Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. the penis.

1763		J. Wilkes Essay on Woman 20: [footnote] But ’tis at Beauty my true Pointer stands.
1772		G. Stevens ‘The Sentiment Song’ in Songs Comic and Satyrical 124: Ye Fowlers who eager at Partridges aim, / Don’t mark the maim’d Covey, but mind better Game; / ’Tis Beauty’s the Sport to repay Sportsmen’s trouble, / And there may our Pointers stand stiff in the Stubble.
1793		Bacchanalian Mag. 72: [as 1772] .
1841		‘Toasts And Sentiments’ in Gentleman’s Spicey Songster 48: Stiff, stubble, and a staunch pointer.
1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.

2. (UK Und.) an informer.

1848

Ladies’ Repository (N.Y.) Oct. VIII:37 316/2: Pointer, One who shows thieves to the police.

3. (orig. US) a hint, a suggestion.

1884		N.Y. Herald 4 Nov. n.p.: I will give him a pointer that will be of great benefit to you in your business [F&H].
1903		A.H. Lewis Boss 167: This for a pointer, then [...] Whatever goes has got to go on th’ quiet.
1912		A. Berkman Prison Memoirs of an Anarchist (1926) 127: Wingie promises to [...] ‘furnish more pointers bymby’.
1934		O. Strange Sudden 26: Want yu to dig suthin’ out – the bullet; mebbe it’ll give us a pointer.
1963		G. Lambert Inside Daisy Clover (1966) 164: With Wade’s help I can pick up a pointer or two.
1982		G.V. Higgins Patriot Game (1985) 59: We could sort of look on and get some pointers about what we might be doing wrong.
1999		Guardian Rev. 23 July 23: This week’s cultural pointer: the Kennedys prove that it’s OK to mourn in Bermuda shorts.

4. (W.I.) a knife.

1936

cited in Cassidy & LePage Dict. Jam. Eng. (1980).

5. (US) in pl., the female breast.

c.1950		K. Howard Small Time Crooks 8: Two pointers swinging out, no ‘falsies’ there with that swing.
1963		A.S. Fleischman Venetian Blonde (2006) 147: My friend here wants to know if them pointers are real or just for flash.