Green’s Dictionary of Slang

an alcoholic drink taken (ostensibly) to counteract the effects of cold and damp.

[1788		‘Dialogue between a Sword and a Hogahead of Spirits’, Amer. Museum (Phila.). n.p.: As for children, I destroy them, by persuading their parents that a dram of raw rum or whisky is necessary for them every morning, to keep the fog out of their throats].
1789		Mass. Spy 12 Nov. n.p.: [The great utility of Rum] has given it the medical name of an Anti fogmatic. The quantity taken every morning is in exact proportion to the thickness of the fog.
1806		Portfolio Ser. 4 I 401: Do you love your glass, every hour brings with it a fresh bumper. There [i.e. the US] you have the gum-tickler, the phlegm-cutter, the gall-breaker, the antifogmatic.
1817		Qly Rev. Jan. 521: The first drop, which consists generally of a gill, taken fasting, is called a gum-tickler. The second dose, just before breakfast, is a phlegm-cutter. A dram before dinner is an anti-fogmatic.
1825		J.K. Paulding John Bull in America 14: The half-pint of whiskey, which every man takes in the morning the first thing he does after getting up, is called an anti-fogmatic.
1833		Sun (Baltimore) Sept. n.p.: ‘Do you know that our particular friend J— kicked the bucket last night?’ ‘You don’t say so! Will you take an anti-fogmatic?’ ‘Don’t care if I do.’.
1833		D. Crockett Sketches and Eccentricities 157: They then take a fog-cutter.
1840		Daily Pennant (St. Louis), May 14. n.p.: Tim had that morning taken a little dust of grog, that is to say an eye-opener, and a sleep-disturber, and a gum-tickler, and a gallbreaker, and an anti-fogmatic, and it may be two or three small horns more, which no gentleman need to be ashamed on.
1840		W.G. Simms Border Beagles (1855) 55: A thirsty throat, to which anything like delay in an anti-fogmatic is almost certain bronchitis.
1843		Northampton Mercury 23 Sept. 4: The farmers up here wouldn’t take her ginger-vengeance [...] instead of eye-openers and fog-clearers.
1852		As Good as a Comedy 134: Tom Nettles [was] mixing a couple of rosy anti-fogmatics.
1861		Examiner (London) 10 Aug. 5/1: The colonel [...] is sure to [...] look out the next time the parties meet to take an antifogmatic.
1862		J. Thomas How to Mix Drinks Preface 4: The Connecticut ‘eye-openers’ and ‘Alabama fog-cutters,’ together with the ‘lightning-smashes’ and the ‘thunderbolt-cocktails,’ created a profound sensation in the crowd.
1872		Whig & Tribune (Jackson, TN) 25 May 3/3: If you have a homely looking wife [...] take a few doses of anti-fogmatic daily, and she will appear [...] beautiful.
1887		Clarksville Wkly Chron. (TN) 8 Jan. 7/2: They never drank a drop during the whole Christmas week — except as an antifogmatic.
1906		Pensacola Jrnl (FL) 8 Apr. 19/3: You must have some anti-fogmatic [...] a little of the antifogmatic will make you see better.