Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (UK/Aus.) a young or newly conscripted soldier.

1918		Aussie (France) VII Sept. 2/1: A bright new War Baby recently toddled into a reinforcement camp in France where he was kept on camp duties, although eager to go up the line.
1921		N&Q 12 Ser. IX 344: War Baby. The youngest member of a platoon.
1927		(con. 1917) J. Stevens Mattock 114: A chance to train mobs of boots into soldiers in a month! And the front lousy with war babies!

2. (US Und.) money gained through the successful hoaxing of a man who had made his money in the (still-recent) World War I.

1940

D. Maurer Big Con 27: The scores, known during the 1920’s as ‘war babies’, increased rapidly.

3. an illegitimate child, conceived and born while the mother’s husband is away on active service.

1984

Partridge DSUE (8th edn) 1308/1: from late 1916, ob. by 1930, but revived in WW2.

4. (US) a bond that is sold during wartime with the presumption that it will ‘grow’ in value.

1921		Unpartizan Rev. Jan.–Mar. 209: Protection for war-babies and organized labor is good old-fashioned Republican doctrine [DA].
1948		Green Bay Press-Gazette 13 July 4/2: The idle rich of Europe [...] clamored for war while they invested great amounts in American war babies and reaped superlative profits [DA].

(US) a baseball bat.

1909		Van Loan ‘The Cast-Off’ in Big League (2004) 56: Twice he gripped his war club between his knees.
1913		Van Loan ‘The Good Old Wagon’ in Lucky Seventh (2004) 199: The dapper young man in the Panther uniform sent his extra war club whirling behind him.
1960, 1975		Wentworth & Flexner DAS.
c.2003		Coach Rob Ellis ‘Lost Secrets of Hitting’ at BeABetterHitter.com 🌐 Stating it straight up, superman swinging a feather can appear to hit as effectively as ‘Joe Average’ swinging with mechanical precision using a war club, except he’ll strike out a heck of a lot more.

a mixture of stout and mild ale.

1909

J. Ware Passing Eng. of the Victorian Era.

(US prison) an inmate who protects another from problems while incarcerated; the protected inmate will be expected to offer homosexual services.

2000

Other Side of the Wall: Prisoner’s Dict. July 🌐 War Daddy: An inmate who protects another inmate from criminal or mischevious acts inside a prison. a protected inmate must also ‘pay’ this protection. (FL).

1. (US) a veteran, an old-timer.

1890–1904		Farmer & Henley Sl. and Its Analogues.
1906		A. Train Prisoner at the Bar 182: An inexperienced prosecutor may be so inadequate to the task of coping with some old war-horse of a lawyer that save for the assistance of the court a rascal would be turned loose upon the community.
1933		(con. WWI) F. Richards Old Soldiers Never Die (1964) 289: Our new Commanding Officer [...] was a proper old war-horse and a very brave man.
1942		R. Chandler High Window 25: ‘About my mother,’ he said patiently. ‘A grand old war-horse,’ I said.
1947		(con. 1944) J.H. Burns Gallery (1948) 27: They cursed the Pentagon, which (they said) had emasculated old warhorses like themselves.
1955		Piersall & Hirshberg Fear Strikes Out 75: Steve O’Neill, a battered old baseball warhorse who had been in the majors [...] for more than forty years.
1989		H. Rawson Dict. of Invective (1991) 202: war-horse. A battle-scarred politician.
1994		M. Ribowsky Don’t Look Back 109: [T]he Stars’ old warhorse player-manager Webster McDonald.

2. (Aus./US campus) an uncompromising, determined woman.

1914		Sport (Adelaide) 25 Sept. 5/6: Min F., the veteran war horse, has beaten her three cattish cobbers for A.B.
1932		J.L. Kuethe ‘Johns Hopkins Jargon’ in AS VII:5 337: war horse — a determined female.
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn).

1. (US black/teen) a street-gang leader.

