1939 Navy officer bridgecoat and reefer/pea coat

[Bob Hudson]

I got these recently from a family that had previously sold me some interesting items from the career of a 30-year destroyerman (including a ship's battle flag from the Battle of Casablanca).

 

One coat is the long bridge coat and the other is the shorter reefer coat, which is basically an officer's peacoat (differently styled than the enlisted peacoat of the pre-WWII era).

 

These were apparently issued to him when he started his Plebe Summer at the Naval Academy in July 1939.

 

 

They each have the a long tag sewn to the lining and the a tag sewn inside the inner pocket:

 

[Bob Hudson]

The reefer coat still has the pre-WWII buttons with the left-facing eagle. Unlike the enlisted peacoats of that era, these only have four buttons per side (the top buttons are hidden behind the lapels). They have much nicer construction too, and don't have the corduroy pocket lining of the EM peacoats.

 

By the way, "reefer coats" is sometimes incorrectly used to refer to the Navy service blue dress coat, the ones that have the gold stripes around the cuffs. A reefer coat is, again, basically a peacoat.

 

 

 

[Bob Hudson]

The bridge coat, although issued in 1939, has the right-facing eagle on the buttons, so the buttons must have been replaced at some point. Being a bridge coat, it has straps for attaching shoulder boards. It also has the half-belt on the back.

 

 

 

 

[Dave]

It's amazing how uniforms really haven't changed. I had a reefer coat that I bought from the base thrift store as an Ensign...and converted the black buttons to gold ones. Later, I got a reefer coat at the Ft Meade base thrift shop that had belonged to a midshipman. Turned out he was STILL a midshipman at the time I bought it. Strange how it ended up in the thrift store of an Army base...or maybe not so much. I ran the midshipman's service number written in the coat and it turned out to have belonged to...

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyle_Eckel

 

Strangely, I was not surprised that it ended up at the thrift shop...though it was a little ironic that it fit me well and I wore it while he was still a midshipman at the Academy.

Strange world, sometimes.

[Bob Hudson]

It's amazing how uniforms really haven't changed.

 

Yeah, these are 75 years old and presumably are still regulation (no mothing, so they're even still serviceable).

[Justin B.]

Those are great! An "officer's peacoat" or short overcoat was regulation from 1913 through WW1, with black sleeve rank but no shoulder boards. It disappeared from the regulations when the overcoat was changed to the gold buttons and open collar. In the inter-war period the reefer coats were a Naval Academy thing. Better for marching and drills, or boats maybe? No doubt some officers continued to wear them after graduation, and 1951 they appeared in the uniform regs again for officers, now called a reefer, with shoulder boards. The article for the officer's reefer referred the reader to the USNA section, where there was also an illustration:

 

 

Does the overcoat have ghosts of sleeve rank (required before 1947)? Thanks for posting,

 

Justin B.

[Father V]

Just finished watching Greyhound (2020) recently and with Tom Hank’s character wearing his academy ring, his use of a reefer on the bridge at one point probably shouldn’t have surprised me, but I was surprised to see it so checked the 1941 regs then went searching and found this thread. 

[Father V]

On 7/21/2014 at 8:08 PM, Justin B. said:

Those are great! An "officer's peacoat" or short overcoat was regulation from 1913 through WW1, with black sleeve rank but no shoulder boards. 

 

Does the overcoat have ghosts of sleeve rank (required before 1947)? Thanks for posting,

The enlisted overcoat in 1913 regs & the 1917 revision was a longer coat with exterior pockets with flaps as well as the vertical slit pockets still being used. The reefer in the photos doesn’t have the additional pockets so it wasn’t the older style with gold buttons replacing the enlisted ones and gold lace removed, it was a purpose built reefer, I think.

On 7/21/2014 at 8:08 PM, Justin B. said:

 

Justin B.

 

[sigsaye]

When I was pushing boots in Great Lakes, I was teaching Company Commander School. Our CO had come in from San Diego. He was a Rotor Head and flew with HAL 3. Any way, didn’t have a real coat for winter. When it hit, he went and bought a P-Coat and had the presence of mind to have the gold buttons put on. He brought it over to me to show me, ( I told him his jacket was not going to cut it here, he disagreed, and a GL Winter set in). However, he didn’t get the shoulder loops put on for the shoulder boards. With a khaki garrison cap, from a distance, everyone would think he’s a Chief. And, he could get into serious trouble for impersonating a Chief 🤣👍🏻⚓️

[Father V]

On 10/5/2023 at 5:12 PM, sigsaye said:

