Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (orig. milit., also flea-park) a sleeping bag or bed; a bedroll, a mattress.

c.1790		‘De May-Bush’ in Walsh Ireland Ninety Years Ago (1885) 91: Bill Durham [...] Was now in his flea-park, taking a snore Fearing every moment the arrival of the real Simon Pure should cover me with shame and disgrace.
1839		C.J. Lever Harry Lorrequer 266: ‘I think the gentleman would be better if he went off to his flea-bag himself.’ In my then mystified intellect this west country synonym for a bed a little puzzled me.
c.1810		‘The May Bush’ in A. Carpenter Verse in Eng. in 18C Ireland (1998) 342: Den out of his Flea-bag he straight flew.
1846		Blackburn Standard 15 July 4/2: Poor Charley would have three or four bottles [...] before he could lift his head off the flea-bag.
1857		Glasgow Herald 15 Apr. 2/4: For this sum I had my meals and a ‘flea-bag’ to sleep upon.
1861		Bell’s Life in Sydney 7 Dec. 3/2: A slashing pair of knickerbockers and a three bushel ‘fleabag’, his property, were missing.
1870		Berwicks. News 5 July 7/3: ‘What! [...] a hundred and ten francs for two days in this hole? — francs a night for that miserable flea-bag!’ [...] flea-bag is a fancy locution of the day for bed.
1881		Sheffield Dly Teleg. 8 Oct. 13/5: This is my bed. ‘Ere, landlord, ’ere’s a bloke got into my flea-bag.
1914		T. Hampson diary 29 Oct. 🌐 Made a flea bag by sewing two blankets together.
1917		‘Ian Hay’ Carrying On 184: As he rolled into his ‘flea-bag’ that night.
1918		L.N. Smith Lingo of No Man’s Land 35: FLEA-BAG Officer’s sleeping bag or bed-roll.
1921		N&Q 12 Ser. IX 499: Flea-Bag [...] is surely the Army sleeping-bag.
1926		‘Ford Madox Ford’ Man Could Stand Up 96: He sat up in his flea-bag, dripping with icy sweat.
1931		Irwin Amer. Tramp and Und. Sl. 75: Fleabag.–A bed roll or sleeping bag. Originally used by tramps and migratory workers, the term was extended to designate an officer’s sleeping bag or bedding during the World War.
1944		P. Kendall Dict. Service Sl. n.p.: flea bag . . . your mattress.
1953		B. Stronach Musterer on Molesworth 32: I sat smoking before turning in to my ‘flea bag’.

2. a cheap hotel or lodging house.

1900		Sporting Times 3 Mar. 2/5: I drove back to seek repose in the before-mentioned flea-bag.
1931		D. Runyon ‘Broadway Financier’ in Runyon on Broadway (1954) 204: I will be living at home with her instead of in a flea bag in Forty-seventh Street.
1946		Mezzrow & Wolfe Really the Blues 177: We all laid around that fleabag-with-room-service for a couple of gripy weeks.
1958		A. King Mine Enemy Grows Older (1959) 25: One flea bag in the West Forties, the Hotel Minnetonka, left a particularly lurid shadow in my memory.
1963		H.S. Thompson letter 9 Sept. in Proud Highway (1997) 397: You don’t want him to know you’re staying in some fleabag.
1970		T. Southern Blue Movie (1974) 64: Awright, awright, there’s two more [hotels] [...] but they’re complete flea bags.
2003		N. Green Angel of Montague Street (2004) 3: There was still a lot of old fleabags like the Hotel Montague.
2016		D. Whish-Wilson Old Scores [ebook] Even double-storey fleabags like the Raceway, made of salmon-brick and orange terracotta, usually had a couple of self-catering rooms.

3. (US, also flea-bed) an ageing, ill dog.

1904		Kipling ‘Steam Tactics’ in Traffics and Discoveries 188: I’ll protect your flanks in case this sniffin’ flea-bag is tempted beyond ’is strength.
1931		O. Strange Law O’ The Lariat 207: Followed the dawg, yu chump [...] Started for town to see yu, an’ that four-legged flea-bag sneaked after.
1971		(con. 1930s–50s) D. Wells Night People 117: Flea-bed. A dog.
1977		S. Stallone Paradise Alley (1978) 28: ‘There ain’t no reason to call Bella a fleabag.’ ‘Hey Vic, that mutt’s got no class.’.

4. (US) an old, worn-out prostitute who is forced to seek equally run-down clients, often on Skid Row, in cheap hotels etc.

1935		A.J. Pollock Und. Speaks 40/2: Flea bag, a girl who solicits (promotes) sailors on the water front.
1944		A. Kapelner Lonely Boy Blues (1965) 93: The man said: No flea bag’s calling me a filthy foreigner!
1958		Murtagh & Harris Cast the First Stone 11: Prostitutes, from the very young beauties to the shabbiest old fleabags, say that [etc.].
1967		in S. Harris Hellhole 169: Prostitutes called ‘fleabags’ because they are inclined to be syphilitic.

5. a general pej.

1943		R. Llewellyn None But the Lonely Heart 117: You wait, you old fleabag, you.
1950		Goldin et al. DAUL 71/2: Fleabag. [...] 2. A petty informer; an unprincipled weakling.
1968		P. Barnes Ruling Class I vii: Yes, he’s a nut-case all right, but then so are most of these titled flea-bags.
1998		B. Robinson Peculiar Memories of Thomas Penman 151: Rumbold and his pal known as ‘Flea-Bag’ turned up.

6. (US) a second-rate nightclub.

1956

‘James Updyke’ [W.R. Burnett] It’s Always Four O’Clock 20: [F]lea-bags where the meals they give the ‘artists’ are more important than the money they pay.

7. (US black) a troublesome, difficult person who tends, like fleas, to follow around and irritate the individual who has been made subject to their woes.

1958		Hughes & Bontemps Book of Negro Folklore 365: Monkey hollered, Ow! / I didn’t mean it, Mister Lion! / Lion said, You little flea-bag you!
1983		R. Klein Jailhouse Jargon and Street Sl. [unpub. ms.].

8. a smelly person, usu. a tramp, a vagrant.

2001

OnLine Dict. of Playground Sl. 🌐 fleabag n. derog. smelly person dressed in Oxfam style dress, possibly wearing Tesco trainers, possibly having fleas too.

9. (N.Z. prison) a member of the Mongrel Mob biker/prison gang [dogs have fleas].

2001

D. Looser Boobslang [U. Canterbury D.Phil. thesis] 70/2: fleabag n. a derogatory term for a member of the Mongrel Mob.