Green’s Dictionary of Slang

the face or mouth.

[a.1529		Skelton Phyllyp Sparowe in Gent’s Mag. (1844) Sept. 233/2: Many a prety kusse Had I of his swete musse ].
c.1790		‘De May-Bush’ in Walsh Ireland Ninety Years Ago (1885) 90: And dere he kept singin’, as sweet as a trush – / His faulchin in one hand, his pipe in his mush.
1859		Matsell Vocabulum 127: mush. The mouth.
1861		N.E. Police Gaz. (Boston, MA) 12 Oct. 8/3: Every time Maurice Lynch opens his cod fish moush the upper part of his head seems about to secede from the lower .
1890		Dead Bird (Sydney) 22 Feb. 4/2: She endeavoured to give him a back-hander over the mush.
1902		C.L. Cullen More Ex-Tank Tales 85: I’d seen his mush in Byrne’s mug book.
1906		E. Dyson Fact’ry ’Ands 202: Er stream iv water thick ez that, takes Fuzzy fair in the mush.
1913–14		Van Loan ‘Scrap Iron’ in Taking the Count 207: You can let a man wear himself out hitting you in the mush.
1914		Truth (Melbourne) 3 Jan. 11/4: She swung a tighty-clenched fist, propelled by a muscular arm, onto to Michael’s mush.
1914		Jackson & Hellyer Vocab. Criminal Sl. 60: moosh, moush [...] The human face; the physiog. [...] Also the mouth [...] Example: ‘He’s got a harp moosh,’ i.e., Irish.
1919		W.H. Downing Digger Dialects 34: moush — Mouth.
1924		H.L. Wilson Professor How Could You! 308: Close the mush!
1932		(con. 1910s) J.T. Farrell Young Lonigan in Studs Lonigan (1936) 3: He had pasted Weary in the mush with an icy snowball.
1938		Press (Canterbury) 2 Apr. 18: A ‘moosh’ or ‘gate’ is mouth.
1938		X. Herbert Capricornia (1939) 66: Shut your meaty moosh or I’ll shut it for you.
1944		A. Marshall These Are My People (1957) 125: I caught him fair on the moosh and he spat teeth everywhere.
1949		F. Brown Dead Ringer 130: With that grin on his mush – he looked about as sinister as Porky Pig.
1955		J. Morrison Black Cargo 191: I just hauled off and lobbed a beaut fair in his moosh.
1958		(con. 1940s) B. Behan Borstal Boy 168: First thing [...] you get a poke in the mush.
1963		A. Burgess Inside Mr Enderby in Complete Enderby (2002) 65: This here’s my fist [...] You’ll get it straight in the moosh, straight up you will.
1965		B. Wannan Fair Go, Spinner 70: I told the big mug I’d give him a double whammy on the moush-houser.
1966		C. Wood Fill the Stage With Happy Hours (1967) Act V: Great laughs and titters at me being seen waving a razor round my mush.
1967		J. Wynnum I’m a Jack, All Right 122: Always had a red mooch. Never have found out whether it’s sunburn or grog.
1967		K. Tennant Tell Morning This 156: ‘From the silly look on his mush you’d think he was a bloody imbecile’.
1968		S. Gore Holy Smoke 10: Buzz orf home, before I belt y’ one in the moosh.
1972		K. Bonfiglioli Don’t Point That Thing at Me (1991) 43: The rich autumnal tints on his swollen moosh.
1976		P. Theroux Family Arsenal 149: It’s all shiny, sort of moving and blowing up in me mush.
1982		P. Bailey An Eng. Madam 59: She [...] with the warpaint on her moosh.
1988		Dandy Comic Library Special No. 11 53: Hit Sniffy in the mush and win a coconut.
1992		R.G. Barrett White Shoes 39: [He] rubbed a bit of cream on his moosh.
1995		J. Cameron Vinnie Got Blown Away 173: See him trying to get a blade out then see Julie Seagrave grab his arm bring her heel down his mush.
1996		Penguin Bk of More Aus. Jokes 338: The Welshman punched him in the moosh.
1999		K. Bonfiglioli Great Mortdecai Moustache Mystery 129: If you like having a soup-strainer hanging from your moosh.
2009		R. Milward Ten Storey Love Song 13: Boby’s about to slam the door in the pizza boy’s mush.
2008		T. Piccirilli Fever Kill 187: Give him any static and he’ll smack you in the mush, dig?
2012		A. Bergen ‘Dread Fellow Churls’ in Crime Factory: Hard Labour [ebook] It’s funny what pointless details you make out when you’re staring death in the mush.