his accounts are kept, his clothing entered, his next of kin, and so on, there is a special page to show how the accounts are to be entered, and Tommy Atkins is the mythical soldier whose signature is given. For a time this was changed to Edward Fitzgerald, or some similar high-sounding name, but the service laughed so much and scoffed so at the name that Thomas Atkins has resumed his place in the books.’ Previous to the Kipling era the term was little known outside the service, and the men – Scotch, Irish, and Welsh, as well as the distinctly nominal English – bandied it in its business sense.
1900		Punch 24 Jan. 64/1: While we proudly tell of TOMMY’S pluck, / And of JACK the handy man of war, / Of Cornstalk ready, and keen Canuck.
1900		E.W. Rogers [perf. Marie Lloyd] The Red and The White and The Blue 🎵 And they catch a glimpse of colour through the kitchen window-pane, / Of their girl with Jack and Tommy, then they say, We'll call again.
1901		Sydney Sportsman (Surry Hills, NSW) 16 Jan. 2/5: A girl and a beer are what Tommy lives for.
1902		J.H.M. Abbott Tommy Cornstalk 10: When he mets Tommy Atkins he wins this gentleman’s admiration.
1903		A. Binstead Pitcher in Paradise 194: A Tommy in a tin hat as I squared with a couple o’ blow told me.
1905		Bush Advocate (Hawke’s Bay, N.Z.) 6 Oct. 3/3: ‘I say, can you fellows shoot?’ inquired the Yank of Tommy Atkins.
1907		Stevens & Francis [perf. George D’Albert] ‘Consolations’ 🎵 [T]here’s brave Tommy Atkins, who’s fought upon the battle-field.
1915		‘Ian Hay’ First Hundred Thousand (1918) 44: It is wonderful what Thomas can lose when he sets his mind to it. [Ibid.] The protective commotion with which we surround that shrinking sensitive plant, Mr. Thomas Atkins.
1916		Wipers Times 20 Mar. (2006) 46: For Sale. The Salient Estate [...] Apply for particulars, etc., to Thomas, Atkins, Sapper & Co.
1916		‘Anzac’ On the Anzac Trail 17: Tommy Atkins can fight; we admit it, and we take off our hats to him.
1917		A.G. Empey Over the Top Intro. v: To me, Tommy Atkins has proved himself to be the best of mates.
1918		L.N. Smith Lingo of No Man’s Land 87: TOMMY ATKINS The most common name for the British soldier.
1919		‘Sapper’ Mufti 24: They are heroes, those Tommies; they are undaunted, but it’s because they’ve got to be.
1920		‘Sapper’ Bulldog Drummond 173: He had fought in the brigade next to them [...] in July ’16 — and he had liked them — those mad Tommies.
1929		J.B. Booth London Town 106: Youthful Tommy Atkins.
1933		E. Mordaunt Mrs. Van Kleek (1949) 194: An English Tommy on duty.
1943		M. Harrison Reported Safe Arrival 99: Who was he but Tommy Atkins at Waterloo, at Rorke’s Drift, at Loos, at Dunkirk?
1944		L. Glassop We Were the Rats 136: The Sixth Division, the Kiwis and thousands of Tommies had gone to the rescue of gallant Greece.
1953		H. Tracy Mind You, I’ve Said Nothing (1961) 130: One has only to look round and see what plums have gone to men with nothing more glorious to their names than the shooting of a Tommy on a dark night.
1966		C. Stead Cotters’ England (1980) 47: A fine looking lad, the Tommy Atkins of me heart.
1973		‘P. Alding’ Field of Fire 60: The only foreigner is the bloke what was chatting up the Toms.
1977		(con. 1941) R. Beilby Gunner 48: Driving off with the British Tommy’s usual injunction to ‘give ’em fook, Aussie.’.
1987		(con. 1930s) L. Redmond Emerald Square 283: The Tommies jumped out of the hedge and caught the lot of us.
1999		Indep. Rev. 28 June 1: The Anglo-Indians were people with loose and lecherous ways [...] whose girls went out with Tommies to dances and God knows what.
2008		‘Yesterday in Parlt.’ BBC Radio 4 [headline] It’s Tommy this and Tommy that – our troops in Afghanistan.
2024		J. Meades Empty Wigs (t/s) 247: He was going to track down the tommies who had carried out this most graceless of burials.

3. attrib. use of sense 1.

1920		Bulletin 9 Feb. (Sydney) 19 Feb. 15/3: A fussy little Tommy major.
1921		(con. WWI) E. Lynch Somme Mud 129: Dark and Snow [...] bribe the tommy engine-drivers to give them a bag or two of coal.
1932		(con. WWI) L. Mann Flesh in Armour 149: The machinations of Tommy brass-hats.

4. an Englishman.

1989

P. Manning ‘Sl.’ in Kray (1989) 62: The English are the Tommies, the Germans are the Hun, / So slang is a language to speak, you know, because it’s a lot of fun.