Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. foolish, stupid.

c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Bullet-headed, a dull silly Fellow.
1770		Foote Lame Lover in Coll. Farces & Entertainment VI (1788) 10: We were plagued the whole season by a bullet-headed Swiss from [...] Bern.
1827		Hamel, Obeah Man I 238: I am defied by a bullet-headed, woolly-headed, ram-headed, old Negro.
1837		‘The Devil & Johnny Dixon’ in Bentley’s Misc. Mar. 252: A soft-looking, bullet-headed farmer.
1842		W.H. Maxwell Rambling Recollections of a Soldier of Fortune 292: He was an under-sized, bullet-headed, beetle-browed savage.
1853		S. Northup Twelve Years A Slave 87: She was a beauty — a picture — a doll [...] None of your thick-lipped, bullet-headed, cotton-picking niggers.
1867		E.B. Christy Box And Cox in Darkey Drama 6 8: Yes, you bullet-head wench, whose room am dis?
1875		F.H. Sheppard Love Afloat 209: The bullet-headed, dark-woolled youth of African descent who was his body-servant, appeared [...] bearing a cup of ‘Navy mud,’ alias coffee.
1889		B. Mitford Fire Trumpet I 152: She rather hates the bullet-headed fool.
1900		Bulletin (Sydney) 23 June 31/1: ‘Ye shudn’t resoide too far away from Woolloomooloo, and yure bullit-headid gomeril av a son wud make a first-class chucker-out at the low pub. Ye’d keep where the poor people ’d be hocussed – git out o’ me road, ye blashted mongril!’ [Kicks the dog and exit.].
1908		Hopper & Bechdolt ‘9009’ (1909) 75: The bullet-headed burglar.
1919		Marvel 3 Mar. 7: Only bullet-headed asses fight.
1936		(con. 1830s–60s) ‘Miles Franklin’ All That Swagger 293: Bullet-headed varlets, with all their power in their thighs, pedalled like demons.
1949		R. Park Poor Man’s Orange 118: How would I know that some bullet-headed calonkus would leave a chair on the stairs?
1957		D. Niland Call Me When the Cross Turns Over (1958) 225: While I’m slogging away like an alec at Yampi she’d bedded down with a bullet-headed by-blow.
1964		T. Ronan Packhorse and Pearling Boat 106: Dad [...] entered into close confabulation with a bullet-headed bearded character in a flannel shirt.

2. (US) stubborn.

1884		Ft Worth Daily Gaz. (TX) 25 Apr. 5/4: Bob was as meek looking as a sheared sheep, and as bullet-headed as a political opponent.
1899		United Opinion (Bradford, VT) 21 July 4/1: ‘Bullet-headed Aisiatic ruffians’ is the polite way Gen. Funston refers to the members of the Filpino army.
1909		Ocala Eve. Star (FL) 28 Aug. 3/4: The negro is a short, plump, round-faced, bullet-headed cuss.