Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a womanizer, a pimp.

1596		Nashe Have With You to Saffron-Walden in Works III (1883–4) 180: In some Countreys no woman is so honorable as she that hath had to doo with most men, and can giue the lustiest striker oddes by 25 times in one night, as Messalina did.
1612		N. Field Woman is a Weathercock III iii: What a mad villain art thou, a striker, a fiftieth part of Hercules, to get one wench with child, and go a-wooing to another.
1624		Massinger Parliament of Love V i: I was a striker, one that could strike home to, And neuer did beget a girle [...] I could produce braue boys.
1635		R. Brome Sparagus Garden IV vii: You have beene a Striker in your dayes: And may be agen.

2. a prostitute.

1593		Passionate Morrice (1876) 80: [He] cannot see a wench out-start the bounds of modestie, but straight he hollowes the sight of a striker.
1609		T. Heywood Rape of Lucrece (1638) (1874) V 201: She ha good clothes, with a faire Roman nose, / For that’s the sign of a striker.
c.1614		Countess of Somerset in British Museum Additional Mss 15476.92: In her foal-age shee began to wince And hath beene a striker ever since.
1635		R. Brome Sparagus Garden V xi: No, you adopted her / In your owne name, and made a Striker of her, / No more a Monylacks.
1650		H. Neville Newes from the New Exchange 8: I can tell you of a notable Striker one Mrs Luson.
1879		Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 29 Nov. 15/1: At this the ‘lovers,’ the petty gamblers and the ‘strikers’ generally break into a coarse laugh.

3. (US) in specific use of sense 2, a hack journalist.

1882

Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 10 June 3/2: [T]he most barefaced and unscrupulous ‘striker’ who ever sold his pen to any thief or harlot who would pay for it.

4. (US Und.) a street tout who entices players into a gambling club; he doubles as a thug in the case of complaints.

1854		J.B. Jones Life and Adventures of a Country Merchant 317: He was one of the most accomplished strikers, or barkers, as they are called, in the employ of the hells.
1872		Schele De Vere Americanisms 319: In the West a striker is not only a shoulder-hitter, as might be suspected, but a runner for gambling establishments, who must be as ready to strike down a complaining victim as to ensnare an unsuspecting stranger.

5. (US prison) a home-made device used to light cigarettes.

1918		H. Simon ‘Prison Dict.’ in AS VIII:3 (1933) 32/1: STRIKER. Strip from the side of an empty match box, coated with igniting composition, carried as a match-lighter.
1950		Goldin et al. DAUL 214/1: Striker. (P) A match-box or a torn-off portion of the sulphur-coated surface of a match-box.
2000		Other Side of the Wall: Prisoner’s Dict. July 🌐 Striker: A device similar to a stinger used to light cigarettes. It generally consists of a bent paper clip pushed thru the erasure end of a pencil and another small piece of wire. When both are pushed into an outlet, the prisoner taps the wire on the carbon on the writing end of the pencil causing a carbon arch with hot sparks. (UT).

6. (also strike) a match.

c.1858		J.H. Green Secret Band of Brothers 114: The word glib, striker means Incendiary.
1919		Sun. Times (Perth) 9 Mar. 7/4: Matches are strikes.
1956		B. Behan Quare Fellow (1960) Act II: Shaybo will give you a couple of strikers.