In sailing, what do such terms as 'in second reefs' and 'under double reefs' mean?

Question

I'm preparing a glossary for my website. The central character is an 18th century, square rigged vessel. Neither I nor most of the visitors to the site are familiar with sailing terms. These reefing terms appear primarily in the logbook. So when it says, 'in 1st reefs,' they're reducing the sail area a little?; 'in 2nd reefs,' reducing it a little more?; 'out 3rd reefs,' they're expanding sail area a little, but the 2nd and 1st reefs would still be in? 'Close reefed' would mean all reefs are in? 'Out all reefs' would mean all reefs have been removed?

Do I have the general idea?

Answer 1

When reefing sails you are reducing the area of the sails, doing to in heavy wind to make the boat more stable and under control.

you may notice on a boats main sail a line or 2 of small ropes hanging from the mast to the leach of the sail (back end).  These are the reef points.  you would lower the sail and then tie the extra sail material up to avoid it flapping around.  Some boats have a single set of reef points, some have more.

The above is a simple explaination, i am sure someone out here will put up a more detailed explaination, quote wikipedia, or some other source, but the above answers your questions.

good luck!

Answer 2

If it's definitions that you're looking for then what you want is a book called "A Sea of Words".

This is a companion book that goes along with the Patrick O'Brian series of books about the sailing adventures of Captain Jack Aubrey.  Most of these stories are situated in the square rigging days of yore.

It contains not only a couple of thousand definitions, there's also vessel recognition illustrations, illustrations of a typical square rigged boat, naming every single part and sail, a detailed log of an actual sea battle and many other bits and pieces that are really interesting reading... useless but interesting reading.