Dicky (A)

in George III.’s time, meant a flannel petticoat. It was afterwards applied to what were called false shirts—i.e. a shirt front worn over a dirty shirt, or in lieu of a shirt. These half-shirts were first called Tommies.

“A hundred instances I soon could pick ye—

Without a cap we view the fair,

The bosom heaving alto bare,

The hips ashamed, forsooth, to wear a dicky.”

So again:—

“And sister Peg, and sister Joan,

With scarce a flannel dicky on … .”

Middlesex Election, letter iv.

(Hair, whalebone, or metal vestments, called dress-improvers, are hung on women’s backs, as a “dicky” is hung on a coach behind.)

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Entry taken from Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, edited by the Rev. E. Cobham Brewer, LL.D. and revised in 1895.