dicksmith

English

Etymology

From dick +‎ smith, from the shameful tendency of some sailors to acquire venereal diseases.

Noun

dicksmith (plural dicksmiths)

1. (vulgar, slang) A United States Navy hospital corpsman.
   • 2000, Steven L. Waterman, “USS Ortolan, ASR-22”, in Just a Sailor: A Navy Diver’s Story of Photography, Salvage, and Combat, New York, N.Y.: Ballantine Books, →ISBN, page 272:

     It was a mixture of pure medical alcohol and Navy-issue canned orange juice. Once the fire went out a little, I kind of liked it. We had a few more, the dicksmiths (the divers’ name for corpsmen who are qualified divers) said “Happy New Year,” and I left for home.

   • 2001, Richard Marcinko, John Weisman, chapter 20, in Detachment Bravo, Atria Books, →ISBN:

     I hit the starter, but all I got was the kind of halfhearted cough I give out when the friendly dicksmith is (squeeze-squeeze) testing me for hernia.

   • 2006, Donald G. Johnson, American Sailor: More Adventures to Go with the Job, iUniverse, Inc., →ISBN:

     All of a sudden the dicksmith started hard-assing one of the deck apes for lifting his pogey bait.

   • 2013, K. W. Hearth, A Common Thread, Abbott Press, →ISBN, pages 25, 27, and 30:

     No one could mistake Doc for a Dicksmith (slang for corpsman, medic). […] You’re a dicksmith (medic)? […] A couple of areas, medicine and chamber operation, really appealed to Doc. Being a dicksmith, they would.