picker-up, n. — Green’s Dictionary of Slang

picker-up n.

1. that member of a confidence trick team who first meets and lures the victim into the plot.

1777		J. Fielding Thieving Detected 29: The first is the Picker-up; his business is to go up to the countryman whom they mean to do, enter into conversation with him.
1865		Leaves from Diary of Celebrated Burglar 8/1: The mob [...] are playing among themselves ‘funk’ fashion, until they receive the ‘office’ from the ‘picker-up’ that he is bringing a ‘flat’ along.
1877		S. James Vagabond Papers (3rd series) 136: You have to go into general business. You must be a magsman, a pincher, a picker-up, a flatcatcher, a bester.

2. (Und.) an employee of a dancehall or gambling house whose task was to entice passers-by into the establishment.

1832		Satirist (London) 16 Sept. 303/1: He then became a bonnet or picker up at a low gaming table.
1834		Satirist (London) 5 Feb. 7/1: ‘[M]y friend the captain’ [...] was nothing more than what is vulgarly called a ‘picker-up.’ Of course, the ruffian [...] has doubtless immortalised himself by his address in nick-ing such a pigeon.
1859		Matsell Vocabulum 115: The picker-up takes his man to a gambling-saloon, and there leaves him to be enchanted, enchained, and allured by what he sees [...] The picker-up is always a gentleman, in manners, taste, dress, and appearance, and sometimes has the superficial knowledge of a scholar. He is thoroughly informed on all the topics of the day [...] Every man has some weak point which can be played upon, and the duty of the picker-up is to discover it.
1860		R. Nicholson Rogue’s Progress (1966) 117: The distinguished position of being a hell-keeper’s tout, a picker-up or bonnet.
1908		Bulletin (Sydney) 10 Dec. 18/4: Graham sprang to meet him, but Dinan dashed past him, and, catching his opponent’s chief ‘picker-up’ a mighty blow, knocked him through a doorway down some steps into the backyard.
1938		(con. 1860s) H. Asbury Sucker’s Progress 415: A jostling mass of cappers, steerers, ropers-in and pickers-up, fighting over the suckers and literally dragging their prey into the gambling houses.

3. in prize-fighting, a second.

1895

C. Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 58: Picker Up, he who acts as second in a prize-fight.

4. (UK Und.) a prostitute [pick up v. (1a)].

1909

J. Ware Passing Eng. of the Victorian Era 195/2: Picker-up (Thieves’, 19 cent.). Woman of the town.