Definition of "Tommy"

Then it's Tommy this, an' Tommy that, an' "Tommy, 'ow's yer soul?"But it's "Thin red line of 'eroes" when the drums begin to roll

1892, Rudyard Kipling, Tommy

And every night now he played pontoon, that game of the Tommies, with Mrs Bolton, gambling with sixpences.

1928, D[avid] H[erbert] Lawrence, chapter XV, in Lady Chatterley’s Lover, authorized British edition, London: Martin Secker […], published February 1932 (May 1932 printing)

Meanwhile the Tommies had discovered several large tins of ham in the captured lorry. 'That,' said the big Nazi, 'is for our tea.' 'No,' said a Tommy sergeant-major. 'That's for our tea. For you, chummy, we've kept a nice bit of bull.'

1949, Stephen Peter Llewellyn, Journey Towards Christmas, page 142

He liked the Germans better than he did the French; but for all that, if he went down the back streets of a night, it was with three or four British Tommies, in case the Jerries weren't as friendly as they made out.

1974, GB Edwards, The Book of Ebenezer Le Page, New York, published 2007, page 129

May was in New Zealand when war broke out, and immediately left for France, where she worked in a military hospital in a converted high school in Marseilles. Writing home, she said that the French officers were said to be 'fussy' so she was glad to be nursing the Tommies (meaning French rank and file): 'they are brave and good, and patient, and such grateful patients. They are helpful to each other, and take such an interest in their fellow sufferers.'

2017, Janet Tolerton, Make Her Praises Heard Afar: New Zealand Women Overseas in World War One, page 38

Here, here, here again! Coquettes, flirts, harlots, adultereſſes, tulips, pinks, roſes, lilies, violets, wormwood, fennel, and hemlock! Unnatural, unnatural, unnatural! Tommies, Tommies, Tommies! Women kiſſing women; doating, languiſhing, dying, pining, crying, caterwauling, for each other! Ha, ha, ha! O the madneſs of this age!

1777, [Anon.], “Number XVII. A faſhionable, diſgraceful Paſſion expoſed.”, in The Laughing Philosopher, Dublin: Printed for James Williams, page 91