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Navy - Vice Admiral (U.S.)

Unrestricted Line Officers' Flags
Indoor/Parade version by Rick Wyatt, 27 September 1998	Outdoor version by Joseph McMillan, 9 September 1999

1865 Version - Vice Admiral

See also:

Restricted Line Officers

by Rick Wyatt, 27 September 1998
Supply, Medical, JAG Officers

To clarify, the white flag with blue stars is flown not only by Supply, Medical, and JAG Corps officers but by all officers not eligible for command at sea. That includes the various staff corps (Supply, Medical, Dental, Nurse, Medical Service, Chaplain, Civil Engineer, and Judge Advocate General) but also flag officers in the restricted line such as engineering duty officers, intelligence and cryptography specialists, and oceanographers. It may routinely be seen up to the three star level (for example, flown by the Surgeon General at the Bureau of Medicine and Surgery in Washington), although there have been a rare few instances of restricted line officers rising to four-star rank (Hyman Rickover was an engineering duty officer). But never aboard ship.
Joe McMillan, 14 June 1999

1865 Version - Vice Admiral

by Joseph McMillan, 8 February 2000

Article 1258 of the 1865 Navy Regulations provided for flags for:
Vice Admiral. Blue with three white stars, flown at the fore royal masthead. On the standard size flag (10.25 by 14.40 feet), the three stars formed an equilateral triangle measuring 18 inches between the centers of each star, the upper star to be 27 inches from the hoist and 18 inches from the upper edge of the flag.

I should reiterate that I've never seen these illustrated. The first depiction of starred U.S. Navy flags in the 1867 signal book shows an arrangement of large stars essentially the same as those used now.

Joe McMillan, 8 February 2000