Beaver felt cocked hat of a warrant officer’s pattern belonging to surgeon James Black (died 1868).

The new uniform regulations of 1825 included the innovation that warrant officers were to have specific insignia on their buttons and embroidered on their collars. The device for a surgeon featured a snake twined around an anchor, which was that of the old Sick and Hurt Office. Unlike the uniform, the button on the hat did not have specific insignia, but featured the fouled anchor on lined ground.

James Black only saw very brief active service – he was appointed surgeon in the Royal Navy on 10 September 1810 and served in HMS ‘Raven’ from 26 June 1812 until sometime before December 1815. In 1824, it is noted in the ‘Navy List’ that he was now a medical doctor. It was during this time that he would have worn this uniform. With the exception of the ‘Raven’, he spent the whole of his career inactive. It is probable that he had his own private medical practice. He retired in 1839 and died in 1868.