Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. the removal of one’s household goods, and with them oneself, late at night in order to escape paying one’s rent; usu. as do a (moonlight) flit v.

1848		Exeter & Plymouth Gaz. 1 July 7/3: Taking a Moonlight Flit John May was summoned [...] for clandestinely removing goods to prevent a distress for rent.
1861		C. Reade Cloister and Hearth (1920) 347: She and her father had made a moonlight flit on’t this day sennight, and that some thought the devil had flown away with them.
1879		Sunderland Dly Echo 22 Oct. 2/6: A tenant who had been guilty of having perpetrated what is popularly known as a ‘moonlight flit’ has been sentenced.
1883		Bristol Magpie 5 Apr.7/2: He couldn’t pay his rent and so— / He did a ‘moonlight flit’’.
1891		Grantham Jrnl 24 Jan. 6/5: Mr Roberts had since discovered that a ‘moonlight flit’ had taken place.
1892		Cassell’s Sat. Journal 28 Sept. 26/3: He had done what is known in Lancashire as a moonleet flit, or, in other words, removed quietly in the dead of night, that nobody knew where he had gone [F&H].
1895		C. Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 50: Moonlight Flit, to clear out, to remove furniture by night.
1900		Bulletin (Sydney) 6 Jan. 24/1: At a recent up-country meeting a certain owner went nap on his nag, and made all preparations for a midnight flit from the hotel where he was staying if the good thing did not come off.
1901		B. Pain De Omnibus 36: When a pore man’s goin’ ter do a moonlight flit ’e don’t do it in broad dyelight.
1908		Sun. Times (Perth) 13 Sept. 4/8: A cuppl of barmaids wot ’ad flattened a lizard out for e’es brass an’ done a moonlight.
1911		A. Bennett Card (1974) 71: She had meant to do what is called in the Five Towns ‘a moonlight flit’.
1920		G. Townshend Widening Circle 82: ‘Wonder how long we shall be at the Metropole Hotel?’ she said, ‘whether we shall have to do a moonlight flit.’.
1926		Breton & Bevir Adventures of Mrs. May 51: D’you think we’re a couple of birds goin’ to do a flit and take yer ’ouse with us as we fly away?
1937		W. Lewis Blasting and Bombarding 215: In the end, I had to do a moonlight flit — flitting with Miss Sitwell’s portrait down the Mews at the dead of nigh.
1941		H. Brearley Knotted String 46: The flight of the children of Israel from Egypt was described, by a scholar, as the first moonlight flit on record.
1953		D. Cusack Caddie 199: Why, yer ain’t goin’ ter do a moonlight flit, are you?
1957		G. Kersh Fowlers End (2001) 211–2: Half-way there I met Copper Baldwin, who asked: ‘Shooting the moon, cocko? Doing a flit?’.
1961		B. Crump Hang On a Minute, Mate (1963) 191: I decided the only way out of it was to do a moonlight on him.
1967		F.J. Hardy in Great Aus. Lover Stories 71: Let us do a moonlight flit.
1968		J. Alard He who Shoots Last 88: We would all have to do a moonlight flitter out of the hotel.
1970		A. Sillitoe Start in Life (1979) 10: Someone had done a moonlight flit to Birmingham.
1973		T. Lewis Billy Rags [ebook] [H]e thought I might screw up anything for him by doing a fast moonlight.
1977		(con. 1962) J. Rosenthal Spend, Spend, Spend Scene 51: We did a moonlight flit.
1989		J. Hibberd Memoirs of an Old Bastard 61: He apologized for doing a moonlight flit.
1999		Indep. 17 July 12: He was forced to do a moonlight flit [...] after he was tipped off that the IRA planned to kidnap and ransom him for the stashed profits of his drug dealing.
2005		B. Hare Urban Grimshaw 40: You might have to do a moonlight flit at a moment’s notice.

2. any form of surreptitious escape.

1864		Stamford Mercury 1 Apr. 6/3: The War in New Zealand. The Maoris were very glad to make a moonlight flit of it, without losing a man.
1898		Nat. Trib. (DC) 24 Nov. 1/7: [of an escape from Cuba] I suspected the poor devil would have been given a chance to take a moonlight flit long ago.
2010		K. Richards Life 220: The great moonlight flit from Marrakech to Tangier was in motion.
2013		K. Sampson Killing Pool 238: Campion [...] did a moonlight flit, never to be seen again on the shores of the River Mersey.