Green’s Dictionary of Slang

see under boulder n.

a bailiff.

c.1591		Shakespeare Comedy of Errors IV ii: A back-friend, a shoulder-clapper, one that countermands The passages of alleys, creeks, and narrow lands.
1607		Dekker & Webster Westward Hoe V i: What a prophane varlet is this shoulder clapper, to lye thus vpon my wife & her ringes.
1611		Chapman May-Day IV ii: I would but have one whiff at one of these same pewter-buttoned shoulder-clappers to try whether this chopping knife or their pestles were the better weapons.
c.1625		Rowley Woman never Vext 63: Zoundes Knight, if the Major come The shoulder clappers are not farre off.
1672		Windsor Drollery 32: He cheateth no Heirs, nor Shoulder-men fears [...] He signeth no Bill, nor maketh no Will.
c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Shoulder-clapper c. a Sergeant or Bailiff.
1725		Life and Glorious Actions of [...] Jonathan Wilde 22: This Youth (like his Ancestors) was bred to his Father’s Trade of Shoulder-clapping, or rather a Shoulder-clapper’s Dog (viz. a Bailiff’s Bull-dog) .
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1839		(con. 1703) W.H. Ainsworth Jack Sheppard (1917) 17: The traps [...] The shoulder-clappers.
1855		Shrewsbury Chron. 20 July 6/6: John Beddow, bailiff, was examined, who proved that and two others of his ‘fellow shoulder clappers’ had [...] seized the clock in question, and with the usual rapacity his craft, bore it away.
1867		Preston Herald 30 Mar. 5/7: If any our readers know some such poor fellow, [...] let them clap him on the shoulder and speak few words of gentle warning; they may thus perhaps save him from that other ‘shoulder-clapper,’ whom Shakspere describes as— One whose hard heart is buttoned up with steel [etc].
1886		G.A. Sala Illus. London News 19 June 644: I do know that a sheriff’s officer used to be called a shoulder-clapper [F&H].

a bailiff.

1766		Midnight Spy 103: A certain gentleman being pursued by one of our shoulder-dabbers, made into our house and there took shelter.
1909		(ref. to 1800) J. Ware Passing Eng. of the Victorian Era.

1. (US) a bully, a ruffian.

1852		S.F. Picayune 24 Mar. 2/5: There is in this city a party of from a dozen to twenty young men, known usually as ‘shoulder strikers,’ who are constantly going about creating disturbances [DA].
1853		Burlington Free Press (VT) 6 Dec. 2/2: Several of them are well-known shoulder-hitters and fighters.
1854		Soulé, Gihon & Nisbet Annals of S.F. 509: The rowdy and ‘shoulder-striker,’ the drunkard, the insolent.
1857		Compiler (Gettysburg, PA) 17 Aug. 2/2: We do not hesitate to say that ninety-nine in one hundred of all the thieves, murderers [...] shoulder-hitters, disbursers of ‘wet damnation’ [...] vote the Democratic ticket.
1858		Horace Bushnell ‘California,’ New Englander Feb. 29: These are the fugitives from justice, the absconding bigamists, the felons and prison birds who want a new field where they are not known, defalcators, pimps, shoulder-strikers and prize fighters.
1862		J.R. Lowell Biglow Papers 2nd ser. (1871) 245/1: Shoulder-hitters: I find that shoulder-striker is old, though I have lost the reference to my authority.
1865		G.A. Sala My Diary in America I 55: The blacklegs, the shoulder-hitters, the ‘hard cases’.
1871		Wkly Democratic Statesman (Austin, TX) 5 Oct. 4/5: I am no shoulder-striker.
1873		J. O’Connor Wanderings of a Vagabond 286: Them two fellers can whip, in a lump, all the shoulder-hitters in New York.
1874		Commercial Advertiser (N.Y.) 9 Sept. n.p.: So long as substantial citizens choose to leave politics to shoulder-hitters, rum-sellers and bummers of every degree, so long will they be robbed at every turn [F&H].
1881		Public Ledger (Memphis, TN) 10 Nov. 2/2: There are gentlemen [...] who carry pistols [...] for protection, if attacked by shoulder-hitters, thugs, robbers [...] and other malcontents.
1885		Seatle Dly Post-Intelligencer (WA) 12 July 3/3: Patrick Flynn, a great double-fisted shoulder-striker.
1888		Belfast News Letter 5 Apr. 3/7: Mitchell, the English half-gentleman shoulder striker, has thrashed Sullivan, the great slogger of Ireland.
1889		Indianapolis Jrnl 8 Dec. 13/3: He was one of the Bowery boys and was reputed one of the best samples of the shoulder hitter.
1892		Kansas Agitator (Garnett, KS) 18 Aug. 1/2: Bro. Routzong is a ‘shoulder-hitter’ and deals the old parties some telling blows.
1893		Morn. Call (San Francisco) 18 June 12/2: It remains for citizens [...] to teach the shoulder-striker, the political heeler and the groggery-keeper that honesty is honesty.
1903		A.H. Lewis Boss 54: If there were to come nothing before him more formidable than the regular opposition, Big Kennedy would go over it like a train of cars and ask no aid of shoulder-hitters.
1913		Eve. World (NY) 25 June 17/3: In front of him stood a lesser shoulder-hitter of the Ring.
1918		Yale Expositor (MI) 18 Apr. 4/5: The fellow who buttonholes you [...] isn’t in it with the shoulder hitter and crazy bone crusher.
1938		H. Asbury Sucker’s Progress 124: In many cities the rowdy element—the plug-uglies of Baltimore and shoulder-hitters of New York and Philadelphia—had already begun to acquire the power and influence which were destined to prove so useful to the politicians.
1948		Wilkes-Barre Times Leader (PA) 3 July 8/5: Train loads of strong arm toughs, / Shoulder hitters known as roughs / Ruffians ready for all rebuffs.
1959		(con. 1900-29) L. Katcher Big Bankroll 27: [‘Big Tim’] Sullivan was a leader. He had come up the ladder, from shoulder bumper to boss, under the aegis of Richard Croker and Tom Foley.
1986		News Jrnl (Wilmington, DE) 17 Mar. D4/3: ‘Shoulder hitters’ or baggage forwarders, as they called themselves [were] accused in court of doing grievous bodily harm.

