Great White Fleet

[DougC]

In the late 19th century, the USN painted its ships with white hulls and buff superstructures.

Just what color is buff and which paint comes closest?

[Timmy C]

A dark tan, yellow-brown. Colorcoats will have it soon: https://www.sovereignhobbies.co.uk/coll ... 1330621932

[drasticplastic]

https://www.alamy.com/stock-photo-the-u ... 54364.html
Here's a good example (albeit, a restoration) of US Navy Buff in full daylight. But note that the upper buff section appears to be slighter lighter than the lower section. The word buff comes from the French "boeuf" which means beef, or most any bovine. Coats made of tanned cow, bull, and elk hides were the fashion in 17th Cen European armies.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buff_coat ... 98.3_F.jpg
In English, "boeuf" became "buff", hence the name "buff coats", and the name of the color.

[drasticplastic]

While we're on the topic of "The Great White Fleet", what color was exposed areas of steel deck on ships of that era?

[SeanF]

Pulling this one back up top again... as the last poster asked (over 5 years ago), does anyone know what color would be used on USN steel decks that were not wood topped in the 1890s-1900s era? Red-brownish linoleum-type stuff?
And also, what color would turret tops and deck blast protector plates be? (They appear to be the same as each other, and definitely not the same color as the general superstructure, as clearly seen in this shot of Massachusetts: https://navsource.net/archives/01/001/010203.jpg

Hopefully someone knows here in 2025!

- Sean F.

[El Santo]

Photos of non-planked decks in this era are maddeningly hard to find, and the overwhelming majority of the ones I've seen show the decks of torpedo boats. Those seem to have been black prior to the Spanish-American War. Once you start seeing ships in the War Color scheme, though, there's simply no telling whether you're looking at faded black or slate gray for the steel decks. I don't know about linoleum one way or the other, but I'd expect the most likely places to find it would be in the fighting tops of the masts and on the conning platforms of torpedo craft.

As for the turret tops, that photo of Massachusetts you linked is the only one I've ever seen that shows them in an obviously different color from the sides. I wonder if she had only just painted out of War Color, and kept the slate gray on the turret tops for some reason?

[SeanF]

Could be the inspiration for it... haven't found anything definitively pre-Spanish-American War that has darker tops.
Note that in that same photo it looks like the Indiana opted not to keep her turret roofs dark.

I found a couple indicating the same thing on the Kearsarge and Kentucky:
https://navsource.net/archives/01/005/010605f.jpg

Kearsarge apparently didn't (always) keep it that way:
https://navsource.net/archives/01/005/010560.jpg

But Kentucky (at least sometimes) did:
https://navsource.net/archives/01/005/010614.jpg

Seems to be a ship-by-ship and time-to-time sort of thing. Found a grainy newspaper pic of Virginia (or a sister) that looks like the dark turret top color even goes down the face! Most photos where you can see it show the tops the same as the sides.
https://navsource.net/archives/01/pdf/011306i.pdf


Also, on the other issue of the deck protector rings, here's one where it would appear Indiana preferred to paint hers the same color as the rest of the superstructure (at least at the time):
https://navsource.net/archives/01/001/010136i.jpg

On all the ships that had them, though, they usually appear darker than the superstructure color. They seem to have gone out of fashion from BB-7 onward.

Oregon seems to have never had the rings at all:
https://navsource.net/archives/01/001/010313.jpg

I think you're probably right about it being Slate Gray (fresh and dark, or quickly sun-faded) for "typical" rings and occasional turret tops. Linoleum wouldn't make much sense on a blast protector.

- Sean F.

[SeanF]

Okay... hopefully an easier question...
I've sometimes seen the inside of ventilator cowls on USN ships of the period painted red. Hard to tell any difference in color from photos. How solid is the certainty of that color, and is there any known start/end to when it was done that way? (i.e. Does it go all the way into the WWI dreadnoughts? Does it stop when ships went to a gray scheme? Was it an actual regulation, or something that varied ship-to-ship? Etc.)

- Sean F.