Dawn breaks at 6am. Nelson signals ‘Prepare for Battle’ with the fleets 17miles apart. Two columns bear down on the French ships moving into their single line of battle. The headlong rush is at walking pace. Light winds grace a gentle approach of six hours; time to think on the quarter deck, Nelson’s imperative: ‘to cut through and engage on the other side’.
Men prepare for action
On the gundeck, the men sharpen cutlasses, polish the muzzles of the guns, write hasty last letters to lovers, a mother or father; three of four dance a hornpipe, a few in quiet prayer, and the exchange of last wills hastily written.
Nelson appears on the gundecks, talking with words of encouragement to his men at their stations. He himself retires to his cabin to write the codicil to his will leaving Emma to the care of the nation, a last letter to Horatia and Emma.
On his knees at prayer: ‘I commit my life to Him who made me ... and the just cause which is entrusted to me to defend. Amen’
With action imminent Nelson decides ‘to amuse the Fleet with a signal’ hoisted aloft ‘England Expects That Every Man Will Do His Duty’ to which cheers arose throughout crews of the fleet.
‘The doctors, parsons, purser and loblolly men, were also getting the medicine chests and bandages out; bands were playing ‘Hearts of Oak’ and ‘Britons Strike Home’;
A prophetic “God bless you Blackwood. I shall never speak to you again”; and the determined will of Nelson not to let Villeneuve’s Fleet escape to the safety of Cadiz, to remain a potent force.
Aim: annihilation of French fleet
Nelson’s resolve: to annihilate the French and Spanish fleet today, decisive in deed.
Through Forty minutes duration Victory comes under heavy fire before she passes astern Villeneuve’s flagship the Bucentaure.
The Victory’s wheel is smashed and steering has to be done by hands at the tiller in the gunroom ... John Scott nearly cut in half by a roundshot.
Then the order came: ‘Stand to you guns.’
My eyes were horror-struck at the bloody corpses around me, and my ears rang with the shrieks of the wounded and the moans of the dying. At this moment seeing that almost every one was lying down .... and several times stooped for the purpose, but ..... a whisper: “Stand up and do not shrink from your duty!”
Eye-witness accounts: gore of war
The marines drawn up at the poop suffered heavily. The double-shotted broadsides which Victory fired into the stern of Bucentaure as she slowly moved past were so effective that she all but ceased to be a fighting machine, and for some time continued to be hammered by the ships as they came up.
Later, in surrender, Captain James Atcherley witnesses on board the Bucentaure:
‘The dead, thrown back as they fell, lay along the middle of the decks in heaps, and the shot, passing through, had frightfully mangled the bodies ... and extraodinary proportion had lost their heads.. A raking shot. which entered the lower deck, had glanced along the beams and through the thickest of the people, and a French officer declared that this shot alone had killed or disabled nearly forty men.’
But Victory’s passage to the open leeside is impeded by Neptune, so Victory is pulled hard to port, to lay alongside the upcoming Redoubtable, now the meat in a French sandwich.
Captain Lucas, realized his crew could not match the British in seamanship and gunnery, so drilled his men in musket-fire and hurling hand grenades from the rigging. This they did onto the upper deck of Victory.
Marines are mown down, and a shot passes between Nelson and Hardy, a splinter from the bits bruising Captain Hardy’s foot and tearing the buckle from his shoe. Both look each other in the eye, “This is too warm work, Hardy, to last long.”
Nelson still paces the quarterdeck urging inspiration to their men, musket fire continues to sweep the deck.
At this moment the musket ball strikes Nelson through the chest, smashes through his ribs and soft tissue of the lung en route to lodging in the spine. He falls full length on his face.
Carried below, he has the presence of mind to hold a handkerchief over his face and medals so that the men on the gundecks should not see him and become discouraged.
Last moments
Extracts taken from the poet Southey’s Autobiography of Nelson:
An hour and ten minutes elapsed from the time when Nelson received his wound before Hardy could come to him. They shook hands in silence. “Well, Hardy," said Nelson, "how goes the day with us?"--"Very well," replied Hardy; "ten ships have struck.........."I hope," said Nelson, "none of our ships have struck?" Hardy answered, "There was no fear of that.” Southey
“I am a dead man, Hardy,” said he: “I am going fast: it will be all over with me soon. Come nearer to me. Let my dear Lady Hamilton have my hair, and all other things belonging to me.”
