Times, Watches & Bells
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The Names of Watches
| Name of Watch | Duration Naval Time |
Duration Civil Time |
| Middle | 23:59 to 04:00 | Midnight to 4:00am |
| Morning | 04:00 to 08:00 | 4:00am to 8:00am |
| Forenoon | 08:00 to 12:00 | 8:00am to 12:00pm |
| Afternoon | 12:00 to 16:00 | 12:00pm to 4:00pm |
| First Dog | 16:00 to 18:00 | 4:00pm to 6:00pm |
| Last Dog | 18:00 to 20:00 | 6:00pm to 8:00pm |
| First | 20:00 to 23:59 | 8:00pm to Midnight |
The purpose of dividing the period between 16:00 and 20:00 into the two dog watches is to provide an odd number of watches in the
24-hour day so that the Port and Starboard watches will keep a different watch every day.
The seaman, unlike the civilian, does not speak of the morning, afternoon and evening, but of the morning, forenoon, afternoon and dogwatches.
The watches got their name because of the time of day they are in.
The dog watches were named as such because seamen used to try and dodge them.
If they had shore leave during these times and they were on watch
they would have to stay behind and finish the watch before going on leave.
Bells
The time on board ship is indicated by striking the hours and half-hours on the ships bell through each watch, in accordance with the list below;
- First half hour - 1 Bell
- First hour - 2 Bells
- First hour and a half - 3 Bells
- Second hour - 4 Bells
- Second hour and a half - 5 Bells
- Third hour - 6 Bells
- Third hour and a half - 7 Bells
- Fourth hour - 8 Bells
The time thus indicated is called one bell, two bells, three bells, etc,
according to the number of times the bell has been struck.
This sequence is repeated in each watch.
Seven bells can therefore indicate 03:30, 07:30, 11:30 or 22:30.
Therefore when quoting the time by this method the name of the watch
is added.
For example, 1130 is described as seven bells in the forenoon.
The exception to this is the last dog watch where time is marked as follows:
- 18:30 by one bell
- 19:00 by two bells
- 19:30 by three bells
- 20:00 by eight bells.
On the 31st of December each year, the occasion is marked by sixteen bells being struck at the end of the first watch
(eight for the old year and eight for the new year).
Traditionally this is done by the youngest member of the ships company.
Except for the purposes of marking the time, the ships bell is struck only when the ship is at anchor in a fog or bad visibility or, in some ships,
to sound the general alarm in the event of fire or other emergency.
For a general alarm the bell is rung rapidly for considerably longer than five seconds, and a pipe indicating the nature of the emergency and
giving orders to deal with it usually follows.
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