When I was pushing boots in Great Lakes, I was teaching Company Commander School. Our CO had come in from San Diego. He was a Rotor Head and flew with HAL 3. Any way, didn’t have a real coat for winter. When it hit, he went and bought a P-Coat and had the presence of mind to have the gold buttons put on. He brought it over to me to show me, ( I told him his jacket was not going to cut it here, he disagreed, and a GL Winter set in). However, he didn’t get the shoulder loops put on for the shoulder boards. With a khaki garrison cap, from a distance, everyone would think he’s a Chief. And, he could get into serious trouble for

impersonating a Chief 🤣👍🏻⚓️

That’s hilarious! Who doesn’t listen to someone who’s already lived through it about what the weather’s like?

 

[sigsaye]

2 minutes ago, Father V said:

That’s hilarious! Who doesn’t listen to someone who’s already lived through it about what the weather’s like?

 

Great Lakes is a different kind of cold. And, it just hits. One April day, it was 75f. I’m out in the yard grilling burgers on the Webber, enjoying a day off. The wind shifted and temps dropped and it snowed. I finished grilling wearing my P-Coat. 

[Justin B.]

An early example of an officer's peacoat or short overcoat on this paymaster, 1869.

[mikie]

On 10/12/2023 at 9:07 PM, sigsaye said:

Great Lakes is a different kind of cold. And, it just hits. One April day, it was 75f. I’m out in the yard grilling burgers on the Webber, enjoying a day off. The wind shifted and temps dropped and it snowed. I finished grilling wearing my P-Coat. 

😲🥶

[Father V]

Justin, what a great photo! I don’t think it’s an overcoat though, since he’s got the cap device of the 1866-1869 regs, and the sack coat was in the regulations then. The overcoat wouldn’t have the sleeve rank, if I recall correctly. The sack coat was typically 4 button, both civilian and military, and the 3 pocket arrangement is also typical (left breast, two lower pockets with flaps that can be hidden in the pocket). 

[Father V]

On the other hand, the sack coat was supposed to be single breasted without sleeve rank: “Sack-coats of navy-blue flannel or blue cloth may be worn as ‘service dress’ by all officers on board ship and in the United States, except at general muster or upon special occasions of ceremony, when a different dress is prescribed by the commanding officer; but never on shore, nor on board ship on duty in a foreign port. Sack-coats shall be single-breasted, with a row of five medium size buttons on the right breast. Shoulder straps and lace on the sleeve will be dispensed with on sack-coats - retaining the star for line officers - in which case the designations of rank and corps will be worn on the ends of the collar, as follows:…

Staff officers will wear on the ends of the collars of their sack-coats their respective shoulder strap devices in the same way as the line officers with whom they have relative rank, omitting the duplicate end device.” 
 

There is the strange anomaly of calling it single-breasted and then specifying a row of buttons on the right breast, which sounds double-breasted to me!

[Father V]

Okay, my apologies but I misidentified the item your paymaster is wearing. It’s the “jacket” mentioned in the regulations in a separate section:

“Jackets may be worn as ‘service dress’ by all officers, except at general muster, or upon special occasions of ceremony when a different dress is prescribed by the commanding officer; to be of navy-blue cloth, faced with the same, and lined with black silk serge; double or single-breasted, as in the coat; rolling collar, with the same number of small sized buttons on the breast as for the coat, and with the same arrangement of lace on the cuffs, and the same shoulder straps.”

Note the “coat” being referenced is the sack coat, so 5 buttons should still be the number.

 

Here’s a similar garment from the same time period.

https://www.history.navy.mil/content/history/nhhc/our-collections/photography/numerical-list-of-images/nhhc-series/nh-series/NH-119000/NH-119774.html

Note the same officer in a regulation sack coat from a slightly earlier time in his career..

IMG_0937.tiff

https://www.history.navy.mil/content/history/nhhc/our-collections/photography/numerical-list-of-images/nhhc-series/nh-series/NH-64000/NH-64915.html

[Justin B.]

The coat is pretty clearly a non-regulation item; my point in posting it was just that a short outer-garment for officers was a pretty old idea. Officers "pea jackets" I belive were first mentiond in the 1841 uniform regs. The thick roll of the edge stitching shows that it's a heavy wool, like pilot cloth or melton, which would not be the case for the sack coat or jacket. There was no provision in the regs for both collar devices and sleeve stripes on any coat before 1877. I think this is just an example of someone "officer-izing" something that was more commonly an enlisted or merchant mariner garment.