1962		P. Crump Burn, Killer, Burn! 54: We were now really a gang [...] and I was its leader: a warlord.
1972		C. Fuller Jr ‘Love Song for Wing’ in King Black Short Story Anthol. (1972) 144: ‘Durango,’ the runner, stood to the rear of his troops and when they were ready nodded to ‘Cornbread’ the warlord.
1988		W.D. Myers Scorpions 43: ‘I’m the Mack,’ Mack said. ‘I’m still the warlord. They don’t mess with the Mack’.

2. (US prison) a gang leader, who takes control of gang fights and killings, although not the absolute head of a gang.

1972		D. Claerbaut Black Jargon in White America 85: war lord n. a gang member who sets the terms and arranges the detaiIs for a gang battle.
1977		J. Allen Assault with a Deadly Weapon 44: I made it though becoming a warlord — I just handled all the weapons.
1992		Bentley & Corbett Prison Sl. 44: War Lord One of the leaders of a gang who leads other members into gang fights and killings. A war lord is higher in rank than a soldier, but is not necessarily number one in command.
2021		T. Pluck Boy from County Hell 71: Their warlord says he ditched them for the Heimdall Brotherhood.

1. court dress, formal dress.

1844		Reading Mercury 10 Aug. 4/6: The ball room is a woman’s chosen battle ground.There she comes forth in her war paint, fully equipped.
1859		H. Kingsley Recollections of G. Hamlyn (1891) 113: There are a pair of good-stepping horses, and old Lady E — behind ’em, by Jove! — in her war-paint and feathers.
1873		Sl. Dict. 336: War-paint evening dress. When people go out in full costume they are often said to have their war-paint on.
1879		H.N. Moseley Notes by a Naturalist on the ‘Challenger’ (1872–76) 497: The visit of the King of the Sandwich Islands [...] pleased me very much. The officers of the ship donned, as in duty bound, full ‘war paint’ to receive him .
1888		‘’Arry at a Radical Reception’ Punch 12 May 219/1: It ain’t every sportsman, dear boy, as can chuck on the war-paint and score.
1890		Dead Bird (Sydney) 4 Jan. 7/2: Tho Spanish bull-fighters, having conquered high society in Paris, have been received lately in the same circle in Madrid in evening-dress. Formerly they were obliged to wear their war paint.
1895		Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 93: Warpaint, evening dress [sic].
1897		Mirror of Life 10 Feb. 3/1: [T]he contrast was made the greater by the glittering evening dress of the modern bung and the old-fashioned, undertaker-like warpaint of Charley Ramsway.
1900		Bulletin (Sydney) 3 Mar. 15/4: Writer was in the habit of ‘popping’ his dress suit at Mish’s. [...] One day she asked me to accompany her to a swell social. Was compelled to refuse owing to my war-paint being in her papa’s custody.
1906		S. Ford Shorty McCabe 76: Now I’d been inside the Metropolitan once or twice before, [...] just for the sake of lookin’ at the real things with their war paint on.
1912		Bulletin (Sydney) 12 Dec. 22/2: [W]e waited only the arrival of the Mayor. ‘He’s comin’ in all his war-paint,’ whispered Bill in a hoarse aside. ‘One of the councillors just told me that he’s new to the job, and puts on all the flummery wherever he goes.’.
1922		P.A. Rollins Cowboy 117: Chaps and his fancy vest [...] what he called his ‘full warpaint.’.
1924		Galsworthy White Monkey 71: ‘Right-o! Warpaint?’ ‘Yes, white waistcoat.’.

2. military uniform.

1861		Sheffield Dly Teleg. 1 Apr. 3/2: We take a little war paint (regimentals) for the purpose of creating an imposing appearance, and we are going to rig the doctor in a staff uniform.
1863		Shrewsbury Chron. 11 Dec. 3/: Although all the military men connected with the case are in full ‘war paint, the lawyers are in ‘mufti’.
1873		Sl. Dict.

3. cosmetics, make-up.

