Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (orig. US, also charley) a generic term for a person, usu. a man; thus as a term of address [generic use of the popular given name; in cit. 1825 ‘Charley’ is an un-named cabbie].

1825		N.Y. Mirror 2 Apr. 287: The gentleman left Charley turning over the silver, quite satisfied with his success in making, as he expressed himself, ‘the flats pay for their experience’.
1834		N.Y. Times 12 May 2/6: A brace of ‘Charlies’ from the city, came up to Lowell, one day this week, to see the factory girls and have a ‘spree’.
1906		S. Ford Shorty McCabe 72: She was watchin’ every move I made, as much as to say, ‘You can’t lose me, Charlie.’.
1912		Day Book (Chicago) 23 Mar. 15/1: The handsome charlys with the fifty-cents gold stickpin and the lovely comb on their hair.
1921		Dos Passos Three Soldiers 41: A lot of soldiers were sitting in a ring round two tall negroes whose black faces and chests glistened like jet in the faint light. ‘Come on, Charley, give us another,’ said someone.
1933		J.T. Farrell Gas-House McGinty 87: You’ll be the big-hand Charlie and feel sorry for every Tom, Dick, and Harry who doesn’t care whether your’re living or dead. Such a man!
1938		J. Curtis They Drive by Night 16: How you going on, me old Charlie?
1944		L. Glassop We Were the Rats 110: Give the kids a fair go Charlie, or I’ll smack you in the chops.
1957		‘Nino Culotta’ They’re a Weird Mob (1958) 203: So watch it, Charlie. Return all shouts, pull your weight on the job, if you have cigarettes offer them to others; if a man does you a favour, return it sometime.
1959		W. Hall Long and the Short and the Tall Act II: Then, one day, this poor Charlie winds up with a bird.
1960		‘Nino Culotta’ Cop This Lot 159: I sez, ‘Yer know wot yer c’n do with those, Charlie.’.
1968		A. Burgess Enderby Outside in Complete Enderby (2002) 299: You got money, Charlie?
1977		G.F. Newman Villain’s Tale 176: Oi, Charlie! Where’s our grub?
1989		H. Rawson Dict. of Invective (1991) 279: Other generics include: [...] Charlie, any male, especially a white one.
1998		L. Stringer Grand Central Winter (1999) 112: He became a Big-Time Charlie at the soup kitchen.
2002		D.H. Sterry Chicken (2003) 97: You’re not here to have a good time, Charlie, you’re here to get paid.
2002		J. Ridley Conversation with the Mann 91: What do you say to a woman who’s probably been tossed lines by every Charlie who’d ever caught her act.

2. (also charley) a small, pointed beard [that worn by King Charles I (r.1625–49)].

1824		Gent.’s Mag. 1 Mar. 295/2: With white pantaloons, watch chains, and Wellingtons, and a Charley at their under lip [F&H].
1841		Hook Widow x 145: He... wore... a Charley on his under lip [F&H].
1861		J.W. Taylor Antiquities Falkland 43: That square, short man... wearing a moustache and Charlie is William Laud [F&H].
1876		R.M. Jephson Girl He Left Behind Him Ch. i n.p.: Dolly himself was occupied in nursing a tuft of hair on his chin termed, grandiloquently, an imperial, familiarly, a Charley [F&H].
1913		Tacoma Times (WA) 3 July 4/4: Lord Ballyrot in Slangland [...] ‘Hey, Con! Yank the chimes! [...] This Cholly guy wants to do a brodie off the rattler.

3. a hunchback [Lancs. dial.; who supposedly carried his ‘little brother Charlie’ on his back; note army jargon charlie, a pack].

1937–84

Partridge DSUE (1984) 199/1: mid-C.19–20.

4. (US) a moustachioed man [? ext. of sense 2].

1922

Appleton Post-Crescent (WI) 29 Apr. 7/4: Flapper Dictionary charlie – Any fellow with a mustache.

5. (also charley) a chamberpot.

1925

L. O’Flaherty Informer n.p.: They’d take the charley from under a pope’s bed .

6. (US black, also cholly, hard-luck charlie) a dollar bill.

1924		Hecht & Bodenheim Cutie 33: Herman handed the man twenty-five charlies.
1936		(ref. to 1918) L. Duncan Over the Wall 21: I learned quickly that [...] a two-dollar note was a Hard-Luck-Charlie.
1936		D. Burley in Chicago Defender 13 June 7: [She] let a ‘sweet tawkin’’ auto salesman ‘tawk’ her out of 1500 chollies.
1944		D. Burley Orig. Hbk of Harlem Jive 51: I couldn’t dig when they’d want me to ‘knock a scoff,’ or ‘weed ’em a brace of chollies’.
1958		Hughes & Bontemps Book of Negro Folklore 482: cholly: A dollar bill. When you beg for a cholly, you’re really down.
1967		P. Thomas Down These Mean Streets (1970) 106: ‘Hey, man, you got a couple charlies you can lend me?’ ‘Sorry, man, I wish I did have two bucks, but here’s half a man,’ and I really wouldn’t hear the ‘Thanks, man,’ as I slid half a dollar into a hand that somehow would convert that change into a fix of heroin.
1972		B. Rodgers Queens’ Vernacular 137: Folding money: cholly (kwn LA, hustler sl, fr black sl = dollar bill).

7. (US campus) menstruation.

1967–8

Baker et al. CUSS 95: Charlie, have be menstruating.

8. (N.Z. juv.) temporarily deadening someone’s leg by driving one’s knee into their thigh muscle.

2003

McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. 44: charlie A knee into the thigh, an unpleasant playground activity.