Green’s Dictionary of Slang

ostentation, showing-off.

1833		Flash Mirror q. in National Standard of Lit., Science etc. I 355/1: Sloggers, or fighting men, ape the dress of the sporting swell, and in every thing resemble them, excepting the flashness of their gait, and the colour of their neck-rag.
1851		J. Henderson Escursions [...] in NSW I 126: Out of a spirit of bravado, or ‘flashness,’ as it is called, one of them actually used a pound note as wadding for his powder and shot.
1865		Leaves from Diary of Celebrated Burglar 43/1: Charley, more for ‘flashness’ than anything else, at this time carried his ‘skin’ in his ‘tail’.
1871		J.B. Castieau Diaries 13 Feb./ (2004) 115: He displayed most stolid endurance without the slightest bravado or flashness & took his fifty lashes without a groan & scarcely a movement.
1888		‘Rolf Boldrewood’ Robbery Under Arms (2004) 122: It’s come just as I said, and knowed it would, through Starlight’s cussed flashness.
1894		‘Price Warung’ Tales of the Early Days 237: By my lights, my flash cove, I’ll have to take your flashness out of yer.
1900		in C. White Hist. of Aus. Bushranging 386: I lay blame on myself that I did not get up yesterday and examine the witnesses; but I thought that if I did so it would look like bravado and flashness.
1901		W.S. Walker In the Blood 230: Drunkeness, the old taint of Australian ‘flashness’—the don’t-care-a-damn manner.
c.1905		J. Furphy Buln-Buln and the Brolga (1948) Ch. i: 🌐 I’m goin’ to take the flashness out o’ this psalm-singin’ beggar!
1911		C.E.W. Bean ‘Dreadnought’ of the Darling 315: You still occasionally hear of some solitary flickering outburst of the old pioneering ‘flashness’ in the West.
1935		R.P. Plowman Boundary Rider 263: And flashness is not approved of in the bush, especially in a parson.
1959		D. Stivens Jimmy Brockett 172: There are blokes who say that it’s only flashness that makes Jimmy Brockett use the phone so much.
1963		Oceania XXXIII 79: Charges of snobbery, or ‘flashness,’ or ‘stuck-upness’ can be levelled at a part- Aboriginal who tries to cut himself away [...] from his Aboriginal ties.
1979		Cashman & McKernan Sport in History 356: Some yelled: ‘Flash nigger’ and ‘That’s flashness’, referring derogatorily to Johnson’s showy manner.
1985		P. Carey Illywhacker 61: Only deriving pleasure from a loose-limbed flashness and not from any great demands on his skill or any pride in the final victory.
1992		M. Binchy Lilac Bus 383: But no matter who had asked her to marry them her mother would have seen flashness and her father suspected insecurity.
2004		G. Cowlishaw Blackfellas, Whitefellas 183: The crudeness of expression challenges white interlocutors and also undermines the suspicion of flashness he attracts as a university graduate.

(Aus.) wild or half-wild cattle.

1894

Truth (Sydney) 1July 5/4: Wild, or half-wild scrab cattle, called by stockmen ‘flash cattle’.

an ostentatious, loudly dressed and usu. ill-mannered man; also as adj.

1849		Proc. Old Bailey 29 Jan. 🌐 THOMAS HUGHES (policeman, H 52) [...] I told him I wanted him concerning some jewellery from the West-end—he said, ‘I suppose it is the rings; I bought them of Flash Harry, in the Lane, for 4l’.
1856		Herts. Guardian 17 May 5/5: Wilson [...] known at Liverpool and Manchester by the cognomen of ‘Flash Harry,’ has been convicted of fraud.
1869		York Herald 17 July 5/4: Among those committed for trial [...] are Harry Capstick, alias ‘Flash Harry’.
1877		Bucks Herald 5 May 8/4: James Alford, alias ‘Flash Harry,’ who escaped from Kirkdale Gaol yesterday, was arrested today.
1880		Bulletin (Sydney) 9 Oct. 8/2: The Georgia Minstrels have finished their Hobart Town season. Richardson, ‘Flash Harry,’ who took them there, made a dead loss.
1884		Dundee Courier 16 May 5/8: Onion was a bad character, and was known as ‘Flash Harry’ and ‘Fagin the Second’.
1890		Morn. Post (London) 16 June 8/4: Harley was removed by force from the dock [...] shouting that he ‘would do 10 pennyworth’ (10 years penal servitude) for ‘Flash Harry’.
1901		‘Flash Harry of Savaii’ in Chambers’s Jrnl 800: I and the native at the bow-oar [...] pulled for all we were worth, just as ‘Flash Harry’ dropped on one knee and fired.
1910		Bulletin (Sydney) 3 Nov. 15/2: The arrival of the mail is an event in towns west of the Big Trickle, and if ‘Flash Harry’ were to sneak in unobserved, the populace would be down on him.
1914		Liverpool Echo 26 June 8/1: Prisoner was known as ‘Flash Harry’, and he was a persistent thief.
1942		J. Lees-Milne Ancestral Voices diary 14 June (1975) 68: ‘This is Lord Brocket.’ B. [...] beamed, bowed, and received the homage of a dozen demi-mondaines and and flash-alfs during an impressive hush.
1978		D. Marechera House of Hunger (2013) [ebook] And she immediately clashed with Flash Harry by exclaiming [etc].
1980		Barltrop & Wolveridge Muvver Tongue 94: A stlylishly dressed individual is a ‘Flash Harry’.
1986		R. Hewitt White Talk Black Talk 39: They walk along the street [...] don’t move out of the way. All along the street. Right Flash Harrys.
1999		(con. 1956) C. Logue Prince Charming 199: ‘Tynan’s a flash harry,’ he said. ‘You can’t count on him.’.
1999		Observer 18 July 33: The jury would naturally tend to believe an upholder of the law rather than a Flash Harry.
2000		Indep. Mag. 1 Apr. 49: I always think BMWs and Audis are posers’ cars, but this doesn’t look too ‘Flash Harry’.
2006		D. Seabrook Jack of Jumps (2007) 274: He pointed at Vaughan [...] and said, ‘Look at Flash Harry.’.
2012		(con. 1943) G.S. Manson Coorparoo Blues [ebook] ‘So Flash Harry here [...] kicks up a stink, then next thing he’s gone’.
2018		G. Gilmore Class Act [ebook] ‘Where’s Flash Harry then?’.

