Uniform coat of a Midshipman, 1748- 58

This frock coat of a midshipman is quite similar to the lieutenant's undress coat of that time. It also features a stand up collar of blue wool lined with white velvet, which would often have been removed and re-attached. For example, in cold or inclement weather, the collar would have been sewn on to the coat as a stand-up collar. If it was not needed in this way it could be re-attached as a turn-down collar.

Since I have already received several questions as to why they were called that, well, that is relatively simple. If you look closely at the uniforms of the 18th and 19th century you will notice that they have buttons on the sleeves. Now relatively useless, but according to legend they were put on to keep the young middies, mostly the very young and still new aboard a ship and therefore often still homesick and therefore often crying, from wiping their tears and runny noses on the sleeve. Hence the name Snotty or Snotties.

Memento Portrait of a Young Midshipman,by John Downman late 18th–early 19th century (x)

However, the origin of this legend is unclear. On the one hand, it is attributed to Napoleon who, during the Russian campaign, ordered his men to wear tasteless cloths at last and not always to use their uniform sleeves and therefore to sew the buttons of their dead comrades onto their sleeves. Nice theory, but unfortunately it doesn’t fit in with the time period, as the naval uniforms from 1748 already had these buttons. Therefore the theory of Nelson, who gave his Midshipmen the same order as Napoleon, only that they should buy extra buttons and sew them on, doesn’t fit either. Similarly, Prussia’s King Frederick the Great was tried to be the origin of this legend.

However, the uniforms, especially the first ones, were strongly based on the prevailing men’s fashion and there are already buttons on the sleeves. Therefore, it was probably simply adopted from there. And the fact that the young midshipmen were also called snotties may simply come from the fact that we were dealing with boys aged 10 and upwards and the young ones were simply homesick and therefore perhaps cried a little more in the evenings than the others and went to bed with a tear-stained face and a runny nose, and probably needed the handkerchief more often than others.