Hardy observed that he hoped Mr. Beatty could yet hold out some prospect of life. “Oh, no!” he replied, “it is impossible. My back is shot through. Beatty will tell you so.” Captain Hardy then, once more, shook hands with him; and, with a heart almost bursting, hastened upon deck.
“Don’t throw me overboard:” and he desired that he might be buried by his parents, unless it should please the king to order otherwise. Then reverting to private feelings: “Take care of my dear Lady Hamilton, Hardy take care of poor Lady Hamilton. Kiss me, Hardy, ” said he.
“Thank God I have done my duty”
Hardy knelt down and kissed his cheek; and Nelson: said, “Now I am satisfied. Thank God I have done my duty. ” Hardy stood over him in silence for a moment or two, then knelt again and kissed his forehead. “Who is that? ” said Nelson; and being informed, he replied, “God bless you, Hardy. ” And Hardy then left him -- for ever.
Nelson now desired to be turned upon his right side, and said, “I wish I had not left the deck; for I shall soon be gone.” Death was, indeed, rapidly approaching.
He said to the chaplain: “Doctor, I have NOT been a GREAT sinner;” and after a short pause, “Remember that I leave Lady Hamilton and my daughter Horatia as a legacy to my country.” His articulation now became difficult; but he was distinctly heard to say, “Thank God I have done my duty.”
The Achilles Blows Up
‘It was a sight the most awful and grand that can be conceived. In a moment the hull burst into a cloud of smoke and fire. A column of vivid flame shot up to an enormous height ..... a prodigious tree in flames, specked with many dark spots, which the pieces of timber and bodies of men occasioned while they were suspended in the clouds.’
This signals the end of the battle.
In September Nelson returned to the fleet having been chosen by the Admiralty as Commander-in-chief.
Nelson was aware that The Revolution Fleet was manned by less skilful sailors: not as well-drilled, and with far less experience at sea.
This played its part in Nelson’s decision to adopt his shock tactics at Trafalgar.
Past tactical plans for sea battles
The sacred cow of naval tactics was that the battleships formed into the line of battle in parallel to the enemy who did likewise.
The two sides would proceed to knock the stuffing out of each other with broadside to broadside until one side yielded. The aim was to get the enemy to disengage.
New tactics of Admiral Howe
Though the single line of battle was still the custom in sea battles, Admiral Howe at The Glorious First of June 1894 adopted another tactic of successfully going through and breaking the enemy line.
After writing his ideas into a book published in 1899, The Admiralty accepted this new thinking.
Nelson had adopted similar tactics at the Battle of the Nile, gaining Nelson a reputation as an Admiral of fierce resolve and bold in action.
Nelson’s Tactic:
Break through the line & annihilate!
The tactic to be adopted was for 2 columns to pass through the enemy line, breaking it into three parts:
- as each ship pass through the gap the carronades on one side to rake through the stern of the enemy ship, each carronade in their turn;
- and the other side to rake the enemy’s bows; the rear and centre sections of the line to be defeated first;
- and with the enemy van being isolated, unable to engage early in the battle, this could be addressed later.
Nelson’s resolve was to annihilate the enemy rather than to simply force the enemy to retire from the battle; to thwart their plans for invasion; and to destroy the French navy as a power on the high seas.
‘Band of Brothers’
To have the absolute trust of his officers and men was crucial for Nelson’s bold plan to work.
Simply put, it was imperative for the captain’s of all the ships of the line to follow into battle in close support of Nelson leading the windward column and Collingwood the lee column, and to keep going with resolve until victory was secured.
“I have the happiness to command a Band of Brothers”
The requirement is to act as a coordinated unit as the tactics demanded, yet each captain is entrusted to use his own judgement in the heat of the battle.
Nelson called a meeting of captains before the battle to discuss tactics. There was a deep sense of unity of purpose.
Cannon 32 pounder
Hardy with Nelson