a dandy, a swell; also attrib.

1843		Cork Examiner 15 Mar. 4/5: Resembling a pick-pocket and being remanded [...] till your friends can [...] prove you are not Flash jack, alias Bunkem, alias the Mizzler, alias Jockey Wide O, alias Slippery Joe [...] alias Conkey Dick.
1874		J. Greenwood Wilds of London (1881) 292: Flash Jack, with his great throat encircled by a bird’s-eye ‘Kingsman’ of irresistible pattern.
1899–1900		H. Lawson ‘The Golden Graveyard’ in Roderick (1972) 343: Jim Bently — a bit of a ‘Flash Jack’.
1902		Burnley Exp. 9 Apr. 4/2: Lord and Lady Easem are the leaders of a gang of burglars [...] In order to throw off suspicion ‘Flash Jack’ (otherwise Lord Easem) makes love to Dolly Miffin.
1909		N.Z. Truth 16 Jan. 6/5: A show, flash-jack sort of a Chow.
1910		Derby Dly Teleg. 5 Mar. n.p.: The other man [...] caught him by the shoulder. ‘Not this time, Flash Jack,’ he said. ‘Are you coming quietly?’.
a.1920		‘Flash Jack from Gundagai’ 🎵 I can do a respectable tally meself whenever I like to try / And I’m known around the country as Flash Jack from Gundagai.
1931		Hastings Obs. 15 Aug. 7/2: The crooks are led by ‘Flash Jack’, an expert with the throwing knife.

see separate entry.

a promiscuous young woman.

1849		Sam Sly 28 Apr. 2/2: How is [...] your little flash piece, Mary G——? Have you done her out of the half-a-crown a week?
1928		W. McFee Pilgrims of Adversity 415: Quite a flash piece, that; one of those Frenchy tarts you see round the opera house in Havana.
1978		Punch CCLXXIV 482: They wheeled in a flash piece called Lomie for him not long ago but he welcomed her in much the same way as Henry the Eighth welcomed Anne of Cleves.
1999		B. Franklin Social Policy, the Media and Misrepresentation 115: She’s not pretty and vivacious, she’s not a flash piece in miniskirt and leather jacket.

(US black) a notably stylish man.

1994

C. Major Juba to Jive 175: Flash-sport n. (1950s) an unusually stylish man.

1. smart, if ostentatious clothes.

1826		‘Nocturnal Sports’ in Universal Songster II 180/1: Had just tipped the cove o the ken a muzzler [...] but in my bolt knocked down an' tumbled over an old voman’s oyster-stall, rolled my flash-toggery in the mud.
1828		Sporting Mag. Oct. 444/2: He entirely eclipses all other huntsmen I have at any time seen; and without the slightest appearance of slang or flash toggery about him.
1828		Hereford Jrnl 16 Apr. 4/1: Brown, whose general ‘turn out’ was of superior character [...] Richmond being also attired in ‘flash togs’.
1834		‘Those London Mots’ in Bang-Up Songster 39: In flashy togs so fine array’d.
1834		(con. 1737–9) W.H. Ainsworth Rookwood (1857) 178: Soon then I mounted in swell-street high, / And sported my flashest toggery.
1865		Leeds Times 28 Jan. 8/4: Osborne’s own taste [...] does not develop itself in flash togs, cigars, or slang sayings.
1879		Era 28 Dec. 4/1: Travers pleased the audience [...] by impersonating the coster in the ‘flash togs’ who sings ‘My native land is Whitechapel’.
1882		‘Blooming Aesthetic’ in Rag 30 Sept. n.p.: A Sunday-flash-togs young man, / A pocket-of-hogs young man.
1894		Blackburn Standard 27 Jan. 3/4: Probably to a policeman anyone not in rags or ‘flash togs’ is of a gentlemanly appearance.
1916		Hull Dly Mail 17 Aug. 1/8: Tourist: Why are you sailors so fond of being tattoed. Old Sea Dog: Well, it’s just like you wearin’ those flash togs.

2. an official garment, denoting rank or attainment, to which one is not entitled.

1872

Worcs. Chron. 17 Apr. 2/5: Hoods or gowns or other flash toggery which they vend with their contemptible paper diplomas.

a pleasant day out.