2. in fig. use of sense 1.

1912		Aberdeen Herald (Chehalis Co., TX) 29 Apr. 4/4: He made a speech [...] denouncing the I.W.W. and its methods, and it was a shoulder striker too.
1912		T.A. Dorgan Daffydils 26 Dec. [synd. cartoon strip] The street corner spieler was delivering a shoulder blow speech anent the wrongs committed.

a bailiff.

1821		W.T. Moncrieff Tom and Jerry III iv: visitors.: A bailiff! – shocking! shocking! [...] green.: Yes, very shocking, indeed, I can’t abide these shoulder-knots.
1835		G. Kent Modern Flash Dict.
1848		Flash Dict. in Sinks of London Laid Open.

(UK Und.) a partner to a pickpocket.

1674		Head Canting Academy (2nd edn) 180: Shoulder sham Partner to a File.
c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Shoulder-sham c. a Partner to a File.
1725		New Canting Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1754		Scoundrel’s Dict. 18: Partners to Files – Shoulder-shams.
1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.

in coaching, a passenger who pays the coachman directly but is not part of the official way-bill.

1876

‘Some Road Slang Terms’ in Malet Annals of the Road 395: 4. Of Coachmen Bit of fish...A passenger not on the way-bill.

a general term for a variety of ‘distraction crimes’, i.e. street robberies performed where one member of a team distracts the target by starting an argument, pouring liquid on their clothes etc; while the argument is being resolved or the clothes cleaned, the actual robber has the opportunity to steal.

1991		Chicago Trib. Travel 11 Aug. 4/2: ‘Shoulder surfers’ can steal your access number [...] then peddle the illicit numbers [...] for $5 or $10 a pop.
1993		Lerner et al. Dict. of Today’s Words 158: Shoulder surfer – a person who illegally acquires and later uses or sells someone’s telephone credit card number.
1994		L.A. Times 1 Oct. D/1: Watch Out ATM Users: A slew of ‘shoulder surfers’ is stealing people’s ATM codes.
2003		BBC.co.uk News 9 Oct. 🌐 An increasingly common problem is ‘shoulder surfing’ – where criminals watch as a PIN number is entered then steal the card using either a Lebanese loop or a door swipe.
2003		Observer Crime 27 Apr. 28: Shoulder surfing. Stealing PIN numbers at cashpoints for use later with copied cards.
2014		St Louis Post-Dispatch (MO) 26 June A008/1: Even a nefarious ‘shoulder surfer’ [...] spying over a user’s shoulder [...] wouldhave trouble plicking out the same person.

1. a bailiff; thus shoulder-tapping adj.

1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1833		Albany Microscope (NY) 28 Dec. n.p.: J. Maddix, formerly a ‘shoulder taper’ [sic] of this city .
1842		S. Lover Handy Andy 332: I’d rather nab a rhyme than a gintleman any day, and if I could get on the press, I’d quit the shoulder-tapping profession.

2. (US) a member of a military press gang, forcing men into the Confederate army.

1862

N.Y. Dly Herald 21 Apr. 4/2: The press gangs in the Southern States are called ‘shoulder tappers’. When a man in the street is tapped on the shoulder it means that he must repair immediately to the nearest camp.

3. (US Und.) a police officer.

1880		Cincinnati Enquirer (OH) 28 Oct. n.p.: Detective gannon [...] is a shoulder-tapper regularly attached to the police of this city.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).

to be drunk.

1737

B. Franklin ‘Drinkers Dictionary’ in Pennsylvania Gazette 6 Jan. in AS XII:2 92: They come to be well understood to signify plainly that A MAN IS DRUNK. [...] He’s burnt his Shoulder.

(US black gang) to fight with one’s fists.

1991

L. Bing Do or Die (1992) 105: They won’t go one on one, they won’t get ’em up from the shoulder.

(Aus./US) involved in fighting; pugnacious.

1872		‘Mark Twain’ Innocents at Home 334: ‘He was on it bigger than an Injun!’ ‘On it? On what?’ ‘On the shoot. On the shoulder. On the fight, you understand.’.
1876		‘Dan de Quille’ Big Bonanza (1947) 287: Jim Cartter is a powerfully-built man [...] a man who is ‘on the shoulder’ and who is at home with either knife or pistol.
1901		Sydney Sportsman (Surry Hills, NSW) 2 Oct. 1/2: Who has the job of catching the two-uppers at play [...] will have to be a bit on the shoulder, for if the players tumble to him they will very likely hurt him.
1904		Sydney Sportsman (Surry Hills, NSW) 8 June 6/2: If Mr. Kelly is a wiso guy he woii't extend his travels, not ‘on the shoulder’ anyway.

see straight from the shoulder adv.