Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a riotous hooligan, a roisterer; an outstanding performer [SE roar, to riot, to behave in a boisterous manner; Griffiths, Chronicles of Newgate (1884), quotes an indictment of 1311 and adds that: ‘The term “roarer” and “roaring boy”, signifying a riotous person, was in use in Shakespeare’s day, and still survives in slang.’].

1586		D. Rowland Lazarillo II (1672) R5: Canil was dressed like a Roarer [OED].
1608–10		Beaumont & Fletcher Philaster V iv: We are thy myrmidons, thy guard, thy roarers.
1617		Middleton & Rowley A Fair Quarrel V i: I am a youth, a gentleman, a roarer.
1629		R. Brome Northern Lasse V viii: I will change you most confus’d Roarer, into an accomplisht Knight.
1631		T. Heywood Faire Maid of the West Pt I II i: I am Roughman, The onely approved gallant of these parts, A man of whom the Roarers stand in awe.
1632		D. Lupton London and the Countrey Carbonadoed 67: Paris-Garden [...] the swaggering Roarer, the cunning Cheater, the rotten Bawd, the swearing Drunkard, and the bloudy Butcher haue their Rendeuouz here.
1640		The Wandering Jew 49: I am a man of the Sword; a Battoon Gallant, one of our Dammees, a bouncing Boy, a kicker of Bawdes, a tyrant over Puncks, a terrour to Fencers, a mewer of Playes, a jeerer of Poets, a gallon-pot-slinger; in rugged English, a Roarer.
1652		Jonson, Fletcher & Middleton Widdow I ii: Your Hospitall for your lame creeping Souldier, Your Baud for your mangled Rorer.
1671		‘Dialogue Concerning Hair’ in Ebsworth Westminster Drolleries (1875) 78: Ask me no more why Roarers wear Their hair extant below their ear.
1741		Scots Mag. 1 May 26/1: There are the Whinners [sic], the Groaners, the Sobbers and the Roarers .
1791		Scots Mag. 1 Jan. n.p.: The roarers rend the roof with loud applause [...] drinking won the cause.
1818		M.L. Weems Drunkard’s Looking Glass (1929) 77: May-be I an’t a Roarer!
1827		Mass. Spy 10 Jan. The Albany beau drinks brandy and talks politics, and is in fact what he styles himself, ‘a real roarer’.
1827		W.T. Moncrieff Bashful Man II iv: Why, because she’s a roarer (Aurora) So, ya, hip! then dash along.
1832		J.K. Paulding Westward Ho! II 97: I’ll be shot if he don’t talk more like common sense than many roarers I have heard make speeches in court.
1834		Nat. Standard of Lit. 11 Jan. 31/1: Here we have it, ‘on a large scale,’ — a roarer from the Salt Licks, chock-full of fun and fight, fisting and feeling, frolic and friendliness.
1839		‘Jim Crow, from Kentucky’ in Jim Crow’s Song-Book 13: Oh, I’m a roarer onde fiddle, an’ down in old Virginny, / Dey say I play de scientific, like Massa Paganini.
1845		D. Corcoran Pickings from N.O. Picayune (1847) 86: He’s death on catgut [...] he’s a perfect roarer.
1848		Paul Pry 4 Dec. n.p.: We advise Bill P—e (the roarer) to pay his debts, and support his wife and child.
1861		(con. 1840s–50s) H. Mayhew London Labour and London Poor III 55/2: I’m a roarer on the fiddle.
1884		A. Griffiths Chronicles of Newgate 18: He was furthermore indicted ‘in Tower Ward for being a cruiser and night-walker against the peace, as also for being a common roarer’.
1886		Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 24 July 2/4: A roughly dressed man of 40. who told passers by that he was Lewis Lessor, a ‘roarer’ from Gall City, Neb .

2. a broken-down horse [the sound of its breathing].

1735		Derby Mercury 3 July 4/1: The jockey [...] swore the Horse was not worth a shilling; for he was a Roarer.
1798		Kentish Gaz. 6 July 2/2: Mr Colman of the Veterinary Coollege [...] pronounced him to be what is termed a Roarer.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1822		D. Carey Life in Paris 115: He [...] knew by the first boxing of his trotters when a roarer had been fluffed for the purpose of sale.
1832		Egan Bk of Sports 60: Contesting every mile of the road with [...] the roarers, the gibs, the limpers (only fit for the dogs).
1845		Bell’s Life in Sydney 6 Sept. 3/2: One on em's a roarer, the other a piper, and tother’s got a seedy toe.
1851		‘Epistle from Joe Muggins’s Dog’ in Era (London) 22 June 3/3: [of a human] Langlands haz berried abuv six hundred ov ther Epsom people, and I’m thinkin it’ll be hiz turne soon, for he’s beginnin to be a bit ov a ‘roarer’.
1853		R.S. Surtees Mr Sponge’s Sporting Tour 167: Calcott’s roarer roared as surely roarer never roared before.
1859, 1860		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc.
1867		J. Greenwood Unsentimental Journeys 197: ‘Kickers,’ ‘roarers,’ ‘jibbers;’ vizens of fierce blood, and who could do anything but behave themselves.
1871		‘George Eliot’ Middlemarch II 21: What the hell! the horse was a penny trumpet to that roarer of yours.
1888		‘’Arry on Marriage’ in Punch 29 Sept. 156/1: But the ruck is no place for a racer as hasn’t yet parted with pace, / Ain’t aged, nor yet turned a roarer.
1895		C. Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 67: Roarer, a broken-winded horse, often termed ‘talking’ by turfites.
1900		Bulletin (Sydney) 13 Jan. 11/2: They applied for temporary leave in order that they might offer their services in the war, and the Department didn’t know whether any particular candidate was spavined, or a confirmed roarer, or gone in the feet, or otherwise ineligible.
1908		‘Doss Chiderdoss’ ‘When They Sigh’ Sporting Times 15 Feb. 1/3: But the cab-horse was a roarer, and the slowest of blood-stock, / And the fare said to the cabby, ‘That’s a musical old crock!’.
1912		P.C. Wren Dew & Mildew 385: Beastly going — and the hunt lost Major Fatty Pomperton (seventeen stun) and his cast-for-age roarer.
1929		D.H. Clarke In the reign of Rothstein 102: [He] would have been one of the greatest sprinters of all time [...] if he hadn’t suffered from a wind affliction. He was what is called a roarer.
1952		in Lethbridge (Alberta) Herald 22 Mar. 14/4: A wind-broken horse is a roarer or a blower.

3. in fig. senses.

4. (US) a noisy argument.

1949

N. Algren Man with the Golden Arm 32: Schwabatski’s ears had long ago tuned out the sort of roarer that the dealer and his Sophie sometimes put on.

5. a riotous good time.

1956

‘Charles Raven’ Und. Nights 180: Off they went on a monumental roarer, and when, a fortnight later, we met up in Sammy’s Spieler, they were all practically skint.