Published by Constable (1996), price £ 16.95 ISBN 0-09-476220-1 205 pages, 11 black and white illustrations.

This is the story of women who lived and worked on board Royal Navy ships of the 18th and 19th centuries. As this book reveals, there were more such women than you might at first suppose. Female Tars by Suzanne Stark looks at the different categories of women to be found on board such vessels.

The first, and probably most obvious category, is that of prostitutes, many hundreds of whom would be rowed out to a ship that came into port. This activity was often actively encouraged by naval officers as long as discipline was not affected. It was thought that women on board ship when in port would help to alleviate some of the harshness of the sailors' life, and reduce the incidence of mutiny and homosexuality on board.

Most of the seamen were in the 20-40 years of age group; the prime of life and the most sexually active period. Ms. Stark looks at the iife of seamen during this period, and the conditions in which they lived and worked, and interrelates this with the story of prostitutes and their lives.

Incidentally, an interesting fact in this book is that these women ranged in age from 9 years and upwards. Many of them were therefore in their teens, the contemporary age of consent being 12 years of age). Alongside the story of prostitutes and sailors, the author has included accounts of the movement to reform such fallen women.

Some seamen actually married, either legally so or in common law. Some wives of warrant officers were allowed to go to sea with their partners from the 17th century onwards. They looked after the children on board (there were many boys aged 11 and 12 years as servants), provided a laundry service and helped the surgeon. There were cases of childbirth at sea, and Ms Stark even investigates the incidences of sexual harassment of such women, which apparently was very rare.

By far the most interesting aspect of this book is the section on the women who joined the Royal Navy disguised as men. The author has found verified accounts of more than 20 women who joined the navy or Marines dressed as men from the late 17th to the early 19th centuries.

The chapter entitled Women in Disguise in Naval Crews looks at the stories of four such women. Anne Chamberlyne, for example, joined the navy in 1690 and fought as a seaman in the battle against the French off Beachy Head. William Prothero was a woman marine who served on board HMS Amazon (an appropriate vessel!} from 1760 until the following year, before being discovered and discharged.

William Brown was a black woman who served in the Royal Navy from 1804 to at least 1816, possibly longer, and was rated able seaman and served as captain of the foretop.

Female Tars discusses how these women were able to pass as men and why. Recruits for the Royal Navy were not examined too closely. It was only when a seaman was flogged that he was stripped to the waist, and in this situation several seamen were found to be women.

Sick and wounded seamen were given only a cursory examination. The marine Hannah Snell spent many months in a hospital having wounds in both her thighs treated without the surgeons realising she was a woman.

So why did women join the Royal Navy and Marines? The author argues that it was to escape the restricted economic and social status assigned to women during this period. To gain her discharge, a woman seaman simply revealed her true gender, no action being taken against such an impostor.

Some women served as seamen, and even when discharged continued to pass as a man in civilian life, such as Mary Lacy, alias William Chandler. She qualified as a shipwright and served at sea and in Portsmouth Dockyard for eleven years disguised as a man.

The book argues that many of these women cross-dressed because of their desire to change sex, and/or to have sexual relations with women. The Victorians devised the myth that these women ran away to sea to be with their lovers!

This is one book that I found hard to put down. It tells a fascinating story of a particular social aspect of the Royal Navy that I have seen mentioned elsewhere, but not in such detail. Female Tars tells the story of all the categories of women who served on board ship, and dispels the myths surrounding them. A book of immense interest to naval historians.

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