LOOK @ GIBSON Robert.  The right hand plate above is rather sad. Warrant officers could be awarded the LSGC medal and were allowed to wear it as long as they had the qualifying time on the lower deck before being promoted officer. This man was obviously promoted to Acting warrant officer whilst relatively young and one assumes that if he had been confirmed a proper warrant officer in normal time, he would not have been awarded his 'gong'.  However, as you see, he had 15 years on the lower deck for substantive rate reasons, and therefore qualified.  What a sad state of affairs for the poor man!

This is the dress for a chief petty officer in 1870 at a time when only small badges separated men dressed as seamen from one another, and here are those badges.   On the left,  the 1880 lower deck [ships company] dress regulations   Incidentally, to the un-initiated, the stripes, or badges as we call them in the navy, which form part of the chief petty officers badge in the picture below are commensurate with a chief petty officers age and length of service, but are not part of his rate badge: that being the crown, the foul anchor and the laurel. Those same three badges could have been added to any of the three other rates shown because they represent time spent in the navy measured from when aged 18 years, one for each for a specific period served to a maximum of three.   The man above right  is enough to put the fear of God into you! Here, you can enjoy looking at this Chief Gunnery Instructor [Chief GI] without fear of him 'biting your head off'. This picture shows the dress of a chief petty officer Seaman and chief petty officer Stoker in July 1896 {when this man joined in 1867 chief petty officers were in square rig}.    Note the simple cap badge, rather like a petty officers hat badge of today; the slits to the rear of the cuffs and the two buttons sewn onto the slits, and the jacket, double breasted showing three button. By 1890 {NAVY LIST 1890 pages 502/503} Chief petty officers of all branches {artificers} except Seamen and Stoker, were wearing three buttons on each cuff.  Note [left file] the black braid instead of gold braid on the Schoolmaster sleeves.

                 Plates showing the uniform regulations for the CPO in 1900. On the left  hand plate, ignore the small amount of text top left above the title of CPO......    All uniforms had four buttons, or space for four buttons.  Officers actually had the four buttons, but ratings not dressed as seamen, had three buttons on the right side with a button hole only where the top button would have been, and the top button on the left hand side, though sewn on, was always hidden under the collar flap. This was the start of three buttons on the jacket front for ratings {chief petty officers and below and from 1972 fleet chief petty officers/warrant officers} and four for all other officers.  A senior CPO worked his way up to become a warrant officer but it took a long time and was usually 'into dead man's shoes';  however, as one would expect, those with outstanding abilities made it early whilst still young.  As you will read a little later on, one's chances of promotion to the wardroom from the lower deck without first going through the warrant rate [and then only a few of them at that] was literally impossible in one period which lasted for 50 years, and virtually impossible at other times. 

L-R. A first class PO, and then a fine old man as a second class PO, a Coastguard man. The Coastguard was not what you may think, Their members were active royal navy men and were responsible, amongst other things, for naval recruiting - see fourth along. Notice his single killick [a type of anchor] with a crown above it. Finally a 'gunnery party'.

We now say goodbye to the men on the lower deck.  They were not treated too badly considering what was happening to countless thousands outside the dockyard gates, and although their treatment was harsh by modern standards, being in the navy during this period protected the men from often total and utter deprivation. Before we do, look at this very special picture on the LEFT and if this one doesn't fill you with admiration [or just plain old amazement] try this one on the RIGHT.

Lower deck titles were much the same as they were in my day {from 1953 onwards} - boy 2nd class, boy first class, ordinary seaman, able seaman etc,  but they were biased towards the seaman branch with executive officers representing the equivalent on the upper deck.     When a CPO was not qualified in either gunnery or torpedoes this anchor is the badge her wore on his jacket collar. Compare it to the size of the anchor a leading seaman wore on his left arm - both thumbnails have been set at 8%    

In those days though, boys, in particular, but others also, were 'different' from  my time.  In my time, young boys came from one source only and that was HMS Ganges [HMS St Vincent entries were older, past their 16th birthday on joining and were known as 'juniors' not 'boys'] but in the late Victorian period, boys in the fleet came from many different training ships each claiming to be better than the other, and many a senior officer had his preferences and demanded boy's from the school he patronised.  After the second world war when Ganges returned to its function of training boys, Ganges boys' were acclaimed to be the best [I was one in 1953] but whether they were or not, they were the only true boys, they having joined at age 15¼. 