1890–1904

Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.

(Aus.) extremely ostentatious.

1901		A. Pratt ‘Push’ Larrikinism in Australia in Blackwood’s Mag. July 38/1: The larrikin who owns a horse, dog, or cat bestows upon his pet the most superlative attention and affection, in which respect he resembles Chinamen, who are also wonderfully kind to animals. An Australian street proverb has in consequence arisen – ‘Flash as a Chinkey’s horse; fat as a larrikin’s dog.’.
1978		Sun-Herald (Sydney) 27 Aug. 59: Eddie [Coogan] is the ultimate lurkman [...] as flash as a rat with a gold tooth [GAW4].
1981		Bulletin 25 Aug. 53: Most Press descriptions of Grassby over the years had seemed to focus rather unnecessarily on his clothing, implying snidely that he was as flash as a rat with a gold tooth.
[1985		R.G. Barrett You Wouldn’t Be Dead for Quids (1989) 70: Sophia was grinning like a rat with a gold tooth].
1997		H. O’Connor letter to Greyhound Lines, Inc. 14 Aug. 🌐 Fine – but what is to stop your slimy lawyers – each flash as a rat with a gold tooth, I have no doubt – from claiming that this second suitcase is ‘inadequate packing.’.
2003		McGill Reed Dict. of N.Z. Sl. 79: flash as a Chow on a red bike Ostentatious. A West Coast saying going back to the goldmining era, when a ‘Chow’ or Chinese man on a red bike was unlikely, for the Chinese kept a low profile.
2005		M.B. ‘Chopper’ Read Chopper 4 176: I’ll be the bloke in the front row looking as flash as a rat with a gold tooth.

1. to produce, to hand over.

1895

E. Townsend Chimmie Fadden Explains 33: He flashed up a fiver.

2. of a woman, to dress showily, to use an excess of cosmetics.

1936

J. Curtis Gilt Kid 36: He was going to pretend to give the girl a break and, later, when he had got her flashed up good, start poncing on her.

3. to act in an exhibitionist manner.

1980

T. McClenaghan Submariners II i: I’ve had enough from this lot without you flashing up.

(UK Und.) a phr. describing one who exists on the fringes of the underworld and pretends to a far greater involvement than they actually have.

1812		Vaux Vocab. of the Flash Lang. in McLachlan (1964) 245: half-flash and half-foolish: this character is applied sarcastically to a person, who has a smattering of the cant language, and having associated a little with family people, pretends to a knowledge of life which he really does not possess, and by this conduct becomes an object of ridicule among his acquaintance.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1833		Sporting Mag. Dec. 94/1: ‘What’s the matter with that dog’s eyes?’ quoth the master, who is, as often as not, half flash and half foolish.

a phr. describing a fool who claims to have a small degree of fashionable worldliness.

1821

Egan Life in London (1869) 183: Do not let it be said of you, sneeringly, that you are quarter flash and three parts FOOLISH!!!

(UK und.) a corrupt magistrate.

1824

Observer (London) 29 Nov. 4/2: The presence of these men was permitted by the flash beaks of the country.

(UK Und.) a dishonest woman; spec. a receiver of stolen goods.

1821		D. Haggart Autobiog. 62: We fenced the dross-scout, drag, and chats with Mary Kidd, [...] a well known flash-blone.
1835		‘A Blow-Out Among The Blowen’ in Secret Songster 15: There was ev’ry flash blowen, and ev’ry flash man.
1841		J.F. O’Connell 11 Yrs in New Holland 42: Rossi’s eyes dilated, when a bellowser,* a flash blowen, entered, simpering and smiling to the audience.
1848		Ladies’ Repository (N.Y.) Oct. VIII:37 316/1: Flash Blowen, A dishonest woman.

(UK Und.) a swindler.

1889		Clarkson & Richardson Police! 342: When a deplorable accident happens, such as a colliery explosion or the capsizing of a lifeboat, members of the ‘flash boys’ gang’ immediately seize the opportunity of getting up subscription books, apparently duly authenticated by some well-known personage [...] in aid of the widows and orphans.
1943		R. Llewellyn None But the Lonely Heart 102: This Sartorelli bloke, and his flash boys and bookies, all plastered hair and pointed shoes, they puts cobs on me, they do.

see flash ken

a thug employed by a casino to ensure order.

1884

(con. 1730) A. Griffiths Chronicles of Newgate 208: A flash captain was kept to fight gentlemen who were peevish about losing their money.

(US police) a car driven by an undercover agent and which is consistent with his undercover persona.

1991

B. McCarthy Vice Cop 236: Vitaliano was sitting in a flash car [...] a biscuit-brown Thunderbird with wire wheels and a roadster roof—any pimp would be proud to drive it, and that was exactly what Vitaliano was pretending to be.

1. (also flash crib) a public house frequented mainly by criminals [case n.³ (1)/crib n.¹ (6)].

