(Originally flugelman.) In its applied meaning, a political leader.
1802. As well might Oliver Wolcott publish to the world the bare-faced assertion, that he himself was the entire and sole author of a lame defence, lately published, of the late administration;—or have the effrontery to tell the people of the United States, that he did not come to New-York to get it corrected and amended by the centre flugel-men of all mischief,—who is still the rallying point for the out-casts of republicanism—whose meetings, Cacusses, plots, and stratagems, are not so secret as the junto may vainly imagine.—J. T. Callender, ‘Letters to Alexander Hamilton, King of the Feds,’ pp. 8–9 (N.Y.).
1814. Like the flugelman of a regiment, he over-acts the movements which he would excite in others.—W. Taylor, Monthly Review, lxxiv. 271. (N.E.D.)
1827. We propose Lord Nugent as a political flugelman.—Sydney Smith, ‘Works’ (1859), ii. 120. (N.E.D.)
1835. Keep your eye on the fugleman.—‘Col. Crockett’s Tour,’ p. 24 (Phila.).
1841. I always observed the instructions of the militia captain to his beginners in the manual exercise; I kept my eye upon the fugleman.—Mr. Benton of Missouri in the Senate, Jan. 26: Cong. Globe, p. 119, App.
1850. I do not recognize the honorable member and his half a dozen compeers on this floor as my file-leaders, or as my fuglemen in this campaign.—Mr. Winthrop of Mass., House of Repr., Feb. 21: id., p. 191, App.
