Green’s Dictionary of Slang

1. (UK/US campus) a student in their first term at a university; also of high school.

1839		‘Vincent Eden’ in Bentley’s Misc. 316: He [...] was told that he could not have a fresher than the gentleman in the coffee-room. The luggage was accordingly huddled into the barrow, and the embryo collegian was stepping into the street. [Ibid.] 319: They generally put fresh gentlemen in the back buildings.
1878		Oxford & Cambridge Undergraduate's Jrnl 13 199: Freshers, if there are many of them together generally contrive to light upon those who are of their own tastes and pursuits.
1885		Cambridge Rev. 6 313: There has been plenty of cricket in the shape of the Freshers’ match.
1890		Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 15 Mar. 7/3: [T]hey were met by the Freshmen of the college [...] Each ‘Freshy’ was armed with a slungshot composed of lampblack in a cheese cloth.
1896		W.C. Gore Student Sl. in Cohen (1997) 6: fresh or freshie n. Freshman.
1900		Boy’s Own Paper 17 Nov. 110: Dressed in flannels, long trousers – they must be long to proclaim to the world that you are only a ‘Fresher’.
1900		E.H. Babbitt ‘College Words and Phrases’ in DN II:i 37: fresh, n. A freshman.
1900		Nat. Police Gaz. (NY) 8 Dec. 6/4: [headline] girl freshies / [...] / get a hazing.
1911		E.B. Morris Senior 12: Spencer [...] [T]here’s another stool — fall over that, fresh.
1911		E.B. Morris Freshman in College Comedies 24: Jerome. All unknown to the freshies.
1920		A. Baer Picked for 1920 24 Nov. [synd. col.] The profs sent him back to the freshies with this sign on his skull: ‘Opened by Mistake’.
1922		Ottowa Campus 10 Oct. 2/3: Oh, to be a fresh again, I sure would study more.
1923		Wodehouse Inimitable Jeeves 123: He was in his fourth year at Oxford when I was a fresher.
1929		H.W. Brecht Downfall 257: That’s what happens when an insignificant freshie has a little luck.
1935		J. Conroy World to Win 121: Look at that Goddamn fairy, Ralph Gibson [...] Look at the way he shakes it up. He’s tried to make every freshie on the campus.
1984		Benjamin & Pearl Limericks Down Under 15: A fresher who came up from Hall, / [...] / Up the garden was led / By a bibulous med.
2004		P. Howard PS, I Scored the Bridesmaids 22: Three or four freshers, total airheads, roysh.
2004		W.D. Myers Shooter 54: I was watching the freshies getting on a bus.

2. a new arrival among a group of soldiers.

1914		B.J. Brookes diary 6 Nov. 🌐 Freshers are always so eager to hear tale of the Front.
1932		‘Ex-Légionnaire 1384 Hell Hounds of France 89: Freshers had to learn [...] that a Légion N.C.O. must be saluted, whether in or out of barracks [...] Failure to comply meant a flogging.