1864		G.A. Sala Quite Alone 3 113: Before she daubed on her war-paint she would anoint her face and hands with a tallow candle.
1870		B. Harte Luck of Roaring Camp (1873) 84: ‘Thank you, miss; thank ye!’ cried the stranger, brightening even through the color which Red Gulch knew facetiously as her ‘war paint.’.
1901		‘Miles Franklin’ My Brilliant Career 78: It was only on the rarest occasion that we donned full war-paint.
1907		‘Hugh McHugh’ Beat It 88: Mrs. Grimshaw, who weighs 278 in her war-paint.
1911		Alaska Citizen 28 Aug. 7/3: In the dapple iron grey of the morning, before she was arrayed in her war paint and gimcracks, the frayed edges stuck out like door knobs.
1914		Sport (Adelaide) 4 Dec. 5/6: Sport wants to know when Maggie G will put on her war paint and sally forth on the yum-yum trail again.
1922		Joyce Ulysses 310: And here she is, says Alf, that was giggling over the Police Gazette with Terry on the counter, in all her warpaint. – Give us a squint at her, says I.
1929		M. Bodenheim Sixty Seconds 71: Myrtle [...] smeared on the war-paint till she was a sight.
1937		C. Woolrich ‘Face Work’ in Penzler Pulp Fiction (2008) 3: I had on my best hat and my warpaint when I dug into her bell. You’ve heard make-up called that a thousand times, but this one time [...] it was just that – warpaint.
1953		K. Tennant Joyful Condemned 281: On Friday, Marie, in all her warpaint, was ready for her night out.
1972		B. Rodgers Queens’ Vernacular.
1983		S. Gee Never in My Lifetime in Best Radio Plays (1984) 85: Come on, slap on the war paint. I pinched some of your eyeshadow.
1989		W. Kotzwinkle Midnight Examiner (1990) 67: She’d left her war paint off and had the same bald, surprised look around her eyes.
1990		S. Morgan Homeboy 181: She was hardly recognizable without her tinsel wig and warpaint.
2006		G. Pelecanos Night Gardener 153: You can [...] reapply that war paint.
2011		C. Faust Choke Hold [ebook] A lot of painfully obvious surgery and some pretty hard faces under the warpaint.
2016		Times 30 Aug. 🌐 A number of people, I learn, are offended by female passengers doing their make-up on the morning commute. [...] I don’t feel it’s any of my business to criticise those who feel the need to [...] ‘put yer war paint on’.
2017		L. McInerney Blood Miracles : No warpaint to match the attitude.
2023		D. Whish-Wilson I Am Already Dead 84: ‘Been a while since I had talons or put on the war paint’.

4. (orig. Aus.) best clothes.

1890		Dead Bird (Sydney) 11 Oct. 5/1: All the very elite of [...] the Chinese larrikin quarters, Gipps-street, Waterloo, Woolloomooloo, and Newtown were there in their war paint. ‘The bold bullee’ had [...] his highest heeled boots, and bell-bottomed pants.
1896		Mirror of Life 27 June 15/3: [H]e keeps St. Monday to visit the mirror of life in his war-paint.
c.1900		[perf. Vesta Tilley] I’m Going to Be a Nut 🎵 The clothes I wear will have to be like nothing else on earth / When I’ve got all my war paint on, complete from boots to hat.

5. (US) rough, potent whisky.

1898

Santa Fe New Mexican 2 Sept. ?/4: War paint whiskey, soiled doves and concealed weapons are a trinity of causes prolific of trouble and mischief.

(US) stories of one’s adventurous exploits, e.g. in a street gang; real war plays no part.

1985		(con. 1969–70) D. Bodey F.N.G. (1988) 69: I don’t like to be telling any war stories, but when we were over nearer Cambo [...] we took incoming for nine straight days.
1994		N. McCall Makes Me Wanna Holler (1995) 187: A group of us were [...] telling war stories about the crazy things we’d done.
2002		J. Lerner You Got Nothing Coming 258: Prison stories — that is, convict war stories — tend to have a common culprit [...] the Bitch Who Snitched Me Out.
2003		A.N. LeBlanc Random Family 43: 10-4’s war stories [i.e. of drug-dealing] impressed George.
2006		D. Winslow Winter of Frankie Machine (2007) 90: He might be a legend and all that, but a bunch of old war stories don’t make the man bulletproof.