1718		C. Hitchin Regulator 21: An Account of the Flash-Cases [...] Henry Andrewson [...] keeps a Case, and all the Traders in general use his House, he is an Old Thief.
1812		Vaux Vocab. of the Flash Lang. in McLachlan (1964) 241: flash-crib, flash-ken [...] a public-house resorted to chiefly by family people, the master of which is commonly an old prig, and not unfrequently an old-lag.
1828		G. Smeeton Doings in London 78: The victims of flash-cribs, and brothels.
1830		Egan Finish to the Adventures of Tom and Jerry (1889) 164: The flash cribs [...] the Irish rows in the neighbourhood of St Giles’s; the low but honest pot-house.
1839		Crim.-Con. Gaz. 10 Aug. 266/3: [advert] Larks of London, or the Swell’s Guide to all the Flash Cribs, Harmonic meetings, Free and easies, Night Houses [...] the exploits of a Cove vot knows life.
1839		(con. 1724) W.H. Ainsworth Jack Sheppard (1917) 244: I’ve been to all the flash cases in town.
1845		J. Lindridge Sixteen-String Jack 197: ‘Softly lads, softly,’ whispered Rann [...] ‘we are not in a flash crib remember.’.
1855		Yokel’s Preceptor [title page]A Joskin’s Vocabulary Of the Various Slang Words now in constant use [...] all the New Moves and Artful Dodges practised at the present day, in all the most notorious Flymy Kens and Flash Cribs of London!
1902		H. Baumann ‘Sl. Ditty’ Londinismen (2nd edn) vi: Tell ye ’ow? Wy, in rum kens, / In flash cribs and slum dens, / I’ the alleys and courts, / ’Mong the doocedest sorts.

2. (US black) a satchel or bag that contains illegal drugs or any other contraband [SE case].

1983

R. Klein Jailhouse Jargon and Street Sl. [unpub. ms.].

a song, or poem, filled with criminal slang.

[1812		Vaux Vocab. of the Flash Lang. in McLachlan (1964) 241: flash-song a song interlarded with flash words, generally relating to the exploits of the prigging fraternity in their various branches of depredation].
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: Flash Chaunt. A song interlarded with flash.
1830		Egan Finish to the Adventures of Tom and Jerry (1889) 242: He can throw off a flash chaunt in the first style; patter slang better than most blades in the town.
1846		Swell’s Night Guide 62: The Fair Maid of Seven Dials – A Flash Recitation.

see flashman n. (3)

1. a thief.

1821		‘An Amateur’ Real Life in London I 142: She shall stump up the rubbish before I leave her, or give me the address of her flash covey.
1822		Bell’s Life in London 3 Nov. 4/3: We shall see no more of their innuendoes [...] than of a flash cove who has caught sight of a police officer while drawing forth a countryman’s handkerchief.
1848		Ladies’ Repository (N.Y.) Oct. VIII:37 316/1: Flash Blowen, a dishonest woman. Flash cove, a dishonest man.
1893		P.H. Emerson Signor Lippo 82: They were on the hunt for flash coves, of course.

2. a landlord or landlady, esp. of a criminal public house.

a.1790		H.T. Potter New Dict. Cant (1795) n.p.: flash cove the keeper of a house for the reception of thieves.
1812		Vaux Vocab. of the Flash Lang.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue n.p.: Flash-cove, or covess The master or mistress of the house.
1835		G. Kent Modern Flash Dict.
1848		Flash Dict. in Sinks of London Laid Open .
c.1850		Duncombe New and Improved Flash Dict.

3. a receiver of stolen goods.

1821		D. Haggart Autobiog. 58: We fenced the scout with a fellow named Alexander, an auctioneer and flash cove. [Ibid.] 62: We fenced the dross-scout, drag, and chats with Mary Kidd, [...] a well known flash-blone.
1835		G. Kent Modern Flash Dict. Flash-cove, the keeper of a place for the reception of stolen goods .
1848		Flash Dict. in Sinks of London Laid Open.

(UK Und.) a burglar.

a.1790

H.T. Potter New Dict. Cant (1795).

(UK Und.) one who enjoys the society of the underworld.

1718		C. Hitchin Regulator 19: The Cull is flash, alias that is he Associates himself with Thieves.
1768		(con. 1710–25) Tyburn Chronicle II in Groom (1999) xxvii: A Flash Cull One that keeps company with Thieves.
1786		Whole Art of Thieving .
1841		‘My Name Is Sam Dodger’ in Gentleman Steeple-Chaser 38: My father before me, he was a sly codger / And first introduced me to my flash pals.

a showy, working-class woman.

a.1909

press cutting in J. Ware Passing Eng. of the Victorian Era 133/2: I was always a real lady, as much as any flash dona what gets her portrait took and then goes on the boards.

(US Und.) counterfeit money, used in a confidence trick.

1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).
1950		Goldin et al. DAUL 71/1: Flash-dough. A roll of banknotes, often a wad of paper with a large note wrapped outside, used in confidence swindles to impress the victim.

1. a criminal lodging house; a tavern frequented by thieves.

1859		Matsell Vocabulum 33: flash-drum. A drinking-place resorted to by thieves.
1865		Leaves from Diary of Celebrated Burglar 16/1: The first place we stopped at was Brighton [...] and knowing some ‘flash drums’ in the town, we made for them.
1895		Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 29: Flash Drum, a thief’s tavern.

2. a brothel.

1860		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc. (2nd edn).
1864, 1867, 1870		Hotten Sl. Dict.

thieves as a group.