  After 1850, engineers, artificers and stokers had been recruited to man the steam/sail iron-clads, but were at that time an unknown factor.  These additional men made a moderately difficult system for officers and men into a complicated one.  Both sides of the deck, upper and lower, were in a continuous state of flux, and even without these additions,  we have seen how complicated the officer corps was with some of its members commissioned and other not. The men, or more correctly the lower deck, but always known as the ships company were a mixture of petty officers and seaman.   Petty officer, was an all encompassing term, and one was borne on the ships book as just that.  For purposes of employment, skills and qualifications, one was either a chief, a first class or a second class petty officer.

The picture above shows the chief class and the first class petty officers in HMS Blake in 1896. Note over to the left a first class petty officer wearing fore and aft rig.  Men were allowed to change rigs providing they did so entirely at their own expense, only getting back their money when the Admiralty actually confirmed the change of rigs.  With money so tight, few could afford to do it.  Today of course, the phrase "petty officer" has become "senior rate" but first and foremost, today's men and women are Warrant Officers, Chief Petty Officers or Petty Officers, and then their employment skills and qualifications are of secondary importance. Officers had a status not used today,  where subordinate officers lived in the gunroom, and lieutenants and above lived in the wardroom.  Lieutenants meant any officers between two rings/stripes and three, so what we call a lieutenant commander today, was a lieutenant  [over 8 years seniority] in those days. 

  Look closely at the stripes on the cuff of the officer standing at the left of this picture. He has 1½ and without the curl. This dates from 1902 and tells us that he is an Assistant Paymaster of 4 years seniority.  So, not all lieutenants had two full rings, some having a ½" ring on the bottom and a ¼" ring on top, and this system is still used in the USN when the officer rank of lieutenant is suffixed JG, meaning Junior Grade. Other lieutenants had 2½ stripes [2 x ½" + 1 x ¼"] which they wore when they had been a two stripe lieutenant for 8 years. The term lieutenant commander didn't come into being until 1914 yet lieutenants had been wearing 2½ stripes since 1877 and we routinely call lieutenant commanders, but in this case it was a contraction of the term 'lieutenant commanding', where a senior lieutenants regularly commanded small vessels.  As from 1914, for social reasons, the lieutenant commander was addressed as commander in speech.  

Plates above  show

uniforms in the second world war. These are important to the story because they show the rank of warrant officers after they lost their buttons in October 1918 and the rank of lieutenant commander dating from 1914.  The plates were relevant until 1949 when the rank of warrant officer was withdrawn.

    Staying on the same theme, there is another set of plates further on in the story which explains one of two anomalies, like, for example, how it is possible to have the same number and configuration of stripes for a rear admiral and a first class commodore.  Look for this sign  *** in PART THREE. The term "officers" meant all officers who wore either rings/stripes on their cuff or three buttons [warrant officers and midshipmen although the latter were styled subordinate officers].  So, when the ships complement [= officers + ships company]  were to assemble for prayers, funerals, colours ceremony, photographs etc., warrant officers, whether commissioned or not assembled with the wardroom officers, and petty officers irrespective of class, with the men [the seamen], fell-in as the ships company, or just plain 'company' with a senior rates platoon and junior rates platoons. Whilst quite naturally, today's chief petty officer would take offence at being called or considered as a petty officer one rate below him, as would a lieutenant commander being addressed as a lieutenant one rank below him, the term "admiral" is still used to address any officer who has attained flag rank between rear admiral and admiral, and it would be bad style to address a rear admiral [a junior admiral] as a rear admiral in general conversation. You would address him as admiral just as you would a very senior admiral proper when speaking to him, but when writing to him, you would address the envelope Rear Admiral Flint and begin the letter with either Sir, less formally with Dear Sir or socially with Dear Admiral Flint. Notwithstanding good manners of course, my point is that a senior admiral doesn't take offence at some newly promoted captain being called an admiral, even though each is separated by three levels of rank. 

