Query origin "number is up"

[Tony P]

Please excuse me as a newbie if this topic is done to death ... I
couldn't find anything relevant by way of searching or the FAQ.

What is the origin of the slang phrase "His number is up", meaning he
is either dead or fated for death?

I had always understood that it was WW II RAF flying jargon, coming
from the numbers of missing pilots being posted on a board. However, I
came across the phrase in John Buchan's "The Thirty-nine Steps" (p.
39, bottom in my ed.), published in 1915 and presumably written in
1914-15, surely before the RFC used the idiom or it became popular
therefrom.

Any takers?

[James Hogg]

The OED is a taker:

"P4. colloq. one's number is up and variants [with reference to the
number on a person's lottery ticket, or some other number by which a
person may be identified, as an army number]: one's time (to die, etc.)
has come, one is finished or doomed."

Here are the first three quotations:

"1804 C. LAMB Let. 25 Jan. in Lett. C. & M. A. Lamb (1976) II. 130
Though this is a lottery to which none but G. Barnett would chuse to
trust his all, there is no harm just to call in at Despair's office for
a friend, and see if his number is come up.

1899 C. ROOK Hooligan Nights iv. 56 You couldn't tallygraft to Billy no
more. His number's up awright, wiv no error.

1915 'BARTIMEUS' Tall Ship i. 11, I think our number's up, old thing."

--
James