1830		Lytton Paul Clifford 168: Rarely have the gentry flash / In sprucer clothes been seen. [Ibid.] 294: On a row of shelves, were various bottles of the different liquors generally in request among the ‘flash’ gentry.
1889–90		Barrère & Leland Dict. of Sl., Jargon and Cant.
1901		J. Caminada Twenty-Five Years of Detective Life II 108: I used to [...] hang about the corners, watching the ‘flash gentry’ turn out for a walk, either on business or pleasure bent.
1925		in J.R. Bryer Fitzgerald the Critical Reception (1978) 234: I can’t just see the greatness of Gatsby. Like all the flash gentry, he was rather a bonehead.

1. a prostitute.

1799		Sporting Mag. Sept. XIV 327/2: Some flash-girl in the market.
c.1800		‘Sandman Joe’ No. 23 Papers of Francis Place (1819) n.p.: While turning of his head about, / He spied his flash gal Sally.
1820		‘Last Night the Dogs did Bark’ in Old Tom of Oxford Radical Harmonist 10: I thought myself cock of the game, / ’Til this tawdry flash-hen, devil fetch her, / Came over and knock’d up my fame.
1833		‘The Merry Flash Girl’ in Rummy Cove’s Delight in Spedding & Watt (eds) Bawdy Songbooks (2011) III 100: Come equip thee, equip thee, my merry flash girl, / Through the streets lit with gas-light to stray.
1837		‘Love in the City’ in Bentley’s Misc. Aug. 131: That ’ere flash madam hit me in the withers.
1848		Proc. Old Bailey 27 Nov. 22: He said he had thrown it down the water-closet—the water-closet—was searched, but no money found—he said a flash girl had pawned the other part of the property.
1886		H. Goldsmid Dottings of a Dosser 81: ‘You’ve been drinkin’ at the Queen’s ’Ead and the Princess Alice,’ she shrieked. ‘You’ve been treatin’ yer flash girls, an you never offered me a drop.’.

2. a female thief.

1841

‘My Name Is Sam Dodger’ Gentleman Steeple-Chaser 38: [I] sported my flash girl [...] We both went a smashing, and did it up brown too, / And lots of bad silver we us’d for to pass.

1. a public house frequented mainly by the underworld.

1753		J. Poulter Discoveries (1774) 7: We reached within four Miles of Whitchurch [...] and lay at a Flash house.
1754		Ordinary of Newgate Account 1 Apr. 69/1: He robbed a man at a house in Chick-lane, an old resort for such fort of people, called in their cant trem [sic], a flash-house.
1793		Bacchanalian Mag. 42: At every Flash-house we’re known.
1810		Kentish Gaz. 31 Aug. 2/5: Mr. Russell [...] occasionally resorts to the well known flash-house, in Moor-street, to listen to conversation ol those who resort there.
1822		Life and Trial of James Mackcoull 17: He generally passed an hour or two at a flash-house near the head of Drury Lane.
1828		G. Smeeton Doings in London 39: It is a game in very great vogue among the macers, who congregate nightly at the flash-houses.
1838		J. Grant Sketches in London 385: They were [...] notoriously in the pay of the keepers of flash-house, and other places for the concoction of schemes for the commission of crime.
1842		Western Times 20 Aug. 3/3: If he lodge at the Rhinoceros, or the Vulture, or any other ‘flash’ house, his landlady is desired not to inform him that the ‘beaks’ will [...] call shortly.
1848		Sinks of London Laid Open 9: Those equally instructive articles on [...] the Connection between the Thieves and the Flash houses.
1851		C. Knight Cyclopeadia of London 268: ‘Bill Sparkes could patter flash ten times faster and funnier than that cove,’ said an élève of the flash-house.
1855		Life in Boston & N.Y. (Boston, MA) 14 Apr. n.p.: A list of respectable shanties! ‘Flash’ houses positively not included.
1859		Matsell Vocabulum 33: flash house A house of resort for thieves.
1867		Illawarra Mercury (Wollongong, NSW) 23 July 4/1: The tragical event by which so many lives were sacrificed [...] and by which so I much consternation was created in the ‘flash houses’ of this city [...] will go far, woebelieve, to abolish the brutalizing practice of prize-fighting.
1895		Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 29: Flash House, a rogue’s resort.
1899		‘Pot’ & ‘Swears’ Scarlet City 539: He and Captain Bolitho had unearthed Macdougall Bingham in a flash West-end house.
1913		Sport (Adelaide) 22 Mar. 12/1: They Say [...] That Jim W [...] has shifted into a flash house [...] and is too flash to work now.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).

2. a brothel.

1831		Satirist (London) 13 Nov. 254/1: Jerry Hawthorn, of the Flash house in Jermyn-street.
1852		C.A. Bristed Upper Ten Thousand 34: That is Mary Black who keeps the greatest flash-house in Leonard Street.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 420: You won’t get a virgin in the flash houses.

(UK Und.) a woman with connections to the underworld.

1865

Leaves from Diary of Celebrated Burglar 44/1: He hung around the Equestrian, a public house [...] where the ‘flash-Jacks’ of that side of the Thames, frequented. Among them was one, a good-loking girl, named Polly Williams.

