Horatio Nelson
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| Horatio Nelson
Viscount Nelson of the Nile and Burnham Thorpe | |
|---|---|
| Born | September 29, 1758 |
| Died | October 21, 1805 |
Vice-Admiral Horatio Nelson was a British naval commander during the wars with Revolutionary and Napoleonic France, and the winner of important victories in the battles of Cape St. Vincent (1797), the Nile (1798), Copenhagen (1801), and the crucial battle at Trafalgar (1805), where he was killed onboard his flagship HMS Victory at the moment of his greatest triumph. His private life was known for his love affair with Lady Emma Hamilton, while both were married to other people.
Early years
Horatio Nelson was the sixth of eleven children born to Edmund and Catherine Nelson. Edmund was the rector of the parish of Burnham Thorpe, Norfolk, England. Although of good manners and scholarly, the Nelsons were poor. Preferment for an education was difficult, but it was hoped that a distant relation, Lord Walpole, could provide the means. However, Catherine’s brother, at the time a captain in the Royal Navy, made the decisive act and agreed to take the boy, then aged twelve, to sea after his mother’s death (Durant, pg. 518).
He was a slight boy, not physically strong, and often sick, but at every opportunity he would seize the initiative and learn all he could. He had to learn how ships operate, and as a midshipman, how to lead men. But there were also times for adventure, such as his first voyage to the West Indies and a scientific expedition to the Arctic in 1773, where, on the ice, he stood up to an advancing polar bear; only a shot from a ship’s gun prevented the bear from killing him and drove it away. He was reprimanded for leaving the ship without authorization (Durant, pg. 518).
Mediteranean service
Lady Hamilton
Cape St. Vincent
The Nile
Naples
Copenhagen
Trafalgar
Grief
Assessment
References
- Durant, Will and Ariel. The Age of Napoleon, Simon And Schuster, New York (1975).