Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a dark lantern.

1772		Public Advertiser 1 Dec. 2/1: It was what the neighbourhood of St Giles’s called Cut-throat Lanterns, which keep the Bearers in the Shade when the Beam is turned, with all its Strength, on the destined Prey.
1937–84		Partridge DSUE (1984) 283/2: ca. 1770–1840.

2. a butcher, a slaughterer.

1857		‘Ducange Anglicus’ Vulgar Tongue.
1860		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc.
1864, 1867, 1870		Hotten Sl. Dict.
1873		Sl. Dict.
1895		Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 22: Cut Throat, a butcher.

3. (US black) a tough, aggressive or frightening black man.

1860		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc.
1864, 1867, 1870		Hotten Sl. Dict.
1873		Sl. Dict.
1977		E. Torres Q&A 117: My first night on post on 111th Street and Madison, I told all the cutthroats there [...] ‘[W]hen I’m on the post, the baddest mother fucker here is me’.
1980		E. Folb Runnin’ Down Some Lines 45: Cutthroat [...] suggest[s] that, like a mad dog, such a person is potentially out of control.

4. (US) a stand-up collar.

1854		G.H. Haydon Aus. Emigrant 178: That confounded swallow-tail and cut-throat collar were sufficient to alloy felicity even greater than mine.
1858		Punch’s pocket-Bk 148: Anon a West-end Swell, in brave attire, / Wide peg-top trousers, many eye-holed boots, / Acut-throat collar, and loose-sleeved coat .
1858		N.Y. Musical Rev. 9 133/2: He’s got a mustash, and a stiff back, and a cut-throat collar.
1870		Perrysburg Jrnl (OH) 6 May 4/1: The narrow standing collar which was at one time fashionable was called ‘cut-throat’.
1888		C.K. Sharpe Letters 1 525: London, where nobody goes to bed without a patent maul-proof nightcap and anti-cut-throat collar.
1901		H.A. Vachell Life & Sport on Pacific Slope 155: Here the women wear the plainest clothes, while the male gladly lays aside his cut-throat collar and assumes instead the soft and becoming stock.

5. an open-bladed, non-safety razor.

1938		G. Kersh Night and the City 270: That big nigger’s after you, with a bloody cut-throat as long as me arm.
1984		Partridge DSUE (8th edn) 283/2: late C.19–20.