Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. a cook, or assistant cook.

1821–6		‘Bill Truck’ Man o’ War’s Man (1843) 159: ‘Come, old Slushyfists [...] Doesn’t hear the call?’ ‘O yes, Bird, we hears the call,’ growled the one-armed cook.
1859, 1860		Hotten Sl. Dict.
1868		Sportsman 18 Feb. 2/1: Notes on News [...] The chief cook, slush, and butler.
1870		Hotten Sl. Dict.
1876		F.W.H. Symondson Two Years abaft Mast 261: An unexpected roll of the ship sent both pig and cook sliding into the lee-scuppers. [...] There was ‘Slushy’ sometimes over, sometimes under the pig .
1876		Sheffield Indep. 23 Dec. 15/3: The owner of the establishment was ‘cook, slush, and bottle-washer’ in one.
1887		H. Caine Deemster I 211: The cook, better known as the slushy, came up the hatchways with a huge saucepan.
1891		A. Day Mysterious Beggar 256: Slushy had been a ship’s cook.
1895		Crowe Aus. Sl. Dict. 76: Slushy, a cook.
1901		H. Lawson ‘G.S.’ in Roderick (1967–9) II 2: In the steamer’s slushy alley, where the souls of men are dead.
1903		Bulletin (Sydney) 10 Dec. 18/1: I useter think ’e wuz doin’ odd jobs fur the cook [...]. But the slushy said ’e didn’t ’inder Fred [...].
1904		L.M. Palmer-Archer Bush Honeymoon 327: There were among them [...] camp cooks, their offsiders, dog-stiffeners, men that spent their time on the marsoopial fence, and bush slushies.
1917		St Helens Mist (OR) 11 May5/3: Berth deck slusher — Messmen who wait on the tables of the crew.
1925		(con. WWI) Fraser & Gibbons Soldier and Sailor Words 261: Slushy: Ship’s cook.
1936		A. Russell Gone Nomad 14: I had to take my turn at [...] as ‘slushy’ to ‘Doughboy’ Terry, the cook.
1940		(con. 1870s) E.C. Studholme Te Waimate (1954) 127: 1 cook’s mate, generally known as the offsider or ‘slushy’.
1953		T.A.G. Hungerford Riverslake 147: When a teacher with your degrees travels round from camp to camp working as a slushie, a lot of people want to know why.
1966		P. Pinney Restless Men 105: ‘Kitchen?’ Chikker cried, aghast. ‘Bloody slushies?’.
1970		K. Giles Death in Church 85: A grey-headed woman was crying in a corner—‘The part-time slushy,’ said Porterman [OED].

2. (Aus./N.Z.) a cook’s assistant, esp. for a shearing gang.

1890		Argus (Melbourne) 20 Sept. 13/6: Sundays are the most trying days of all say the cuisiniers, ‘for then they have nothing to do but to growl.’ This man’s assistant is called ‘the slusher.’.
1897		H. Lawson ‘The Green-hand Rouseabout’ in Roderick (1967–9) I 322: Stiff and aching green-hand stretches — ‘Slushy’ rings the bullock-bell.
1899		H. Lawson ‘A Rough Shed’ in Roderick (1972) 465: We hate the boss-of-the-board as the shearers’ ‘slushy’ hates the shearers’ cook.
1908		Sun. Times (Perth) 13 Dec. 1/1: The jovial kitchen slushy [...] prepares the prog.
1910		Bulletin (Sydney) 20 Oct. 11/4: When strangers entered the Heads they would ask, with curiosity, what the amazing thing was; and the steward, the cook, the slushy, the deck-sweep and the coal-passer would reply frankly that they didn’t know.
1916		C.J. Dennis ‘The Push’ in Moods of Ginger Mick 41: An’ if yeh want a slushy, or a station overseer, / Or a tinker, or a tailor, or a snob.
1922		H. Lawson ‘Bob the Baker and British Breeding’ in Roderick (1972) 924: I started as slushy and was promoted to spud-peeling.
1957		J. Greenway ‘Australian Cattle Lingo’ in AS XXXIII:3 168: slushy, n. A cook’s helper.
1967		‘Whisper All Aussie Dict.’ in Kings Cross Whisper (Sydney) xl 4/4: slushy: Prisoners employed in gaol kitchens.
1974		D. Ireland Burn 3: They kept me at Sydney showground twelve days. Slushie in the officers’ mess.

3. any unskilled assistant; a servant, thus a derogatory label.

1906		E. Dyson Fact’ry ’Ands 100: Ther slush wanted t’ boost me off ther mat, but I sez my biz was of ther ’ighest himport.
1912		Sport (Adelaide) 6 July 13/1: They Say [...] That A new booth was opened at the Adelaide Oval last Saturday week, Carl barman and Onser slushy.
1924		(con. WWI) A.G. Pretty Gloss. Sl. [...] in the A.I.F. 1921–1924 (rev. t/s) n.p.: slushey. A mess orderly.
1929		K.S. Prichard Coonardoo 273: A slushie – damned rouse-about.
1953		T.A.G. Hungerford Riverslake 133: If Silver wants to make a slushy of himself, that’s up to him!
1983		R. Aven-Bray Ridgey-Didge Oz Jack Lang 45: Slushy Kitchen worker in prison.