Approximately ten years after the introduction of steam and the iron-clads, the navy had polarised itself into groups to accommodate steam technology but the overall plan despite much concern, had not changed much from the pre-steam days. The officers structure looked like this: CLICK HERE.

It is not part of my story, but the introduction into the wardroom of engineering officers was like a replay of the days of wardroom status warrant officers [Master, Purser, Surgeon and Chaplain] in that the wardroom of the 1860 period, found them socially unacceptable. The engineers were socially naive, engaged in artisans talk, tended to undermine learning and knowledge [though of course they had goodly amounts of each for their own needs] by their pragmatism. Moreover, the engineers were recruited in many cases direct from engineering jobs in civilian life and had, as it were, jumped the naval ladder [in both the gun room and the lower deck] and were, to say the least, considered as upstarts.  For good reasons, historians and authors almost to a person, take the road of following famous naval officers and the battles they fought as being the yard stick for "Naval History." When those subjects are exhausted, they start to look for 'domestics' like mutinies, pay and conditions [especially if by being bad, they cause mutinies] etc, but if I were to ask you why an ERA, a chief petty officer, has his own mess and a stoker messman, and doesn't mess with other chief petty officers when afloat, would you know why?  If you don't, it is probably because our raconteur's have never bothered to spread the word. The answer is not a logical split to fill up all those individual water-tight spaces on the ship or boat. No, it comes from the 1860's when the navy were absolutely desperate to get senior engine room and boiler room staff into our warships and would, within reason, pay the going price to get such men. These engineers knew that, and were able to 'call the tune' to which the hapless Admiralty had to dance.  First, the engineers demanded high wages and the navy went some way to meet their demands, until it reached the point where the engineer would be earning as much or more than the master or a surgeon.  Then privileges above his lowly [but needed] station were sought, when the engineer could take what leave he wanted once the engines had been rung-off, and a naval uniform for him would be an encumbrance rather than an asset.  As steam became more and more important ashore for transportation, factories, docks, commercial shipping, the engineer grew in importance and touted his skills to the highest bidder.  History doesn't show us the list of bidders, but I doubt whether many could out-bid the Admiralty especially when it was desperate to man the iron-clads, the most powerful warships of the day. The Admiralty more than met the engineers demands, and so started a privileged set of sailors.  However, the shrewd Admirals had made their own demands in a subtle way. They offered a package which, just as today [thinking about the brain-drain], few other employers could match, which for a return of service [job security], they would get the very best machinery to play with where money would be no obstacle; money would be spent on training, and promotion was more or less guaranteed. Their pay was moderated and other specific attractions were added to their conditions of employment.        Firstly, that they were skilled, knew it, were arrogant about it, and looked down on common sailors, and so their demand for their own mess or living space with their own steward was met in full. Then this led to them having their own uniform, but as the uniform regulations were rewritten, they had to adhere except that badges were not needed for engineers - it was obvious who they were! - and that they would circumvent the traditional lower deck ladder climbing, and enter as first class petty officers, soon to become chief petty officers, and almost as quickly, warrant officers, commissioned warrant officers, and then engineering officers as lieutenants.  That package made everybody happy, and the navy got back to work with the engineers below playing with their machines, and the mariners up top, wondering whether to set sail or make smoke?  As the Admirals went to bed that day, content that they had 'tamed' the engineer by making him sign-away his ability to make demands, they decided that the precedent would not be repeated in the future.  Within a matter of months the boy artificer training programme had begun, and within just a few short years, engineers touting their skills were ridiculed by the navy, unless of course they wanted to join-up on Admiralty terms and not theirs.

