Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(also she slavey, slavey donna, slavvy) a servant, usu. female; also attrib.

1789		G. Parker Life’s Painter 171: Moll slavey. A servant maid.
1812		Vaux Vocab. of the Flash Lang.
1821		Egan Life in London (1869) 213: I imposed myself upon him once as a Slavey.
1829		‘The great black fight at Bosreegaum’ in Oriental Sporting Mag. June 1828 to June 1833 (1873) I 121/1: The Mussaulchee was escorted by the cadgers, costermongers, prime slavey swells, and nothing-to-do lootchas of every sect in Camp.
1833		H. Smith Gale Middleton 1 148: I vas five yaers a butcher’s slavy, and learnt how to floor an ox.
1833		‘The Beak and Trap to Roost are Gone’ in Swell!!! or, Slap-Up Chaunter 48: Moll slavey — kids — all napping now.
1836–7		Dickens Pickwick Papers (1999) 617: Hearing you were here, from the slavey, [I] took a coach and came on.
1843		R.S. Surtees Handley Cross (1854) 111: ’Ow many slaveys does he keep? [...] cook-maids and such like h’animals.
1846		Swell’s Night Guide 71: A go of blue, which they copped on the cross of the slavey donna, while she touted the rum-cull nanty pipe’ums, cos her nibs was rank sweet on the shallow cove.
1852		Kendal Mercury 3 Apr. 6/2: Nor tell the old molls (the ladies); or she slavies (servant girls), vot he’s pannum struck (hungry).
1854		Thackeray Newcomes I 120: The slavey has Mr. Frederick’s hot water, and a bottle of soda water.
1865		H. Kingsley Hillyars and Burtons (1870) 198: The servant-of-all-work (‘slavey,’ as a snob would so suggestively have called her).
1879		‘Autobiog. of a Thief’ in Macmillan’s Mag. (London) XL 501: I had not been at Sutton very long before I piped a slavey (servant) come out of a chat (house).
1880		Bulletin (Sydney) 28 Aug. 12/1: A ‘slavey’ at the Thames Goldfields, N.Z., has been left a legacy of £3,000.
1882		A. Trumble Mysteries of N.Y. 25: I am not one of those who object to pretty ‘slaveys’.
1889		J.K. Jerome Three Men in a Boat 63: He might have been [...] irritating the dog, or flirting with the slavey, instead of sprawling there.
1891		G.R. Sims ‘The “Lancet”’ Dagonet Ditties 145: They were told that every morning when the slavey shook the mat / Germs of death were scattered broadcast.
1893		Civil & Milit. Gaz. (Lahore) 10 Mar. 4/2: ‘When you hear the salib’s “koi hal.” / To your master quickly fly. / For I’m the boss, you're the slavvy’.
1894		Truth (Sydney) 10 June 1/8: The slaveys there they had no right / To smear their bread when things were tight.
1896		Pink & LeBrunn [perf. Marie Lloyd] Chance Your Luck 🎵 You kiss her quick, then find out by and by / That the one who’s got the kisses is the slavey, not the missus.
1903		A. Binstead Pitcher in Paradise 73: The little country slavey led the unexpected visitors into the room.
1904		Sun. Times (Perth) 24 Jan. 1/1: The average slavey is also driving away boarders with ballds from her bingey.
1904		Sydney Sportsman (Surry Hills, NSW) 3 Feb. 2/4: Pollie Emery, the greatest little woman in slavey parts we ever had.
1910		Sun. Times (Perth) 22 May 2nd sect. 9/1: He there beheld his son and heir smoodging the slavey.
1912		H.G. van Campen ‘Our Theatrical Boarding House’ in L.A. Herald 26 Nov. 6/5: The Slavey—Will I feed Elmer the seal, mum? The Landlady—Oh, Heavings, Susy, wait’ll I git my thoughts together .
1914		Joyce ‘Two Gallants’ Dubliners (1956) 48: We went for a walk round by the canal, and she told me she was a slavey in a house in Baggot Street.
1914		S. Lewis Our Mr Wrenn (1936) 105: She [...] sent a slavey to make the fire.
1921		Truth (Brisbane) 13 Feb. 3/4: No English lady would call her servant ‘slavey’.
1922		B. Hecht A Thousand and One Afternoons [ebook] A slavey on her day off. There is no mistaking this. Nineteen or twenty years old, homely as a mud fence; ungraceful, doltish.
1925		L. Doyle Dear Ducks 76: I’m very well in with the slavey, an’ she’s on my side.
1928		H. Castling [perf. Lily Morris] ‘Because He Loves Me’ 🎵 I'm slavey at a small hotel they call the Traveller’s Rest.
1936		D. Stivens Tramp and Other Stories 71: Think I’m your slavey?
1942		G. Marx letter 12 Feb. in Groucho Letters (1967) 28: And what servant trouble we’re having! The local slaveys have all become privy (ah there, Mencken) to the fact that the defense industries offer much bigger salaries.
1953		L. Doyle Back to Ballygullion 192: She can act any part from a slavey to a near-lady, an’ maybe to a complete one.