Green’s Dictionary of Slang

a prostitute.

1966		Trimble 5000 Adult Sex Words and Phrases.
1986–7		Maledicta IX 149: The compilers ought to have looked farther afield and found: [...] public convenience.

a prostitute.

c.1786		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue ms. additions n.p.: Public Ledger. A Prostitute: because, like that [news] paper, she is open to all parties. NB the Motto of that Paper is open to all Parties but Influenced by none.
1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue (2nd, 3rd edn) .
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
[1861		N.E. Police Gaz. (Boston, MA) 5 Oct. 8/3: Annie French is like a cheap hotel, open to all classes of customers].
1862		E. de la Bédollière Londres et les Anglais 317/1: public ledger, femme de mauvaise vie.
1896		Farmer Vocabula Amatoria (1966) 29: Balances de boucher, f. A prostitute; ‘a public ledger’.

a bankrupt.

1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.

a confidence trickster who poses as a dissenting preacher, thus attracting a crowd who can be robbed by the ‘preacher’s’ confederates.

1864, 1867, 1870		Hotten Sl. Dict. 207: Public patterers swell mobites who pretend to be dissenting preachers, and harangue in the open air to attract a crowd for their confederates to rob.
1873		Sl. Dict.

working as a prostitute.

1765

Harris’s List of Covent Garden Ladies 38: Has been on the public but a few months.