Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (UK Und.) in pl., old stockings that, through wear, have developed mis-shapen heels.

a.1790		H.T. Potter New Dict. Cant (1795) n.p.: sinkers old stockings that have sunk the small parts into the heel.
1809		G. Andrewes Dict. Sl. and Cant.
1821		Flash Dict.
1835		G. Kent Modern Flash Dict.
1848		Flash Dict. in Sinks of London Laid Open.
c.1850		Duncombe New and Improved Flash Dict.

2. in monetary senses [SE sinker, a small circular lead weight].

3. (US) any form of doughy cake, esp. a doughnut [the habit of dunking or ‘sinking’ a doughnut into one’s coffee, or resemblance to annular lead sinkers used by fishermen].

1870		J.H. Beadle Life in Utah 223: Our favorite dinner, when we could get the meat, was of fried ham and ‘sinkers’.
1883		J. Keane On Blue Water 36: These ‘'water whelps,’ as we called them, are properly called ‘dough-boys,’ but our ‘grub-spoiler’ — pet name for ship’s cook — called them ‘swimmers,’ probably because they were such heavy sinkers.
1886		Marion (OH) Daily Star 22 Nov. 3/3: The waiters in one of Chicago’s many cheap restaurants were astonished [...] when a stranger entered and called for ‘boot leg and sinkers.’ After repeating his order two or three times [...] the stranger, a New Yorker, translated his language into plain ‘coffee and doughnuts.’.
1888		N.Y. Herald 1 Apr. 9/6: The facetious patrons of the restaurant call these cakes ‘sinkers,’ because if they were thrown overboard they wouldn’t float.
1896		Ade Artie (1963) 29: Next day they had to make a hot touch for a short coin so as to get the price of a couple o’ sinkers and a good old ‘draw one’.
1900		E.H. Babbitt ‘College Words and Phrases’ in DN II:i 59: sinker, n. 1. A wheat or buckwheat cake. […] 3 A hot roll. 4. A doughnut.
1902		N.-Y. Trib. section II, 27 July 2: Butter cakes, those deadly bullets of, rather, small cannon balls of dough, which are commonly known to the hardy eaters thereof as ‘sinkers,’ but which it is high treason to call by that name within the lunch room.
1905		J.W. Carr ‘Words from Northwest Arkansas’ in DN III:i 94: sinker, n. Cream of tartar biscuit. ‘The biscuits in the dorm are called “sinkers”.’.
1907		B. Fisher A. Mutt in Blackbeard Compilation (1977) 8: He didn’t even hold out enough for the sinkers and java.
1911		S. Ford Torchy 248: I’ve lived on sinkers and pie too long to duck amateur cookin’.
1914		D. Malloch Amer. Lumberman in Botkin (1944) 33: It is the meat, / The pie and sinkers.
1917		J.A. Moss Officers’ Manual 485: Sinkers, dumplings [DA].
1920		Ade Hand-made Fables 238: That’s the Curse of having [...] a Record involving Coffee and Sinkers.
1923		E. O’Neill Hairy Ape Act VII: Feedin’ your face – sinkers and coffee.
1927		K. Nicholson Barker III i: None o’ your greasy cookhouse sinkers an’ mud.
1931		W.N. Burns One-Way Ride 285: Ham and eggs [...] shipwreck two in the pan, sinkers and draw one – that’s the kind of stuff Jake ordered.
1936		K. Mackenzie Living Rough 225: We hit a restaurant up for a cup of coffee and sinkers.
1940		‘Argot of the Sea’ in AS XV:4 Dec. 450/2: coffee an, coffee and. Coffee and sinkers (doughnuts) or coffee and snails (cinnamon rolls).
1949		Monteleone Criminal Sl. (rev. edn) 209: sinker [...] a doughnut sinkers and suds Doughnuts and coffee.
1955		B. Schulberg On the Waterfront (1964) 99: I’m gonna [...] grab me some sinkers ’n coffee.
1962		Ragen & Finston World’s Toughest Prison 817: sinkers – Doughnuts or crullers.
1962		T. Berger Reinhart in Love (1963) 268: ‘You want a doughnut, Niles?’ [...] Having opened the bag and withdrawn a sinker and found it hard, however, he suggested toast.
1977		(con. 1949) J.G. Dunne True Confessions (1979) 30: I had a couple of sinkers [...] you want to throw the book at me?
1991		(con. 1920s) O.D. Brooks Legs 132: You like a couple of sinkers to go with them?
1993		B. Moore Lex. of Cadet Lang. 343: sinker solid cake and custard served as dessert in the CSC mess.