Green’s Dictionary of Slang

(US) a drunkard.

1856

Life in Boston & N.Y. (Boston, MA) 22 Nov. n.p.: The first on my list is that rum-barrel, Charles C—l.

1. the adam’s apple.

1950		Bennett, Clarke & Wilson Anancy Stories and Dialect Verse 37: Him too short, him head too big, him too mawga, him de head too lickle, him have rum-bump a him throat or him too ugly.
2005		L. Goodison Fool-Fool Rose is Leaving 130: [He] pumped his ‘rum bump’ up and down like a piston until the glass was empty.

2. a swelling in the throat supposedly caused by excessive rum drinking.

1950

cited in Cassidy & LePage Dict. Jam. Eng. (1980).

(US) a drunkard.

1851		Manchester Spy (NH) 5 July n.p.: This virtuous man (a rum casj we thought).
1856		Life in Boston & N.Y. (Boston, MA) 22 Nov. n.p.: This traveling rum cask [...] depends on the quantity of poor rum and molasses that he guzzles down.
1859		Wkly Varieties (Boston, MA) 29 Oct. 8/2: Walt [...] is making a rum-cask of himself.

see dragger n.¹

see separate entries.

see rum-dum n.

see rum-dum adj.

see booze factory under booze n.

a drunkard, esp. a rum-drinker, thus rum-headed, drunken.

1834		Ely’s Hawk & Buzzard (NY) Mar. 22 2/1: Come along down to the Catharine Market, and prey upon the old Rum-Heads that loaf around.
1842		Whip & Satirist of NY & Brooklyn (NY) 5 Feb.. n.p.: Not a rum-head took a parting cup, / O’er the grave where our buster we buried.
1856		Life in Boston & N.Y. (Boston, MA) 23 Aug. n.p.: Mike R—n, the rum-headed artist.
1921		Arizona Republican 3 May 11/5: Mark Twain had no respect for King Arthur whom he doped out as a bluffing old rumhead.
1949		(con. 1943–5) A. Murphy To Hell and Back (1950) 22: You illiterate rumhead.
1958		H.S. Thompson letter 23 Jan. in Proud Highway (1997) 102: I haven’t seen the one of those who turn into rumheads.
1995		Francis-Jackson Official Dancehall Dict. 44: Rum-head alcoholic.

(US) orig. a cheap tavern, specializing in rum; a bar, any cheap drinking place.

1827		N.-Y. Enquirer 4 June 2/3: Among the most common and destructive [gambling games] are Faro Banks, Roulette Tables, Billiard Tables, Card Tables, and Nine Pin Alleys; some of which are now almost invariably the accompaniments of the numerous ‘rum holes’ with which our city is thronged.
1834		Sun (N.Y.) 14 May 2/3: There is, at the present time, in this city, a rum-hole, a house of prostitution, an apothecary shop, and a coffin-ware-house, all under one roof [DA].
1842		Whip & Satirist of NY & Brooklyn (NY) 30 Apr. n.p.: There is a number of rum-holes around this place where the clucker’s [sic] travel to get their toddy.
1853		Ohio Organ (Cincinnati, OH) 24 June 6/2: A horrible murder occurred at [...] a rum hole in Cincinnati.
1863		Yale Literary Mag. xxviii 139: There is in the village a rum-hole, which is destroying the peace and happiness of the community.
1872		Schele De Vere Americanisms 216: The State of New York alone [...] uses the term rum-holes for its smaller grog-shops.
1882		Sydney Sl. Dict. (2 edn) 10: Last night she was flashing the gilt in S-----’s rum [...] Last night she was showing off with her money in S-----’s drinking-house and rendezvous.
1887		I. Alden Little Fishers v: I’ll hunt out towns where the fellows have just been left to stay in the streets, or else go to the rum-holes [DA].
1891		Kansas Agitator (Garnett, KS) 10 Mar. 4/4: Every rum hole in Wall Street and in the country at large rejoice that [etc].
1899–1900		C.L. Cullen Tales of the Ex-Tanks 62: No customers were in the place, which was a pretty swell rum joint.
1904		G.D. Chase ‘Cape Cod Dialect’ in DN II:vi 427: rumhole, n. A liquor saloon.
1910		Custer Co. Republican (Broken Bow, NE) 10 Nov. 1/4: I still insist that the only place suitable for a Rum Joint is in the middle of hell.
1919		Cayton’s Wkly (Seattle, WA) 15 Mar. 2/1: There’ll be few gents in prison when Barleycorn’s got his’n, and locks the Rum Hole door.
1921		Londonderry Sifter (VT) 13 Oct. 4/1: When Fatty Arbuckle was ‘discovered’ for the movies he was a spitoon cleaner in a rum-hole.
1928		Sun. Express (London) 24 June 8/4: They fought in a rum-joint and everyone joined in [DA].

a heavy drinker.

