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Green’s Dictionary of Slang

curry someone’s hide v.

also curry someone’s coat, ...jacket

[SE curry, to dress tanned leather; note Grose (1785): ‘to curry any one’s hide, to beat him’]

to thrash, to beat.

1654		E. Gayton Pleasant Notes III xi 145: Amadis had a powting slut, a sullen huzzy, he should have curried her Coat.
1785		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: To curry any one’s hide, to beat him.
1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue (3rd edn).
1811		Lex. Balatronicum [as cit. 1785].
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue [as cit. 1785].
1839		Crim.-Con. Gaz. 3 Aug. 252/2: [H]e had a terrible itch to curry someone’s hide soundly with a good cudgel.
1884		J. Harrison ‘Negro English’ in Anglia VII 273: To stripe one’s jacket = to whip.
1914		J.C. Ruppenthal ‘A Word-List From Kansas’ in DN IV:ii 104: curry (one’s ) jacket, v. phr. To whip soundly on the back.