liberty man

Noun

liberty man (plural liberty men)

1. A sailor who has been granted permission to go ashore.
   • With these counsels, and many others equally valuable, did Papa Wick fortify Bobby ere that last awful night at Portsmouth when the Officers' Quarters held more inmates than were provided for by the Regulations, and the liberty-men of the ships fell foul of the drafts for India, and the battle...1889, Rudyard Kipling, “Only A Subaltern”, in Under the Deodars, Boston: The Greenock Press, published 1899, page 135
   • ‘When libertymen come back there’s the quartermaster, the crusher, the officer of the day, sometimes the Jaunty hisself and usually Big Bill.’1960, J. E. Macdonnell, Don't Gimme the Ships, Melbourne: Horwitz Publications, page 74