Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a thief or rogue.

1570		R. Ascham Schoolmaster 215: Men that hunt so be privy stealers, or night walkers .
1598		Stow Survey of London (2005) 72: This conduit was first built [...] to be a prison for night-walkers and other suspicious persons.
1617		Middleton & Rowley A Fair Quarrel IV iv: Muffled late night-walkers.
1623		Webster Devil’s Law-Case I ii: There is no warier Keeper of a Parke, To preuent Stalkers, or your Night-walkers.
1633		Massinger Guardian V ii: You have been, Before your lady gave you entertainment, A night-walker in the streets. [...] Traded in picking pockets.
1640		Fletcher [title] Night-Walker or The Little Thief.
1660		‘Megg. Spencer’ A Strange and True Conference 6: [A]ll Night-walkers, Wandering Whores, pockets, married, unmarried, sound or unsound [etc].
1668		W. Davenant Man’s the Master I i: jod.: We, sir are night-walkers; or rather men of Norway [...] And that’s my master, sir, the greatest walker in the world. steph.: Or rather the greatest robber.
1676		D’Urfey Madam Fickle V iii: Hang’d! A man of parts! An honest Nightwalker hang’d!
1680		T. Betterton Match in Newgate IV iv: Know him! a most notorious Thief; his house has been suspected for a Bawdie-house [...] a harbourer of Cut-purses and Night-walkers.
1693		Congreve Old Bachelor I v: The knight was alone, and had fallen into the hands of some night-walkers.
1725		New Canting Dict. n.p.: Night-walker a Thief, a Rogue.
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. 1725].
1741		Braggadochio 70: The Knight was alone, and had fallen into the Hands of some Night-walkers, who, I suppose, would have pillaged him.
1826		Hull Packet 30 May 4/2: It was too continued a sound to be a signal among night walkers.
1828		Enniskillen Chron. 28 Aug. 1/1: My wife kept a tipling-house [sic] on the side of the hill, and the night-walkers used to go there.
1881		Orangeburg Times (SC) 18 Aug. 1/6: I heard of some depredations being committed [...] by some audacious, intrepid night-walking thieving rascals.
1905		Sporting Times 4 Mar. 1/5: Wanted General servant; good wages; no night-walker or window-climber need apply.
1915		M.G. Hayden ‘Terms Of Disparagement’ in DN IV:iii 209: night-bird, -cap, -hawk, -hunter, -walker, a thief or harlot.

2. (also night-stroller) a prostitute; thus night-walking, working as a street prostitute.

1616		W. Haughton English-Men For My Money E4: Now may your knaueries giue the deadliest blow To night-walkers, eaues-droppers, or outlandish loue.
c.1617		Fletcher Chances I vi: All that be Curious Night-walkers, may they find my Fee.
1654		Mercurius Fumigosus 23 1–8 Nov. 201: A Cracker going off a Monday at night in West Smithfield, happened to fly under a Night-walkers Coats.
1664		Etherege Love In A Tub IV iii: Do you take me for a Night-walker, Sir?
1674		Head Canting Academy (2nd edn) 83: She that is a Diver or Pick Pocket is an infallible Stroler or Night-Walker.
1680		M. Stevenson Wits Paraphras’d 116: Drunk in my cups I stamp and stair / [...] / And make myself a very stalkhors / Amongst the Bulkers and nigfht walkers.
1688		Proc. Old Bailey 5 Dec. n.p.: Being one that practised the Trade of Night walking, she invited him to a Tavern in St. Martins le Grand, in order to partake of a Bottle of Wine.
1691		‘The Vindication of Top-Knots and Commodes’ in Ebsworth Bagford Ballads (1878) I 123: Then silly old Fops, that kiss but like popes, / And call us Night Walkers and Fairies, / Go fumble old Joan, and let us alone, / And never come near our canary’s.
a.1704		T. Brown Comical View of London and Westminster in Works (1760) I 145: If rainy, few night-walkers in Cheapside and Fleet-street.
1719		in D’Urfey Pills to Purge Melancholy V 28: Now Miss turn Night-walker, till Lord Mayor’s Men she meets.
1725		New Canting Dict. n.p.: night-Walker [...] a Light Woman.
1734		C. Johnson Hist. of Highwaymen &c. 67: [ref. to prostitutes] We were known to be such notorious Night-Walkers.
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. 1725].
1769		Garrick England Run Mad 50: If the humble Night-walkers of the Strand [...] take deviously to the Ascent of Catherine-street, they are driven back with the Charge of Impudence and Vanity unbecoming such low wretches, by the mid-region Nymphs.
1774		in J. Malcolm Anecdotes of Manners and Customs (1808) 120: Every watchman, as well patroles as others, and every beadle [...] are hereby authorized and impowered to arrest and apprehend all night walkers.
1818		W. Perry London Guide 126: At times, the importunities for relief from the night walkers, descend so low as a few pence.
1824		J. Wight Mornings in Bow St. 58: [T]hey were picked up by the little night walker; that she being known to Mr. Mahoney as ‘a noisy customer,’ he told her to go off and leave the lads alone.
1842		Whip & Satirist of NY & Brooklyn (NY) 9 Apr. n.p.: Of every two night-walkers, one, at least, is a chambermaid.
1846		New Swell’s Night Guide to the Bowers of Venus 18: Castle Street [...] Is an abode where swells, night-walkers and the pavé revive the days of old.
1850		E.V. Kenealy Goethe: a New Pantomime in Poetical Works 2 (1878) 335: Hatchet-face, Night-walker, Wanton — / Is it thus your tongue you wag.
1856		G.G. Foster N.Y. by Gas-Light (1990) 195: The bloated night-walker [...] who lives by pacing the purlieus of the Points or Water street all night, and enticing drunken negroes, sailors or loafers into two-shilling bed-houses.
1861		(con. 1840s–50s) H. Mayhew London Labour and London Poor I 184/2: Those that come out at midnight, are for the accommodation of the ‘night-walkers’.
1876		New Northwest (Portland, OR) 9 June 2/3: We now have a new law, which renders the male night-walker liable to equal penalties with the female. Any male person frequenting the streets [...] by night to ‘entice, allure, or “invite” the other sex shall be deemed a common nightwalker’.
1880		Ouachita Teleg. (Monroe, LA) 17 Dec. 2/3: All females over the age of thirteen years found on the streets [...] unaccompanied by a male person [...] are hereby declared to be nightwalkers.
1897		N.Y. Tribune 1 July 2/3: Every common prostitute or night-walker loitering [...] for the purpose of prostitution, or solicitation.
1909		Intermountain Catholic (Salt Lake City, UT) 11 Dec. 3/3: The street at night is the school where the young are educated to be loafers, gamblers, night-walkers and thieves.
1915		M.G. Hayden ‘Terms Of Disparagement’ in DN IV:iii 209: night-walker, a thief or harlot.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 728: Roving around the city meeting God knows who nightwalkers and pickpockets.
1927		H. Asbury Gangs of N.Y. 177: Originally women of this class were known as night-walkers, for they were seldom seen on the streets before dusk.
1933		S. O’Casey Within the Gates iv: Aha, are you another of the night-strollers seeking lightsome contacts in the gloomier parts of the Park?

3. a bellman or town crier.

c.1698

B.E. Dict. Canting Crew.