Marine Name Generator

A Marine name lands differently from a generic soldier name because the Marine Corps has its own rank structure and its own way of talking. There is no Specialist and no Airman: the enlisted ladder runs Private, Private First Class, Lance Corporal, Corporal, Sergeant, Staff Sergeant, Gunnery Sergeant, Master Sergeant or First Sergeant, then Master Gunnery Sergeant or Sergeant Major. Officers go Second Lieutenant, First Lieutenant, Captain, Major, Lieutenant Colonel and Colonel. Getting that ladder right is the quickest way to make a fictional Marine read as authentic, and getting it wrong is the quickest way to lose a reader who served.

The second layer is informal. Marines call a Gunnery Sergeant Gunny, a First Sergeant Top, and a Second Lieutenant a butterbar. Squad nicknames are earned, not chosen, and they tend to be short and unflattering: Doc for the corpsman, Tex or Brooklyn for wherever you are from, Tiny for the biggest man in the platoon, Boots for the newest. Aviators use call signs, which follow the same rule.

The names below mix all of these: formal rank-plus-name entries for a roster or dog tag, plain full names with the diverse surnames you would hear at a real morning formation, and nicknames in quotes for the characters who need a little more personality.