• Awarded to Naval personnel for various heroic or meritorious actions, medals are understandably a source of great pride for many sailors. While the Navy encourages sailors to wear their medals on certain uniforms, there are strict regulations that sailors must follow when displaying these medals. In general, sailors are to wear their medals only with formal uniform combinations and replace them with corresponding ribbons in other circumstances.
  
  

Large Medals

• Large medals are the normal sized awards issued to sailors who wear them only with their full-service dress blue and white uniforms on the the left breast of the service coat. If a sailor has multiple large medals, he suspends them from a holding bar arranged 1/4 inch above the left breast pocket.
  
  The Navy requires sailors to arrange medals side-by-side in rows and wear them in order of precedence, with the most distinguished medal at the top left of the arrangement. There should be no more than five medals in each row, and the medals should only overlap proportionately if there are more than three in a row. The row with the least medals, if necessary, should be at the top of the arrangement. Medals should hang low enough to cover the suspension ribbons of the medals in the row below them.
  
  

Miniature Medals

• Miniature medals are exactly what they sound like--scaled-down, smaller versions of original medals issued to sailors. Sailors wear these medals with their formal dress uniforms at various evening events, service dress and enlisted jumper uniforms. Worn in a similar fashion to large medals, there is no overlap when wearing miniature medals side-by-side under any circumstance.
  
  Sailors must display these medals on the left breast, centered on the lapel of the dinner coat or 1/4 inch above the pocket flap on the service coats. In the jumper uniform, the medals hang with the lowest row 1/4 inch above the left breast pocket.
  
  

Medal of Honor

• Due to its prestige, the Navy has different rules for dislpaying the Congressional Medal of Honor. A sailor may never wear his Medal of Honor on a suspension rack; instead, he wears it around his neck with a blue suspension ribbon. When wearing this medal with the men's white service coat, he wears the suspension ribbon on the outside of the coat. Otherwise, the ribbon goes under the coat collar but on the outside of the shirt collar. There is no miniature version of the Medal of Honor, and no other allowable way of wearing it.