1912		Fulton Co. News (McConnelsburg, PA) 29 Jan. 8/4: The other old pal is just a rum hound.
1920		Ade Hand-made Fables 5: The amateur Rum-Hounds piled out at the Main Entrance to Liberty Hall.
1926		Wood & Goddard Dict. Amer. Sl.
1937		W.M. Raine Cool Customer 216: There’s one or two rum hounds among them.
1940		S.J. Simonsen Among the Sourdoughs 24: You can never tell what these rum-hounds will do.

(Aus.) a heavy drinker; a drunkard.

1885

Bulletin (Sydney) 30 May 12/1: It is within the power of the Melbourne magistrates to imprison a truculent solicitor. […] What a chance then for O’Malley […] to call up before him certain legal rum-jars which infest our police courts, charge them with daring to breathe, and give them life all round!

see separate entry.

see separate entry.

(US) a bar.

1886		Century Mag. 31 226: There is no church and no antipodal rum repository within its borders.
1898		Eve. Star (Wash., DC) 26 Nov. 14/4: A soldier and a sailor were engagded in a two-handed game of poker [...] in the rear of room of a Honolulu rum respository [...] A bar-tender [...] stood in the doorway watching.
1899–1900		C.L. Cullen Tales of the Ex-Tanks 43: A couple of warm members, all togged out in fur coats, came out of a rum repository.

(US) a tavern, a bar.

1859

Wkly Varieties (Boston, MA) 3 Sept. 3/4: Deserving of the Lash [...] Andrew Foss [...] keeper of a rum-roost.

(US Und.) a bootlegger’s fleet, held in international waters and thus beyond US jurisdiction.

1916		Arizona Republican (Phoenix, AZ) 2 Sept. 7/3: Good-bye, old bootlegger, farewell old rum row.
1928		B. Fisher ‘Mutt and Jeff’ [comic strip] Skipper, I want you to take me out to rum row.
1928		Phila. Eve. Bulletin 5 Oct. 40/4: Here are a few more terms and definitions from the ‘Racket’ vocabulary: [...] ‘rum row,’ a group of liquor-laden vessels at sea beyond jurisdiction.

rum punch.

1789		G. Parker Life’s Painter 162: Bobstick of rum slim. That is, a shilling’s worth of punch .
[1827		Morn. Chron. 12 June 3/3: Mine frients, it was not a rumsling — no, nor a ginsling; no, nor a mint vatersling].
1864, 1867, 1870		Hotten Sl. Dict.

(US) a drunkard.

1853

Life in Boston & N.Y. (Boston, MA) 8 Oct. n.p.: Why does that fat rum struck, Tom Mackey, follow every girl he sees?

(US) a heavy, habitual drinker, thus rum-sucking, excessive drinking.

1837		Windham Co. Democrat (Brattleboro, VT) 21 July 1/5: She flew at him like a tiger; ‘Let her alone, you dirty rum-sucker,’ she cried.
1845		Ypsilanti Sentinel (Wastenaw Co., MI) 10 Sept. 2/5: A rum-sucker declared that he could beat any cold water fellow in jumping.
1850		Life in Boston & N.Y. (Boston, MA) 10 Aug. n.p.: Others are notorious for their rum-sucking propensities.
1853		Ohio Organ (Cincinnati, OH) 16 Sept. 5/1: Not a single rum-sucker or rum-vendor [...] got a nomination.
1860		Wilmington Jrnl (NC) 29 Mar. 5/3: ‘I will fill thy bottle.’ [...] Then the rum sucker’s heart was made glad.
1872		Schele De Vere Americanisms 216: The habitual toper has conferred upon him the name of rum-sucker.
1883		Cooperstown Courier (ND) 13 Apr. 4/1: This impression was given by the rum sucker and rum seller, and those who have decided to stand by rum.
1890		Globe Repub. (Dodge City, KS) 1 Jan. 1/6: No thanks, Mr Traveler; I am no rum sucker.
1904		Goldsboro Wkly Argus (NC) 8 Sept. 8/3: Some red-nosed rum-sucker would devise some means to get that bottle.
1915		Manchester Jrnl (VT) 11 Mar. 8/4: ‘You look like a rum-sucker’ ‘I am’.
2006		W. Chen Chutney Power and Stories 133: Bhola was a bigger rum-sucker than he.

see have in some liquor under liquor n.