1. (also flash cane, ...kane) a criminal lodging house.

c.1698		B.E. Dict. Canting Crew n.p.: Flash-ken, a House where Thieves use, and are connived at.
1719		A. Smith Lives of Most Notorious Highway-men, etc. (1926) 205: [as cit. c.1698].
1725		New Canting Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1737, 1759, 1760, 1776		Bailey Universal Etym. Eng. Dict. [as cit. c.1698].
1768		(con. 1710–25) Tyburn Chronicle II in Groom (1999) xxvi: A Case, or a Flash Ken A House frequented by Thieves.
1785		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1791		‘A Pickpocket’s Song’ in Confessions of Thomas Mount 20: Day-light being over, / And darky coming on, / We all go to the Flash ken, / And have a roaring song.
c.1800		‘Drunk in the Night’ No. 26 Papers of Francis Place (1819) n.p.: We all bundled in to a flash ken to drink.
1812		Vaux Vocab. of the Flash Lang.
1821		D. Haggart Autobiog. 7: My want of knowledge of the flash kanes, where I might fence my snib’d lays. [Ibid.] 33: We stopt in the house all day, which was a flash cane, kept by Robert Inglis.
1830		Lytton Paul Clifford I 140: One Peggy Lobkins, who keeps a public-house, a sort of flash ken, called the Mug, in Thames Court.
1839		(con. 1724) W.H. Ainsworth Jack Sheppard (1917) 227: Blueskin would be at a flash-ken near the Chase.
1846		Swell’s Night Guide 123/2: Flash ken, a house where thieves and vagrants resort.
1859		Matsell Vocabulum.
1895		Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 29: Flash Ken, a thief’s boarding house.
1897		C. Whibley ‘Deacon Brodie’ A Book of Scoundrels 238: The thief, also, found him irresistable [...] the flash kens of Edinburgh murmured the Deacon’s name in the hushed whisper of respect.
1901		Argus (Melbourne) 20 Sept. 6/4: The haunt of such men is the padding-ken, a side pocket, a flash ken, or a flash panny.

2. a brothel.

1833		‘Ye Rakehells So Jolly’ in Swell!!! or, Slap-Up Chaunter 25: Ye rakehells so jolly, who hate melancholy; / And love a full flask and a doxy; [...] While we live, till we die, to some flash ken let’s fly.
1840		R. Barham ‘Lay of St. Aloys’ in Ingoldsby Legends (1842) 243: Those troublesome ‘Swells’ / Who come from the playhouses, ‘flash-kens,’ and ‘hells’.
1844		New Sprees of London 8: Unless you can fight, and well too, never boast of your powers in any flash ken, or perhaps you may be called upon to exercise them.
1914		Bulletin (Sydney) 3 Dec. 43/1: Next when he strummed flash kens within, / A slave chained to the galley; / Operas, rag-time – through the din / He pined, till he cased his violin, / For his ‘piece’ in Cut-throat Alley.

a dandified young thief.

1812		Vaux Vocab. of the Flash Lang. in McLachlan (1964) 248: kiddy: a thief of the lower order, who, when he is breeched, by a course of successful depredation, dresses in the extreme of vulgar gentility, and affects a knowingness in his air and conversation, which renders him in reality an object of ridicule; such a one is pronounced by his associates of the same class, a flash-kiddy or a rolling-kiddy.
1823		Egan Grose’s Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1833		Colonist (NSW) 13 Aug. n.p.: John Elliott better known as ‘flash Kiddy Elliott’, was indicted for stealing, or receiving and knowing them be stolen several sums of money.
1834		‘The Blowen’s Ball!’ in Bang-Up Songster 4: There was thirty flash kiddies or more, / A couple to every w---e.
1844		New Sprees of London 11: [A]s for clerks, apprentices, shopmen, and the like [...] attempting to dress like flash kiddies, they only make themselves fools.
1848		Bell’s Life in Sydney 25 Nov. 2/5: I’ll have all such flash kiddies as you up when I catch an opportunity.
1888		‘Rolf Boldrewood’ Robbery Under Arms (1922) 256: You’d better set up a night-school, Dick, [...] and get Billy and some of the other flash kiddies to come.

(UK Und.) a prostitute.

1812

Vaux Vocab. of the Flash Lang. in McLachlan (1964) 274: throw off to talk in a sarcastical strain, so as to convey offensive allusions under the mask of pleasantry, or innocent freedom; but, perhaps, secretly venting that abuse which you would not dare to give in direct terms; this is called throwing off, a practice at which the flash ladies are very expert, when any little jealousies arise among them.

the jargon of the criminal underworld.

1785, 1788, 1796		Grose Classical Dict. of the Vulgar Tongue.
1811		Lex. Balatronicum.
1835		Metropolitan Mag. XIV Sept. 333: The uncommon pleasure he took in recounting his actions in flash lingo.
1897		C. Whibley ‘George Barrington’ A Book of Scoundrels 193: Having cultivated a grave and sober style for himself, he recoiled in horror from the flash lingo.

see flash girl

see separate entry.

(orig. Aus. Und.) a gang of thieves or confidence tricksters (cite 1840 may refer to prostitution).

1840		Colonial Times (Hobart, Tas.) 10 Mar. 4/3: The Flash Mob at the Factory consists [...] of a certain number of women, who, by a simple process of initiation, are admitted into a series of unhallowed mysteries [...] With the fiendish fondness for sin, every effort, both in the Factory, and out of it, is made by these wretches, to acquire proselytes to their infamous practices.
1849		J.P. Townsend Rambles in New South Wales 231: These men were known [...] as the ‘flash mob.’ They spoke the secret language of thieves.
1906		G.R. Sims Mysteries of Modern London 44: He doesn’t want him to fall into the hands of a rival gang. So he has put a spy on to watch, and inform him if any overtures are made to the ‘pigeon’ by any other members of the ‘flash mob’.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).

a thief’s female companion.

