Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. to fondle or molest sexually (cite 1756 prob. verbal love-making).

1756		‘On Deborah Perkins’ in A. Carpenter Verse in Eng. in 18C Ireland (1998) 304: If I haven’t their letters, / I sing of their betters, / When I touch up young Deborah Perkins.
1785, 1788, 1796, 1811, 1823		see sense 2.
1837		‘Blue Bells of Ireland’ in Ri-tum Ti-tum Songster 3: And when Johnny touched her Fanny up, / she still cried encore!
1849		Sam Sly 20 Jan. 2/1: He advises H— B—g[ ...] to look a little more after his children, and pay fewer attentions to the ballet girls. You are too fond of one Miss D—l in particular, and exhibit your folly by touching her up behind, and treating her to pennyworths of oysters afterwards.
1896		Farmer Vocabula Amatoria (1966) 26: Badiner [...] 2. To grope a woman; ‘to touch up.’.
1927		‘J.M. Hall’ Anecdota Americana I 65: ‘Did he do this?’ lifting her skirt and touching her up.
1954		in Randolph & Legman Ozark Folksongs and Folklore (1992) I 541: The ball was all in splendour, all the City nobs were there, / Touching-up the ladies just like farmers at a fair.
1959		K. Amis letter 15 Dec. in Leader (2000) 565: I thought of that cold night outside the Gents / When Dai touched Gwyneth up with his gloves on.
1965		E. Bond Saved Scene vi: The ol’ bleeder shuts ’is eyes for prayers an’ they’re touchin’ ’em up all over the place.
1971		J. Mandelkau Buttons 42: My mate happened to turn around and see a skinhead touching up his girl.
1977		(con. 1960s) D. Goines Black Gangster (1991) 20: No way for . . . you to go behind the walls . . . without being touched up.
1999		Guardian G2 23 Aug. 4: I’ve just been touched up by Frank Bruno.
2006		D. Mitchell Black Swan Green 107: I’ll tell him [...] you touched me up.

2. to urge someone into action, to exert influence on.

1795		Fortnights Ramble through London 30: Mr Smirk, the auctioneer [...] could touch you up a lot. There was no resisting him. He would force you to bid whether you would or no.
1796		T. Morton Way to Get Married in Inchbold (1808) XXV 57: caust: I order you, sir, to arrest him. mcquery: [...] You will make the affidavit, and I will touch him up with a bit of a capias.
1817		M. Edgeworth Harrington I iii 55: You will see [...] how cleverly I will get myself out of the scrape with her. I know how to touch her up .
1831		Satirist (London) 22 May 55/2: Touch up the elder Sumner, for not sending me more presents.
1850		Life in Boston & N.Y. (Boston, MA) 27 Apr. n.p.: I have wished [...] that some one would ‘touch up’ the wayward youth of this place.
1851		‘Epistle from Joe Muggins’s Dog’ in Era (London) 24 Aug. 4/4: Then someboddey saide as how he [...] had back’d Nancy [...] for fifteen hundred poundes for ther Grate Yorkshire Stakes, and that wood tutch ’em up a bit.
c.1863		T. Taylor in M.R. Booth Eng. Plays of 19C (1969) II 140: The roughs adore music..and as for sentiment and sensation, if you could hear Miss St. Evremond touch them up with the ‘Maniac’s Tear’, the new sensation ballad [etc.].

3. of a man, to have sexual intercourse.

1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: To touch up a woman; to have carnal knowledge of her.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.
1896		Farmer Vocabula Amatoria (1966) 23: Avoir du plaisir = to copulate; ‘to get touched up.’.

4. to jog the memory of.

1811		Austen Sense and Sensibility (1970) 255: We must touch up the Colonel to do something to the parsonage.
1817		M. Edgeworth Love and Law I ii: Touch Catty up about her ould ancient family, and all the Kings of Ireland she comes from.
1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.

5. to stimulate, to interest.

1878		‘’Arry on Politics’ in Punch 11 May 205/1: For I tell yer they’re [i.e. newspapers] pilled up that spicy, they touch up a fellow to rights.
1920		Table Talk (Melbourne) 7 Oct. 34/1: They've been touchin’ us up a bit. / ‘A real snodger!’ they called him [i.e. a racehorse] / ‘A regular rumpty-tummer!’.
1939		Wodehouse Uncle Fred in the Springtime 236: ‘Valerie? Coming here?’ ‘I thought that would touch you up’ .

6. to beat, to punish with a caning.

1904		Wodehouse Gold Bat [ebook] This meant that the culprit must be ‘touched up’ before the house assembled in the dining-room.
1909		Wodehouse Mike [ebook] ‘He wanted me to call a prefects’ meeting and touch young Mike up’.