Now for some pictures just to break-up the story.

						Taken in Grand Harbour under the Valletta curtain-wall of Lascaris in 1925
An excellent teaching picture. Front row 1st and 2nd from right - executive and non executive lieutenants over 8 years seniority. Back three left and back two right are warrant officers. Notice 4 commanders, 2 seated non executive plus one executive probably engineer and paymaster, with a second executive commander 3rd from right standing.  The ship is HMS DAVASTATION at Devonport	A picture of HMS ARDENT a torpedo boat destroyer late 19th century. Good opportunity to have a good look at officers uniforms in every detail of a LT [over 8] - executive, the CO; LT [under 8]  - non executive; Sub Lt and a WO.	HMS BOXER an MTB. This is her full crew. Note 4 officers sitting together with the one on the right a WO. Also of interest, note the CPO [two small button sewn onto split in back of cuff] on left of WO, and the ERA, the first CPO rate to wear 3 buttons on cuff front, sitting on right of left hand seated officer.	Midshipmen. See also this photograph of a midshipman who became the captain of the signal school HMS Mercury A. Scott-Moncrieff	A boatswain over 10 years seniority. This is a Mr Jones, a boatswain in Simon's Town Dockyard South Africa. Offered DQ's or this draft, I think it could so easily have been..."mind your fingers"...	Christmas 1914.  A lieutenant [telescope under arm] and a warrant officer read their mail from home. Alongside them is a rating and all three are wearing their great coats suggesting that they are on duty.  Note rum barrels. The rating with the great coat also has a brief case and it appears that it is he who is handing out mail from it.	HMS WARSPITE. Rear Admiral Claude E Buckle and staff.	The normal daily dress for an officer of the late Victorian era. Mr Gibbs has been a warrant officer for 10 or more years.	A Gunner [warrant officer of over 10 years seniority] supervises the maintenance of user checks on a secondary armament.	Posted here to show you a good picture of a MAA of those days. Note no three buttons on cuff but two small ones sewn onto a slit in the back of the cuff and the badge - NP and crown [Naval Police] NOT Naval Patrol as it might be today and was in my day!
Executive officers of HMS TERRIBLE	Non executive officers of HMS TERRIBLE.	The Engineers of HMS RODNEY. ERA's have three buttoned cuffs but chief stokers have two small buttons sewn on to the split at the rear and bottom  of their cuff the same as seamen CPO's	The Officers of HMS CAMBRIDGE. I like the CO's fine set!	The flag-captain is His Serene Highness [HSH] The Prince Louis of Battenburg, Lord Mountbatten's father. The flag lieutenant is a lieutenant under 8 years seniority and the admiral's secretary is a non executive civil branch lieutenant  also with less than 8 years seniority	Young budding engineers	It is obvious that 5 of the 6 officers standing are warrant officers, and it is possible, because he looks elderly, that the lieutenant standing could have been a former commissioned warrant officer. Northumberland was a training ship. Taken in 1901	Text attached to picture is self evident.	A group BLUE-JACKETS with a 2nd class PO and an Artisan.	Members of the CPO mess and not a cuff button in sight, except for the two small ones at the back of the split cuff. The scattering on 2nd class petty officers were 'mates'. See description of 'mates' at the bottom of these photographs.
These three pictures [added in January 2007] are relevant to our story. Adrian Wright, who very much wanted a naval career, spent most of his working life working with and directly for the navy in the front-line support unit WSTG [Weapons System Tuning Group] and therefore has experienced some aspects of life at sea with the "grey funnel" line and is fully familiar with most of the naval weaponry. Adrian who now works as a volunteer in HMS Collingwood's Museum is extremely proud of his grandfather, and for good reason too, for he was a Commissioned Torpedo Gunner, a man much respected by all in the ships company and often feared by those who did not pull their weight or meet the high standards of discipline demanded by the navy of those far off days. This is a photograph of his grandparents with Adrian's father standing in front of his father.  If you look carefully at the right sleeve of  grandpa's jacket, you can see one cuff button and the ¼-inch stripe above it, and note also the four buttons on the front of his jacket.  