1. One who has charge of a store or stores; one who superintends the receipt and issue of stores; spec. an officer or official in charge of naval or military stores.
1618. in J. Charnock, Hist. Mar. Archit. (1801), II. 238. Under storekeepers, Chatham.
1663. Pepys, Diary, 5 March. Troubling me and other friends for getting him a place (that is, storekeeper of the Navy at Tangier).
1704. Chamberlayne, Pres. St. Eng., III. (ed. 21), 532. Yeoman-Sadler and Store-keeper. Ibid., 575. Officers of Her Majesty’s Yards. At Chatham…. Store-keeper.
1751. Johnson, Rambler, No. 113, ¶ 8. That the best storekeeper was the mistress’s eye.
1798. Hinderwell, Hist. Scarborough, 81. Besides whom, the military establishment consists of R. V. Drury, Esq. Storekeeper; a Barrack-Master, [etc.].
1809. Lond. Chron., 1 July, 2/3. Mr. John Trotter, jun. the Storekeeper-General, and some of the other heads of departments, have gone to Portsmouth.
1838. Lytton, Alice, IV. v. The post of Storekeeper to the Ordnance.
1876. N. Amer. Rev., CXXIII. 300. A dishonest store-keeper at a distillery.
1890. Rlwys. Amer., 307. Everything in the nature of material, however small, directly or indirectly passes through the Store-keeper’s books.
2. U.S. and Colonial. A shopkeeper.
1741. P. Tailfer, etc. Narr. Georgia, 107. Augusta … is principally if not altogether, inhabited by Indian Traders and Store-keepers.
1775. A. Burnaby, Trav., 38. The chief of the inhabitants are storekeepers or public officers.
1817. M. Birkbeck, Notes Journ. Amer. (1818), 97. The store-keepers (country shopkeepers we should call them) of these western towns.
1857. D. P[useley], Rise Australia, etc., 421. Geelong…. Richardson, S., storekeeper, Ryrie street.
1858. Simmonds, Dict. Trade, Store-keeper,… the name for a retail dealer or shop-keeper in the Colonies, who keeps a miscellaneous assortment of all kinds of commodities.
1887. F. Francis, Jr. Saddle & Mocassin, 61. To and fro flitted a few busy store-clothed store-keepers and clerks.
b. U.S. slang. An article that remains so long on hand as to be unsaleable.
1891. Century Dict.
