Word.ws English Dictionary

captain's servant

captain's servant noun: before 1796, the rating of a boy entering the Royal Navy at about the age of twelve before becoming a midshipman.

Noun

captain's servant (plural captain's servants)

  1. (historical) Before 1796, the rating of a boy entering the Royal Navy at about the age of twelve before becoming a midshipman.
    • "When one reads of a distinguished naval officer having been "a captain's servant," it does not mean that he blacked the captain's boots, mixed his grog, and emptied his slops, but that he entered the service under a captain's protection."1905, John Masefield, Sea Life in Nelson's Time

Forms of captain's servant

pluralcaptain's servants

Questions about captain's servant

What does captain's servant mean?
Captain's servant means before 1796, the rating of a boy entering the Royal Navy at about the age of twelve before becoming a midshipman.
What part of speech is captain's servant?
Captain's servant is a noun.
What is the plural of captain's servant?
The plural of captain's servant is captain's servants.

Words near captain's servant in the dictionary

  1. captain's goal
  2. captain's goals
  3. captain's pick
  4. captain's picks
  5. captain's run
  6. captain's servant
  7. captain's table
  8. captain's tries
  9. captain's try
  10. captain's walk
  11. captain-lieutenant

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: captain's servant (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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