Bully Dawson was a renowned gambler from London

London

London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 in the time of Charles II

Charles II of England

Charles II was monarch of the three kingdoms of England, Scotland, and Ireland.Charles II's father, King Charles I, was executed at Whitehall on 30 January 1649, at the climax of the English Civil War...

. His name became a byword for a swaggering fool. His character is summed up by Charles Lamb: "Bully Dawson kicked by half the town, and half the town kicked by Bully Dawson".

He is said to have come from either Blackfriars or Whitefriars and little is known of him other than he was a gambler and "sharper". He may have been a punch brewer. Some idea of his reputation can be gleaned from the various works of literature that mention him.
In Goldsmith's She Stoops to Conquer

She Stoops to Conquer

She Stoops to Conquer is a comedy by the Irish author Oliver Goldsmith, son of an Anglo-Irish vicar, first performed in London in 1773. The play is a great favourite for study by English literature and theatre classes in Britain and the United States. It is one of the few plays from the 18th...

Hardcastle refers to him in Act 3: "And can you be serious? I never saw such a bouncing, swaggering puppy since I was born. Bully Dawson was but a fool to him."

He appears in one of Joe Miller's Jests:
He is reputed to be the model for Captain Hackhum in Thomas Shadwell

Thomas Shadwell

Thomas Shadwell was an English poet and playwright who was appointed poet laureate in 1689.-Life:Shadwell was born at Stanton Hall, Norfolk, and educated at Bury St Edmunds School, and at Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, which he entered in 1656. He left the university without a degree, and...

's The Squire of Alsatia.

Sir Roger de Coverley

Roger de Coverley

Roger de Coverley is the name of an English country dance and a Scottish country dance . An early version was published in The Dancing Master, 9th edition . The Virginia Reel is probably related to it...

 is mentioned in The Spectator

The Spectator (1711)

The Spectator was a daily publication of 1711–12, founded by Joseph Addison and Richard Steele in England after they met at Charterhouse School. Eustace Budgell, a cousin of Addison's, also contributed to the publication. Each 'paper', or 'number', was approximately 2,500 words long, and the...

No. 2 as having "kicked" him in a public coffee house for being called "youngster", and he is noted in The Newgate Calendar

The Newgate Calendar

The Newgate Calendar, subtitled The Malefactors' Bloody Register, was a popular work of improving literature in the 18th and 19th centuries....

as having been robbed by Davy Morgan after having some success at the gaming table. Morgan, observing Dawson had won a great deal of money, asked to speak to him outside where he proceeded to rob Dawson of 18 guinea

Guinea

Guinea , officially the Republic of Guinea , is a country in West Africa. Formerly known as French Guinea , it is today sometimes called Guinea-Conakry to distinguish it from its neighbour Guinea-Bissau. Guinea is divided into eight administrative regions and subdivided into thirty-three prefectures...

s at gun point before tying him up and making off.