Equity or a Sailor's Prayer before Battle, from the Battle of Trafalgar. A 19th-century caricature portraying ratings on a Royal Navy ship. The man with a sword is a commissionedofficer, as is the man on the ladder with the telescope. All others are ratings.The Royal Navy during the Second World War. Six naval rating recruits of the training ship HMS Impregnable, Devonport, scramble up the rigging during a daily training exercise.Royal Navy Certificate of Service (Form S.459), given to all ratings on discharge.
In a militarynavy, a rateorrating, and sometimes known as a bluejacket in the United States, is a junior enlisted sailor who is below the military rankofwarrant officer. They are not a commissionedofficer. Depending on the country and navy that uses it, the exact term and the range of ranks that it refers to may vary.
The term comes from the general nautical usage of 'rating', to refer to a seaman's class or grade as recorded in the ship's books.[1] The system of conferring authority on sailors in the Royal Navy evolved through the recognition of competence: landsman, ordinary seaman, able seaman, through to the appointment of authority as a petty officer.
The general structure for ratings in the Royal Navy now used breaks down into four major groupings:[2]
United States Navy & United States Coast Guard[edit]
In the United States Navy (USN), the term bluejacket is used instead to refer to enlisted sailors that rank below a chief petty officer.[3] 'Bluejacket' derives itself from an item of clothing that was worn by junior enlisted sailors before 1886.[4] It was used especially when the sailors were deployed ashore as infantry.[5]
In the United States Navy and United States Coast Guard, the term rate refers to an enlisted member's pay grade (i.e. relative seniority or rank), while rating refers to occupational field. In the U.S. Navy and Coast Guard, an enlisted sailor is most commonly addressed, both verbally and in correspondence, by a combination of their rate and rating rather than by rate alone, unlike in other branches of the armed forces. For example, a sailor whose rate is 'Petty Officer 1st Class' (pay grade E-6) and whose rating is 'boatswain's mate' would be addressed as 'Boatswain's Mate 1st Class' (abbreviated BM1). However, it is also correct to address sailors in pay grades E-4 through E-6 simply as 'petty officer' (e.g. 'Petty Officer Jane Smith') and pay grades E-7, E-8, and E-9 are addressed as 'Chief', 'Senior Chief', or 'Master Chief' respectively. Pay grades E-3 and below maybe referred to as their rate and rating, a Gunner's Mate Seaman Apprentice would be 'GMSA'. Those who do not have a rating, are sometimes referred to as 'non-rates', and simply addressed as 'Seaman', or by their last name alone; i.e. 'Seaman Jones' or merely 'Jones'.
United Kingdom Rank Insignia (View)
