Clothing Definitions — definitions of garments and clothing terms from Apparel Search
A reefing jacket, or reefer, is a type of warm jacket designed for use by midshipmen while aloft and engaged in sail reefing. A midshipman performing this duty is also known as a reefer. The jacket belongs to the working dress of the sailing navy, made for the coldest, highest work on the ship, and if a midshipman fell from aloft the garment for the water was the life jacket, worn instead of the reefer for that risk. This page explains the reefing task itself and what a jacket for that work had to do.
If a midshipmen falls over, he or she would be wearing a life jacket instead of a reefer ...
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| The above article is licensed under the GNU Free Documentation License. From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/reefing_jacket ). 1/6/06 |
Reefing was among the most demanding routine tasks of a sailing warship. When wind rose, sail area had to come down quickly, and the crew for the work, led and driven by the midshipmen, climbed the rigging, edged out along the yards high above the deck, and leaned over the yard to haul up, fold and tie down wet, heavy, flogging canvas. Every condition of the job argued for a purpose-made jacket: the height multiplied the wind's cold, the work was done with both hands so nothing could be held or adjusted, the canvas and cordage saturated the workers with spray and rain, and a fall meant the sea. A warm jacket that stayed close to the body, fastened securely, and left arms and shoulders free to pull was not comfort but equipment, in the same class as the life jacket worn for the fall risk itself.
The midshipmen who wore it were the navy's young officers in training, boys and young men learning seamanship by doing its hardest work, and the transfer of the jacket's name to its wearer, the midshipman on reefing duty called a reefer, records how completely the garment belonged to the task. Naval working dress of the period was otherwise improvised and informal by modern uniform standards, which makes a named, task-specific jacket notable: it marks reefing as work distinct enough, and dangerous enough, to dress for deliberately.
The reefer's descendants are the close, warm, weatherproof jackets of modern sailing and outdoor work, fleece and soft-shell layers under waterproof shells, worn with harnesses where the midshipman trusted his footing and his grip. The word also travelled: reefer came to be used for short, double-breasted heavy coats in the pea coat family, a separate development of the same naval wardrobe. As a definition, though, the reefing jacket keeps its first meaning, the warm jacket of the young officer aloft in bad weather, tying down sail, a garment named for the single job it existed to make possible.
A reefing jacket, or reefer, is a warm jacket designed for use by midshipmen while aloft and engaged in sail reefing, shortening sail in rising wind. The name covers both the jacket and, by transfer, the midshipman performing the duty.
Reefing is reducing the area of a sail in strong wind by folding or rolling part of it and tying it down with reef points along the sail. The work is done aloft, out on the yards, in the wind and weather that made the reef necessary, which is why it needed its own warm, close working jacket.
Reefing is done high in the rigging, fully exposed to wind, at the moment weather is worsening. The jacket had to insulate against that cold and wind while fitting close, with nothing loose to snag in rigging or flap against the hands and eyes of a man working with both hands.