 

The jacket was just the frock coat (or, earlier, the undress tail coat) cut off at the waist, basically like the USNA parade jacket but with a rolling collar. The reference to the same buttons as on "the coat" comes from earlier regs, before the sack coat had been authorized.

The jacket was the "working dress" of the sailing navy, and since midshipmen did more hands-on work aloft it became associated with them in both the US and British navies. The short double-breasted jacket, BTW, became the mess jacket in the Royal Navy, and still has buttonholes all the way up the lapels from the days when it could be buttoned up to the neck.

 

15 hours ago, Father V said:

There is the strange anomaly of calling it single-breasted and then specifying a row of buttons on the right breast, which sounds double-breasted to me!

It's single-breasted. If there weren't buttons on the right breast, how could you button it? 😉

 

 

15 hours ago, Father V said:

Here’s a similar garment from the same time period.

 

That's another interesting one, it looks like a heavier version of the kind of coat that would slide over from the merchant service to become the USN 1886 1st class PO coat and the RN officer "monkey jacket."

 

[Father V]

1 hour ago, Justin B. said:

The coat is pretty clearly a non-regulation item; my point in posting it was just that a short outer-garment for officers was a pretty old idea. Officers "pea jackets" I belive were first mentiond in the 1841 uniform regs. The thick roll of the edge stitching shows that it's a heavy wool, like pilot cloth or melton, which would not be the case for the sack coat or jacket. There was no provision in the regs for both collar devices and sleeve stripes on any coat before 1877. I think this is just an example of someone "officer-izing" something that was more commonly an enlisted or merchant mariner garment.

I didn’t notice that roll detail on first examination. Good catch.

 

I like your theory on him borrowing something from civilian use. 
 

1 hour ago, Justin B. said:

The jacket was just the frock coat (or, earlier, the undress tail coat) cut off at the waist, basically like the USNA parade jacket but with a rolling collar. The reference to the same buttons as on "the coat" comes from earlier regs, before the sack coat had been authorized.

The jacket was the "working dress" of the sailing navy, and since midshipmen did more hands-on work aloft it became associated with them in both the US and British navies. The short double-breasted jacket, BTW, became the mess jacket in the Royal Navy, and still has buttonholes all the way up the lapels from the days when it could be buttoned up to the neck.

While that presumption concerning the design of the jackets in the first paragraph from the time before photography of the uniforms before the 1841 regs (Daguerre’s invention being officially 1839) & even the official illustration of the midshipman’s jacket in the 1852 regs, I’m less certain of the time of the 1860’s for other officers and especially in the peacetime Navy of 1866-1869. The officer in my photos is one Oscar W. Farenholt (later Admiral), and the set of photos in the Navy’s official history site includes just about every service coat there was then including this:

He was on duty overseas to Japan, obviously.

 

And then this one as Master:

 

I doubt given the nature of his assignment that he was just winging it. At least one of these in summer uniform I believe to be the fine flannel coat allowed for warm conditions. While the one that looks a bit like the later mess jacket could indeed be a cut off design, the others seem properly cut like their civilian equivalents. The dearth of photographs surviving (or even taken) in the 1866-1869 period means there’s very little way to confirm it.

 

Thanks for the info on the Royal Navy. It’s interesting to me to see the cross-influences and divergences over the years with British naval uniforms and terminology. I was shocked recently to discover that there were a number of years where we both officially referred to a particular enlisted garment as a “jumper,” one of the many words originally used to refer to the ubiquitous working garment that has been called all of the following things: smock, frock, smock frock, slop, and jumper (in some cases to the confusion of contemporaries) and is still called a “jumper” in current Uniform regs, although no longer worn as a protective garment. Most of those terms have been used in RN or USN regs at one point or another also from what I’ve read.

[Justin B.]

On 11/21/2023 at 3:47 PM, Father V said:

While that presumption concerning the design of the jackets in the first paragraph from the time before photography of the uniforms before the 1841 regs (Daguerre’s invention being officially 1839) & even the official illustration of the midshipman’s jacket in the 1852 regs, I’m less certain of the time of the 1860’s for other officers and especially in the peacetime Navy of 1866-1869. The officer in my photos is one Oscar W. Farenholt (later Admiral), and the set of photos in the Navy’s official history site includes just about every service coat there was then including this:

 

Yes that is the jacket. And indeed, it is rarely seen in photos, especially after the sack coat came in. But it can be seen in some wartime groups:   

 

The last is interesting because it has gold cord on the collar which was prescribed for ensigns on the overcoat.

The USNA version was very similar before getting a standing collar in 1866, but was specified to have outside pockets.