Uniforms of the German Navy
The uniforms of the officers and men of the German Navy are made of dark blue cloth for winter wear and of white duck for hot weather as in other navies and in general they follow the lines of other navies, but there are several distinctive features. The officers have no special full dress coat with the cutaway skirts or swallow-tail effect, a frock coat taking its place; and the enlisted men have in addition to the ordinary sailor shirts with the wide falling collar a dress jacket reaching to the waist line and roached over the hips like the jackets of the American midshipmen. This jacket has a row of small buttons down each side of the front and also on each cuff and is worn unbuttoned with the falling collar of the shirt outside of it.
The commissioned officers have full dress, dress, blue service and white service uniforms.
The full dress uniform consists of a cocked hat similar to that worn by British naval officers; a long double-breasted frock coat; trousers with gold lace stripes down the outer leg seams; black shoes; a sword belt covered with silver and gold lace with a wide red stripe running through it, and epaulets or shoulder knots depending upon the rank and corps of the officer. A distinctive feature of this full dress frock coat is that while it has a standing collar trimmed with gold lace, the front is provided with wide triangular lapels covered with color facing indicating the corps or branch of the service to which the wearer belongs.
The dress uniform consists of a bell-crowned cap of dark blue cloth with a braid of the distinctive corps around the band and a distinctive insignia on the front; a frock coat like that of the British or American naval officer; with which shoulder knots are worn; plain dark blue trousers, and black shoes. With this uniform the same sword belt is worn as with the full dress but instead of the sword a short sword or dirk is worn. As a variation of this uniform the cocked hat is sometimes worn with it for special occasions.
The blue service uniform consists of the blue cap; a double-breasted square cut sack like that worn by British officers; plain dark blue trousers, and black shoes. A plain black double-bow knot tie is worn with this uniform.
The white service uniform consists of a white cap of the same design as the blue cap but with a black band and black visor as in the United States and British navies; a white single-breasted sack coat with standing collar, a patch pocket on the left breast and a patch pocket on each side below the waist; white trousers, and black or white shoes depending upon the occasion. The dirk is worn with this uniform suspended from a black leather belt worn beneath the coat. Shoulder straps showing the rank are worn on the white service coat.
The overcoat is a long double-breasted coat cut to fit the figure, buttoning to the neck, with a wide falling collar and an outside pocket with flap on each side below the waist. It is closed by gilt buttons, one row down each side.
Following the universal military custom, the rank of German naval officers is indicated on the blue uniforms by stripes worn upon the sleeves of the coat just above the cuff. The number, width and arrangement of these stripes are shown in the accompanying [illustration].
On the full dress coat sleeves there is a vertical three-pointed strap on the outside over the rank stripes, its color being the distinctive color for the corps to which the wearer belongs.
The rank is also indicated by insignia upon the tops of the epaulets and shoulder knots. The tops of the epaulets are of the distinctive colors of the corps except those for officers of the Line which are of gold. The lower grade in each branch has no fringe of bullion on the epaulets.
The stripes indicating the rank of officers of the Line are sewn directly upon the cloth of the coat sleeves and have a German Imperial crown above the upper stripe. Officers of the Staff corps do not wear the crown above their rank stripes. The corps or branch of the service to which officers of the Staff corps belong is indicated by stripes of colored cloth worn between the stripes indicating the rank, and the distinctive colors are:—
| Engineer officers | Black. |
| Gunnery officers | Dark gray. |
| Torpedo officers | Dark gray. |
| Medical officers | Dark blue. |
| Naval Constructors | Black. |
| Paymasters | Light blue. |
| Legal Department officers | Red. |
| Pilot officers | Light gray. |
| Dockyard Construction officers | Black. |
The insignia worn upon the cap for commissioned officers is a gold wreath surrounding a circular emblem made up of concentric circles of red, white and black (from the center out) and surmounted by the German Imperial crown. This medallion is also worn upon the center of the front of the enlisted men’s flat caps.
These distinctive corps colors are also worn as the “facings” on the full dress uniforms, that is on the lapels of the coat and on the three-pointed straps on the cuffs, and around the band of the service cap, blue and white, except that pilots wear a gold band on the cap.
Warrant officers in the German Navy wear a dress uniform and a service uniform both blue and white similar in design to that worn by commissioned officers, with their distinctive rank stripes on the sleeves and on the shoulder straps.
German Navy. Officers’ sleeve decorations indicating rank
| 1. Grand Admiral | 2. Admiral | 3. Vice Admiral |
| 4. Rear Admiral | 5. Captain | 6. Commander |
| 7. Senior Lieutenant | 8. Junior Lieutenant | 9. Sub Lieutenant |
In the German Navy there is a rank intermediate between that of Warrant officers and Chief Petty officers which has no counterpart in the American Navy. This is called Feldwebel. His dress uniform is a blue cap; a short dark blue jacket with rolling lapel collar and a row of small gilt buttons down each side of the front; a blue waistcoat with gilt buttons, and plain dark blue trousers; and his service uniforms, both blue and white, are similar to those of other officers. On the cuffs of the dress jacket he has three narrow gold stripes around the sleeve close together and below them three similar stripes around the sleeve and continuing down the outer seam to the bottom edge of the sleeve, with a vertical strap of dark blue cloth across the stripes with six small gilt buttons on it.
The Bandmaster is a Warrant officer and the distinctive mark of his rank is a gold lyre on the center of his shoulder straps.
The uniforms of the enlisted men are the dress or “parade” uniform, the service uniform and the white uniform.
The dress uniform consists of a sailor flat cap; a white sailor shirt with wide dark blue falling collar; the dark blue dress jacket worn with the collar of the shirt outside of it, and dark blue trousers, the trousers being cut without the wide “spring” or flare at the bottom of the legs so common in other navies.
The blue cap is similar to that worn in other navies but the crown is higher in the front than in the back, which tends to give it a military appearance. The name of the ship or station is worn upon a cap ribbon around the band of the cap, the ends of the ribbon being tied at the back and allowed to fall down the back in streamers. Upon the front of the crown at the center is the red, white and black medallion, the colors of Germany.
The collar of the shirt has three rows of narrow white braid around the edges as in the American and British navies.
The service uniform consists of the blue cap; a dark blue shirt similar to that worn in the American Navy, and dark blue trousers.
The white service uniform is of the same design but of white duck instead of dark blue cloth or flannel.
The rank or rating and the branch of specialty is indicated by distinctive marks worn upon the left sleeve between the elbow and the shoulder. Some of the principal of these marks are:—
The overcoat worn by enlisted men of the German Navy is a short double breasted pilot coat with turn-down lapel collar and a double row of gilt service buttons down the front.
For service ashore in landing parties and when on duty at the coast forts in hot weather or tropics, a khaki helmet is worn instead of the white hat with white uniforms and khaki canvas leggings are also worn. For landing parties as infantry or artillery black leather boots are worn with the blue uniforms, the trousers being tucked inside of the boots.