Word.ws English Dictionary

new chums

new chums is the plural of new chum.

Meaning of new chum

Noun

new chum (plural new chums)

  1. (Australia, archaic) A newly arrived convict.
  2. (Australia) A beginner; a novice.
  3. (Australia, dated, derogatory, mildly) A newly arrived and inexperienced immigrant; a newcomer.
    • ‘New chum?’ queried the barman, after serving him.
      ‘I suppose I am,’ replied Jim. ‘Look here, would you mind telling me what in the devil′s name a new chum is?'
      ‘A new chum is a man fresh from home.’
      ‘From England?'
      ‘Scotland, Ireland, anywhere else, if he′s green and inexperienced. Miners from the...1906, Edward Dyson, In the Roaring Fifties, 2005, Gutenberg eBook #17045
    Synonyms:
    comeling

Questions about new chums

What is new chums the plural of?
New chums is the plural of new chum.

Words near new chums in the dictionary

  1. New Chester
  2. New Chichester
  3. New Christian
  4. New Christians
  5. new chum
  6. new chums
  7. New Church
  8. new circus
  9. new circuses
  10. New City
  11. New Clark City

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: new chums (page history and authors); new chum (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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