1868

‘Six Years in the Prisons of England’ in Temple Bar Mag. Nov. 534: ‘Hoisting’ [...] that’s a much better game, but it requires a fellow to be rigged out like a ‘toff,’ and they generally have a ‘flash moll’ with them at that job.

a female criminal or habitué of the underworld; a prostitute.

1812		Vaux Vocab. of the Flash Lang. in McLachlan (1964) 241: flash-mollisher a family-woman.
1821		Egan Life in London (1869) 210: He bid fair, in a short time, to become as prime an article [...] as either of the above heroes [...] to chaff with the flash Mollishers.

1. a counterfeit banknote; see also sense 3

1816		Proc. Old Bailey 18 Sept. 425/1: When I arrived at the Bull in Aldgate I had a two-penny flash note, which I had had for five or six years.
1817		Proc. Old Bailey 17 Sept. 436/2: I found four flash notes in the prisoner's box, a bill for 395l., and some imitations of 2l. notes.
1821		‘An Amateur’ Real Life in London I 555: The purse of course is found to contain counterfeit money—Flash-screens or Fleet-notes.
1828		Proc. Old Bailey 3 July 686/1: I searched him and found a flash-note for 50l. in his pocket-book, and this pair of trousers in his hat;.
1835		N.-Y. Daily Advertiser 15 July 1/7: [headline] Flash Notes.
1838		Proc. Old Bailey 26 Nov. 222: I took the prisoner at Chalton Fair, and found four handkerchiefs on him [...] a purse, a flash note for 5l., a pair of scissors, a knife, tobacco-box, and key.
1844		Proc. Old Bailey 8 Apr. 886: [He] took this other purse from under a handkerchief, and gave it me—it had four bad sovereigns in it, and a 5l. flash note—I thought it was not right.
1855		Proc. Old Bailey 29 Jan. 354: I afterwards searched him, and found two medals, one of the size of a sovereign, and the other of half a sovereign, and also a flash note.
1859		Coventry Times 13 July 4/7: While holding a roll of flash notes in his hand, he pretended that he wanted to go out.
1867		Sportsman 3 Jan. 2/1: Notes on News [...] [M]arked cards, loaded dice, and flash notes.
1873		Proc. Old Bailey 24 Nov. 6: I went up and said to Anderson ‘I am a constable of the Metropolitan Police, and you have a flash note here’—he said ‘I don’t know what you mean’—I said ‘Oh yes, you do; no nonsense about it’.
1885		Bulletin (Sydney) 13 June 9/1: From his ‘mug,’ gait, and speech, it was easy to see that Redwood had more than a passing acquaintance with men who bought old lead from young larrikins, ‘smashed’ flash notes, and planned suburban burglaries.
1895		Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 29: Flash [...] the reverse of what it appears, as ‘flash notes’.
1896		B.L. Farjeon Betrayal of John Fordham 289: If Louis ’ad ’ad a chance of ’andlin’ the flash notes as I counted ’em out it’d been all up the orchard with us.
1900		Truth (Sydney) 30 Sept. 5/5: She were just a old procuress, / Allers after little gells. / Pays with flash ’uns; why? you wonder.
1905		Marvel III:61 4: I wonder how soon our bearded friend will be arrested for uttering flash notes?
1956		R.T. Hopkins Banker Tells All 51: All contained orders for flash or forged notes.

2. a piece of paper that at first glance looks like a banknote; a forged paper of any kind, e.g. licence, certificate.

1828		Westmorland Gaz. 19 Jan. 2/5: The silly fellow readily caught the bait, handed opver his five sovereigns, and received in exchange — a flash note!
1838		Cases [...] in the Court of King’s Bench 1837-8 536: There can be no doubt that a flash note would be admissible to prove the fraud.
1851		Jurist 557/2: There is not a word about the prisoner having ‘knowingly’ passed off the flash note as a Bank of England note.
1864		M.E. Braddon Henry Dunbar 32: He took out the little packet of bank-notes. ‘I suppose you can understand these?’ he said. The languid youth [...] looked dubiously at his customer. ‘I can understand as they might be flash uns,’ he remarked, significantly.
1866		Proc. Old Bailey 19 Nov. 95: I took Main to the station, searched him, and found this flash note for 30,000l., these five medals imitating sovereigns, 14s. in silver, 4d. in copper, a purse, and a knife.
1880		Illus. Police News 3 July 4/1: A flash note for £10 [...] and five £10 flash notes, two £5 flash notes.
1888		Proc. Old Bailey 28 May 258: ’I have a 10l. note here,’ taking out what appeared to be a 10l. note, ‘if you can give me change for that?’ [...] — he did not open the note. (This was a flash note on the ‘Bank of Engraving’) .
1891		G.R. Sims ‘Jackson’ Dagonet Ditties 111: At Epsom he passed a flash note in the ring.
1894		Proc. Old Bailey 28 May 673: I saw him find this lady's card-case in a box there, and in it was this piece of crisp paper, which looks like a flash note—he handed it to me; it is really a sort of advertisement of a confectioner.
1897		‘Price Warung’ Tales of the Old Regime 9: Neither was Mr. Pounce ignorant of the process of manufacturing ‘flash ’uns’.
1905		Marvel III:61 4: I wonder how soon our bearded friend will be arrested for uttering flash notes?
1935		A.J. Pollock Und. Speaks 40/2: Flash note, a counterfeit bank note.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).
1972		(ref. to 1844) R.P. Hargreaves From Beads to Banknotes 40: The Debentures, popularly known as ‘government rags’, were given various nicknames such as [...] ‘flash notes’.

