Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (Scot.) a bagpipe.

1790

‘Bumper Allnight. Esquire’ Honest Fellow 15: Song X/ The Jingling Johnny† †A name for a bagpipe in some parts of Scotland.

2. an Indian cart and horse.

1885		B. Patterson Life in the Ranks 151: Other individuals [will] enjoy a drive for a dozen or twenty miles through the country in conveyances called ‘jingling Johnnies.’ These are small, flat, light structures, which run upon two wheels [...] the native driver sitting in front to guide the single horse.
1892		Morn. Bulletin (Rockhampton, Qld) 15 Dec. 3/4: We found there were no tongas to be had, and that we must either go on to Baramulla in native carts, called ekkas [...] Now an ekk., called by Thomas Atkins a ‘Jingling Johnny,’ is entirely without springs.

3. (Aus./N.Z.) in pl., hand shears [the clicking noise of the shears].

1897		Nat. Advocate (Bathurst, NSW) 25 Nov. 2/7: ‘The Great Question’. Once more the shearing’s over. / The shortage sadly showed / What sheep took Drought the Drover / Adown the Deathwood road / [author] Jingling Johnny.
1941		Baker Popular Dict. Aus. Sl. 39: Jingling johnnies, hand shears.
1988		McGill Dict. of Kiwi Sl. 63/1: jingling johnnies hand shears, the shearer a jingling johnny; c.1870.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. [as cit. 1988].

4. (Aus./N.Z.) a hand-shearer.

1933		(ref. to 1890–1910) L.G.D. Acland Early Canterbury Runs (1951) 384: Jingling johnnies – Old time slang term for hand shearers.
1988		see sense 2.

5. the musical instrument known as a Chinese pavilion or Chinese crescent [it ‘consists of a pole, with several transverse brass plates of some crescent or fantastic form, and generally terminating at top with a conical pavilion or hat. On all these parts a number of very small bells are hung which the performer causes to jingle’ (Grove’s Dict. of Music). A later Aus. version, which uses bottle tops tacked loosely onto an old broomstick, is the lagerphone].

1893		ref. to 1854) Western Mail 18 Mar. 5/4: The regimental band with ‘ingling Johnny’ (an instrument taken during the Crimean War).
1925		(con. WWI) Fraser & Gibbons Soldier and Sailor Words 132: Jingling johnny, The: [...] A somewhat similar ‘Jingling johnny’, termed a ‘Chapeau Chinois’, used solely as a band instrument, was in use in certain regiments which had black bandsmen [...] between 1778 and 1840.
1936		Nottingham Eve. Post 18 July 6/5: When the Military Band was introduced into this country from Germany [...] the crescent was irreverently chistened ‘ingliong Johnny’.
1977		J. Skvorecky Engineer of Human Souls (trans. 1994) 166: The stage boards rattle with blows from the Jingling Johnny and a thunderous bass voice carries the solo.