Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (UK Und., also set) a scheme aimed at defrauding a victim through crooked gambling.

1725		New Canting Dict. n.p.: Set, as Dead Set, a Term used by Thief-catchers when they have a Certainty of seizing some of their Clients.
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. 1725].
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1833		Niles’ Weekly Register n.p.: A ‘dead set’ is making at the lottery system in several of the states [...] a most wicked gambling for money.
1913		‘O. Henry’ ‘A Dinner at —*’ in Rolling Stones (1913).

2. a pointed attack on or approach to another person, often in the context of wooing.

1728		T. Walker The Quaker’s Opera I i: I shall send you half a Dozen Fellows by and by. I have a dead Set upon the Rogues.
1781		G. Parker View of Society I 196: He then gave me what I term the dead set with his eye.
1824		History of Gaming Houses & Gamesters 55: His Lordship and Co. failed in the dead-set they then made upon a certain Duke.
1846		D. Corcoran Picking from N.O. Picayune n.p: ’Stead of learnin’ to set his saw, he has made a dead set at my reg’lar business.
1852		C.A. Bristed Upper Ten Thousand 111: When you saw him [...] talking to some young lady in the boxes, you would have imagined that he was making a dead set at her.
1857		‘Ducange Anglicus’ Vulgar Tongue.
1857		Bell’s Life in Victoria (Melbourne) 25 July 2/4: [T]here is nothing more dangerous nor unsportsmanlike than making a dead-set to follow some well-known rider over his chosen panel.
1858		‘Shadow’ Midnight Scenes 97: [in commercial context] What a ‘dead set’ is made at workmen’s wives [...] as they lounge about the draper’s door [...] with manifest discomfort at having money in their pockets!
1859		Wrexham Advertiser 6 Aug. 4/2: The lady made a dead set upon the Welsh harp [...] calling it ‘a weak and paltry instrument’.
1861		Hills & Plains 2 230: Whenever a regiment makes a dead set against one, it has [...] the amplest reason for so doing.
1864, 1867, 1870		Hotten Sl. Dict.
1877		Five Years’ Penal Servitude 145: He was made a dead set at by some other prisoners, who schooled him for a career of vice and crime.
1884		Sporting Times 1 Nov. 4/5: Of late a dead set has been made against Mr M’George as starter.
1884		Ally Sloper’s Half Holiday 18 May 19/2: [caption] Making a dead set at thoroughly appreciative eligible.
1899		Kipling ‘The Moral Reformers’ in Complete Stalky & Co. (1987) 124: Maybe a lot of fags have made a dead set at Clewer.
1908		Bulletin (Sydney) 6 Aug. 3/2: But he was timid as a mouse. / The maid a dead-set made at him. / She tracked him down that fearful way / The hungry lion tracks his prey, / With little fuss – / Insidious.
1913		A. Lunn Harrovians 199: It isn’t pleasant to have these big louts making a dead set at one every time I touch the ball.
1926		Wood & Goddard Dict. Amer. Sl. 32: make a dead set. Try to influence by persistence.
1936		M. Harrison All the Trees were Green 40: The girls made what is called a ‘dead set’ at me.
1941		V. Hodgson Diaries (1999) 3 Jan. 108: They seem to be making a dead set at the City.

3. (US campus) a complete failure to learn and recite the lesson.

1837		Knickerbocker (N.Y.) IX 123: The next week came Greek. I knew nothing of the Grammar—I took dead set after dead set, that is, I was set down [DA].
1844		Augustus Peirce Rebelliad 52: Screws, dead-sets, and fines.
1861		in Publications Colonial Society of Massachusetts XXVII 69: I’ve dealt them dead setts, tho they’ve scrapped till I’m sore [DA].