Naval Institute Press

291 Wood Road

Annapolis, MD 21402

© 1996 by Suzanne J. Stark

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or utilized in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying and recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

First Naval Institute Press paperback edition published in 2017.

ISBN: 978-1-68247-269-9 (eBook)

The Library of Congress has cataloged the hardcover edition as follows:

Stark, Suzanne J., 1926–

Female tars: women aboard ship in the age of sail / Suzanne J. Stark.

p.            cm.

Includes bibliographical references (p.) and index.

1. Great Britain. Royal Navy—Women—History—18th century.

2. Great Britain. Royal Navy—Women—History—19th century. I. Title.

VB325. G7S73 1996

359’. 0082—dc20

Print editions meet the requirements of ANSI/NISO z39.48-1992 (Permanence of Paper).

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First printing

First two verses from “A Man of War Song No 56,” A Sailors Songbag: An American Rebel in an English Prison, 1777–1779, ed. George G. Carey (Amherst: University of Massachusetts Press, 1976), 147. Reprinted by permission of the publisher.

Two verses from “The Maiden Sailor,” by John Curtin, The Pepys Ballads, ed., Hyder Edward Rollins, 8 vols. (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1932), 6: 176–77. Reprinted by permission of the publisher.

Illustration on title page: Detail of a line engraving by C. Mosley. From Charles N. Robinson, The British Tar in Fact and Fiction (New York and London: Harper and Brothers, 1909). Boston Athenaeum.