1. a public house used primarily by criminals.

1811		Lex. Balatronicum n.p.: Flash Panneys. Houses to which thieves and prostitutes resort.
1812		Vaux Vocab. of the Flash Lang.
1828		Lytton Pelham III 298: Why, you would not be boosing till lightman’s in a square crib like mine, as if you were in a flash panny.
1833		‘The City Youth’ in Out-and-Outer in Spedding & Watt (eds) Bawdy Songbooks (2011) IV 139: And in some flash panny he ventures for to sit, / Where he learns to patter flash.
1859		‘Scene in a London Flash-Panny’ Matsell Vocabulum 102: The flash-panny was now in the full tide of successful operation.
1860		Hotten Dict. of Modern Sl. etc.
1873		Sl. Dict.
1881		Trumble ‘On the Trail’ in Sl. Dict. (1890) 43: [as cit. 1859].
1895		Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 29: Flash Panny, a house of thieves.
1901		Argus (Melbourne) 20 Sept. 6/4: The haunt of such men is the padding-ken, a side pocket, a flash ken, or a flash panny.

2. a brothel.

1811

Lex. Balatronicum n.p.: Next for his favourite mot the kiddey looks about, And if she’s in a flash panney he swears he’ll have her out.

a sum of money that is revealed as proof that a person, esp. a narcotics dealer or other criminal, is willing to do business; the money is ‘flashed’ before the client.

1902		Wash. Times (DC) 14 Sept. 10/3: Flash roll — Bills wrapped around apper to make a big showing; used by confidence men.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).
1974		G.F. Newman You Flash Bastard 188: When Sneed had need of some monkey money for a flash-roll on a job [...] rather than risk losing ten-grand, which would have been very difficult to raise in the circumstances, he had gone to a friend in security with one of the big banks.
1987		R. Campbell Alice in La-La Land (1999) 14: You take the five, all I’ve got left is a flash roll.
1991		D. Simon Homicide (1993) 543: Showing off his flash money and telling everyone about how good is drug connections were.
1991		C. Hiaasen Native Tongue 285: There had been vague accusations of unprofessional conduct [...] something about a missing flash roll.
1997		E. Little Another Day in Paradise 83: [...] made everybody lie on the ground while Mel tied ’em up [and] took their flash roll.
2002		G. Yach Las Vegas... a Cops View 46: One, other incident, involved needing to get a large ‘flash roll’ of money late at night. The money was to be used to prove that we were big money people.

see screen n.¹ (2)

1. a prostitute; esp. one seeking wealthy customers who will be robbed by her pimp.

1868

‘Six Years in the Prisons of England’ in Temple Bar Mag. Nov. 538: ‘I heard a bloke talking about a picking-up moll [...] What did he mean by that?’ ‘Oh! that’s a very common racket. He meant a “flash-tail,” or prostitute who goes about the streets at nights trying to pick up “toffs”.’.

2. (US black) any prostitute.

1983

R. Klein Jailhouse Jargon and Street Sl. [unpub. ms.].

(US) a confidence trickster.

1920

C.S. Montanye ‘Perfect Crime’ in Penzler Pulp Fiction (2007) 351: You haven’t got enough imagination to be a flash-thief or a con.

see flash note

(US Und.) a wad of notes with high denomination bills displayed at top and bottom but only singles in between.

2013

J. Stahl Happy Mutant Baby Pills 79: I pulled out my paper-clipped flash was. A fifty in front and back. Nineteen singles in between.

(US Und.) items that are bought legally but sold as ‘stolen goods’ in order to excite the customer.

1940

S. Sterling ‘Ten Carats of Lead’ in Black Mask Stories (2010) 226/2: Phony ‘flash wares’ bought at auction [...] for sale to overwise suckers.

a prostitute.

1783		flash song in Sportsman’s Calendar (Aug. 1818) 144: Mott — a flash woman.
1823		‘Jon Bee’ Dict. of the Turf, the Ring, the Chase, etc.
1929		B. Duffy Rocky Road 216: I saw her on the South side with a dark-eyed swaggerin’ fella and a flash woman.

(UK Und.) involved in some form of criminality.

1859

G.A. Sala Gaslight and Daylight 354: The sooner you peels off them cloth kicksies the better. There ain’t no wear in ’em, and they’se no good, if you ain’t on the flash lay.

(UK Und.) to inform, to put on guard, to pass on information.

1786		Proc. Old Bailey 22 Feb. 396/1: Lyons said, let us go and put Bower's wife flash, it will be a good piece of fun, and make a blow up, and at the same time we may do his panne.
1812		Vaux Vocab. of the Flash Lang.
1823		Egan Grose.
1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.