Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. imprisoned, transported.

a.1790		H.T. Potter New Dict. Cant (1795) n.p.: lagged transported.
1823		‘Jon Bee’ Dict. of the Turf, the Ring, the Chase, etc. 69: Downey coves, who know how to pick pockets, or gamble cleverly, or how a man can ‘get off the capital’ (i.e. avoid hanging) or being lagged, bottled, or even stagged.
1832		Egan Bk of Sports 263: [note] He had twice been pull’d, and nearly lagg’d, but got off by going to sea.
1846		G.W.M. Reynolds Mysteries of London I 36/2: ‘He’s sartain sure to be lagged.’ ‘Ah! it must be a clever nob in the fur trade who’ll get him off’.
1849		J.P. Townsend Rambles in New South Wales 168: You, you long-tailed donkey, were lagged with your own consent.
1858		A. Mayhew Paved with Gold 70: It’s a bad game, you know as well as I do, and I won’t stand by and see a mere kid like this here put in the way of being lagged or scragged (transported or hanged) as he is sure to be at last if he goes on the cross like us.
1861		(con. 1840s–50s) H. Mayhew London Labour and London Poor III 392/1: Some’s dead, some’s gone to sea, some into the country, some home, and some lagged.
1879		‘Autobiog. of a Thief’ in Macmillan’s Mag. (London) XL 503: I [...] guyed down a double before you could say Jack Robinson. It was a good job I did, or else I should have got lagged (sent to penal servitude).
1880		Melbourne Argus 9 Aug. 1: These people [i.e. the Kelly Gang] lagged at Beechworth the other day had no more revolvers in their hands than you have at present.
1882		Cremorne I 25: The man you [...] sent on the broad road to the devil till he got lagged.
1888		‘Rolf Boldrewood’ Robbery Under Arms (1922) 166: I don’t see but what bush-ranging [...] ain’t as safe a game, let alone the profits of it, as mooching about cattle-duffing and being lagged in the long-run all the same.
1894		Truth (Sydney) 4 Mar. 4/7: He ran against a Tartar — snagged, / And now in goal’s securely lagged.
1896		A. Morrison Child of the Jago (1982) 156: Want to git me lagged now, do ye?
1905		Marvel III:55 10: When he’s lagged, you and me’ll work together on our own.
1912		E. Pugh City Of The World 263: Another reason why burgling ain’t exactly dinner for tea is that he’s bound to cop out at the finish – get lagged, I mean.
1918		Jackson Dly News (MS) 1 Apr. 7/3: Crook Chatter [...] ‘A crook when convicted is said to be “lagged”’.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 155: If a fellow gave them trouble being lagged they let him have it hot and heavy in the bridewell.
1935		R.T. Hopkins Life and Death at the Old Bailey 63: The following crook’s words and phrases date from the days of the old Old Bailey: [...] transported – lagged.
1940		D. Maurer Big Con 140: The fear of getting lagged keeps you always under a strain.
1943		R. Llewellyn None But the Lonely Heart 342: You’d look bright if you got lagged, wouldn’t you, eh?
1967		‘Whisper All Aussie Dict.’ in Kings Cross Whisper (Sydney) xxxvi 4/1: lagged: To be given up to the gendarmes.
1989		J. Morton Lowspeak.

2. (US prison) imprisoned with no hope of release.

1936

Mencken Amer. Lang. (4th edn) 581: In virtually all American prisons [...] To have no hope of release is to be buried, lagged or settled.