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Uniform
In the MN there were quite a few variations in uniform and indeed when and where it was worn. I personally thought that whatever the dress, decent standards of work were more important.
However, some of us had whites, some of us had greys, some had kharkis and in one case, of a mate who shall remain nameless, we had brilliant blue! When uniform was required it was worn, when not, it wasn't. Always wore it in the saloon though on the basis that if the stewards were required to wear it, then so should the officers.
Personally I wore khaki for working on deck/in hatches when sailing on the older tonnage with hatch boards and canvas covers but once the raised hatch coamings arrived even that was impractical and the white overalls took over - you can't stay clean leaning over raised coamings or maintaining the panel chains, not to mention deep tank work.
If memory serves, the company wanted officers to wear the grey tropical stuff but I'm not sure it was a popular idea with seagoing folk; I never liked it.
I read somewhere once that on grey funnel line ships OOWs working after dark could wear whatever they wanted and the article quoted one OOW who always wore DJ and bow tie! Can't see that being permitted in a fighting situation!
Speaking of RN, their 'Woolly Pullys' were excellent (we used to get them in the RMAS), whereas the commercial versions were cheap and nasty and barely lasted a few months. To counterbalance that, the RN foul weather gear was rubbish when compared to a good commercially bought set.
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