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Tattoo designs and locations in the old U.S. Navy
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For the last 250 years, the art of tattooing has been closely associated with men who go to sea, but little is known about the tattoos themselves. This investigation provides at least some information about the designs, locations, and continuity of subject matter for tattoos worn by American sailors from the earliest days of the Republic to the eve of World War I. The study also attempts to explain why some designs were preferred over others and offers speculation on the reasons for the diversity of body locations chosen by men for the placement of their tattoos.
Although it is uncertain when large numbers of mariners began wearing tattoos, it is known that many crew members on Captain James Cook's first Pacific expedition (1768-71) were tattooed. Later in the 18th century, as the result of another Pacific voyage, an actual catalog of seafarers tattoos was compiled by William Bligh, captain of the ill-starred Bounty. It was not an interest in indelible skin art that led the captain to compile a roster of his mens' tattoos. His purpose in producing the record, of course, was to enable the authorities to make positive identifications if the notorious mutineers of 1789 were ever apprehended.
Despite the close association between tattooing and seafaring over the preceding several centuries, little descriptive material survives about the designs of the tattoos or their placement on the bodies of the men who acquired them. It was not until 1989, when Ira Dye published an extensive account of early American sailors' tattoos, that scholars had any detailed information on the designs worn by mariners in times past. Dye relied on three major sources for his research. The Philadelphia Seamen's Protection Certificate Applications from 1796 to 1818 held by the National Archives in Washington, DC provided the largest portion of his...