Green’s Dictionary of Slang

the West End of London, as seen either from the East End or from the further western or suburban areas.

1885		F. Gilbert ‘I’m the Fellow that Tells the Truth’ 🎵 When I wander up West ’mong people well dressed, / My wrath quickly opens its vials, / For they don’t give a thought to [...] the people who starve on the Dials.
1898		F.W. Hume Hagar of the Pawn-Shop 61: Let me know when you want me up West.
1899		Sketch (London) 22 Feb. 18: ‘I was over West, in a theayter crowd, but there wos two peelers onter me’.
1902		Western Times 7 Feb. 3/4: Thats wot comes of it! — a stayin’ out a-gallivantin’ West.
1905		Illus. Police News 30 Dec. 6/4: I find that the ladies up West / Are quite unaccountably kind.
1937		R. Westerby Wide Boys Never Work (1938) 196: If he had the money now he would go up West for a drink.
1956		‘Charles Raven’ Und. Nights 87: A model husband, he kept out of spielers, never went up west except for business.
1959		B. Naughton ‘The Little Welsh Girl’ in Late Night on Watling Street (1969) 143: We did see her again, about two years later, over the West. In that street that leads off Piccadilly to the Regent Palace.
1963		B. Naughton Alfie II ii: lacey: Old Benny said he’d seen you working the smudge over the West. alfie: Yeh — in the ’Aymarket.
1970		A. Sillitoe Start in Life (1979) 208: Wandered [...] around Victoria Station for a couple of hours, then walked up West.
1981		(con. c.1900s) A. Harding in Samuel East End Und. 110: There were two kinds of girl. Those who went up West, mixed with the toffs.
1997		D. Farson Never a Normal Man 266: East Enders [...] felt ill at ease if they ventured ‘up West.’.
2005		(con. late 1960s) Guardian Weekend 2 Apr. 25: It’s the first time I ever recall going ‘up west.’.