See first quotation.
1714. Fidlars are a sort of small Crabs, that lie in Holes in the Marshes.—J. Lawson, ‘The History of Carolina,’ p. 162. (N.E.D.)
1839. Besides showing, when I grew a year or two older, an extraordinary tact in roasting crabs and fiddlers, oysters and sand-eels, and such other stray edibles as I could lay my hands on.—R. M. Bird, ‘Robin Day,’ i. 16.
1852. Sand-fiddler … the local name for a small animal of the shell-fish kind, and which abounds on the [Carolina] beach.—C. H. Wiley, ‘Life in the South,’ p. 30 n. (Phila.).
