Personalised black US special forces debossed dog tags 1954-1967 style with notch

Special forces black dog tag set with debossed text, notch and with the text read from the flat side and with the hole to the right.

These tags are inspired by the order for Special Operations Forces of the US military to 'darken insignia when behind enemy lines' which was issued on the 15th of January 1967.

During 1967 the spec of the tags changed to the version without the notch. For late 67 and onwards please see the featured items at the bottom of the page for more options. 

This set and the images follow the layout used between 1954 and 1967. You are free to add whatever text you would like to these tags though, you don't have to follow the format used at the time.

The layout used between 1954 and 1967 was:

Line 1: SURNAME 

Line 2: FIRST NAME AND INITIALS

LINE 3: SERVICE NUMBER

LINE 4: BLOOD TYPE

Line 5 : RELIGIOUS PREFERENCE

These tags wouldn't have featured the rubber silencers used on modern tags but they can still be fitted. If fitted some of the text might be obscured.

If you would like silencers please use the silencer options drop down box to add them to your order and choose the colour.

Debossed tags feature a fairly limited character set compared to the more modern embossed tags that were introduced in 1975.

The characters available are:

A-Z (caps only)

0-9

Punctuation marks . ' & / - ( )

Please note that commas and any other punctuation are not supported. If you include any non standard characters we will do our best to work around it but it may delay your order if we have to contact you for clarification.

What makes this set so great and unique to us are the 304 grade stainless steel tags and chains with a super hard wearing black PVD coating. These tags can be worn 24/7, 365 days a year without having any concerns about them loosing their finish.

Back in the 1960's these finishes didn't exist and were typically painted black or even simply covered with black tape

Being based on our authentic military stainless steel tags, these also include the traditional rolled edge and detailing around the hole that makes dog tags so recognisable and iconic.

The order to 'darken insignia' was given during the Vietnam conflict in an attempt to reduce the number of visual traces that might reveal a soldier's position, particularly at night.

Examples of the special forces that use black dog tags include:

-Army Rangers

-Navy Seals

-Green Berets

-Commandos

-Delta Force

-Special warfare and combatant craft crewman (SWCC)

-Brown water navy gun boat crews

-Explosive ordnance divers (EOD)

 To achieve the black finish we've coated our MIL spec stainless steel tags and chains using an industrial process called plasma vapour deposition.

This results in a finish known as a 'DLC' or 'diamond like coating' as it's as hard as a diamond.

To coat the tags and chains they are placed in a vacuum chamber and blasted with a jet of plasma. This same process is used in the coating of things that are subject to high wear like formula 1 car and jet engine components. You will also see the same coating used on high end black stainless steel wristwatches.

These tags can be personalised with your own choice of debossed text, simply complete the text boxes on this page for line 1, line 2 etc.

If you’re giving the tags as a gift then you should also consider our custom presentation box which you can add at checkout.