The next two pictures are respectively of the front and back of Form S 447, the form used to record the results of a board convened to exam a rating  for the rank of warrant officer.               Such a document is very rare today and it is worth looking at it in some detail, and used for the officer in the picture above. {Note: Although a seaman, a boatswain, he had a qualification in wireless telegraphy] First note that the Form would have been prepared in advance ready for The Examination Board and that his record of service in various ships [front page] was transcribed from his Service Record [on parchment], and was completed down to where is says "Given under our hands..." in a very restrictive space, whereas, his professional 'history' sheet [back page], completed by the same hand using much bolder script in a more generous space, tells The Board of his various qualifications in the Gunnery and Torpedo Branch. The form, dated 1896, refers to  "Her Majesty's Fleet and where mentioned has been crossed out and 'His' [or King's for Queen's] has been added.  The Queen died in January 1901 and this is November 1902 - strange that the forms were continued for so long!  His Official Number, viz 160650, is added just before the table of ships begins.  To start with, Lawrence William Wright had a classical ratings career in that in May 1891 he joined as a Boy 2nd class joining HMS Impregnable at Devonport when aged 15, advanced to Boy 1st class then to an Ord [Ordinary Seaman] {6 May 1894}. On 1 July 1895 he qualified for T.M. [Trained Man = Able Seaman] and then as a S G 1 CL [Seaman Gunner First Class] on 26August 1896. He became a ships diver {an extra duty when called upon by the Captain} [a diver proper would have belonged to a branch specialising in diving {deep sea for example} on a full time basis] but after four years requested to cease being a ships diver and his certificate was withdrawn.  Meantime, he was a seaman and continued his duties in that branch. In Feb 1897 he qualified as a SGT Seaman Gunner Torpedo; five months later as a Leading Seaman and three months later as a LTG [Leading Torpedo Gunner].  In January 1901 he was advanced to be a Leading Torpedo Gunner, and at this point his career 'took-off' for just thirteen short months later he had the necessary qualifications to be a Torpedo Gunner [a warrant officer] and had also completed a course at HMS Vernon in Wireless Telegraphy {almost at the very beginning of the W/T being used by the Royal Navy}. The torpedo branch became the original electrical branch responsible for the maintenance and defect-casing of embryonic telegraphy wireless devices: telegraphy devices, particularly over land telegraph,  were virtually old hat by the turn of the century and had played a leading part in opening the West as North America was being populated. I have mentioned in these pages {for example, see above to the text just below the sketches of badges} that there was a period when many bright young petty officers and leading hands were allowed to become warrant officers, jumping the queue of 'old and bold' chief petty officers who got to be warrant officers [eventually] simply because of their length of service and a 'clean' but an uninspiring Service record.   By the time Lawrence William Wright had served just 11 years and 165 days [of which 4 years and 354 days had been on a sea-going ship - not a lot of sea experience] he had sat and passed the Examination Board for Warrant Officer Torpedo Gunner.  'Fast-track' is the expression which would be used today. However, this early promotion meant that Lawrence did not have enough time on the lower deck to qualify for a Long Service and Good Conduct Medal or the bounty which came with it! Each of the Board Members from four different ships [in the presence of the Captain of HMS Duke of Wellington] signed the Form, one commissioned and the other three warrant officers themselves. However, before that event took place, two weeks earlier, a Naval Instructor [a school master - today called an Instructor or a schoolie, also of HMS Duke of Wellington] had signed the Educational Certificate on the back page of the Form, certifying that he was numerate and literate to the level required for a warrant officer. Lawrence William Wright served another eighteen years [30 in all] in the Royal Navy retiring as a Commissioned Warrant Officer Torpedo Gunner.