Trafalgar, 21st October, 1805

Today is the 202nd anniversary of Trafalgar, perhaps the Royal Navy's greatest victory. The picture shows part of Nelson's sketch of his famous battle plan, to sail at an angle through the French and Spanish lines, rather than line up in parallel and blast away with broadsides as was the usual tactic.

This plan however involved 20-30 minutes of sailing under heavy fire toward the enemy lines without being able to engage them until the point of breaking through.

Colin White of the National Maritime Museum describes how Nelson drew up his battle plan here .

There is an interesting animation showing the progress of the battle, on the National Maritime Museum website.

Budding admirals who would like to test their skills against a computerised enemy can refight the battle in the BBC's Trafalgar Battlefield Academy

Various eyewitness accounts such as that of 16-year old marine Lt Paul Harris Nicholas show how Nelson's plan to bring about a chaotic "pell-mell" in order to defeat the enemy became all too true. Casualties on both sides were heavier than any sea battle in the previous 250 years.

David Cordingley's excellent book Billy Ruffian (Bloomsbury, 2003) contains a gripping description of the battle from the point of view of a particular ship of the line (the Bellerophon).

Cardinal Wolsey's Vodpod selections this week have a naval warfare theme, including a very funny spoof.

Finally here is a useful Royal Navy index of navy slang, so you can find out what Honkydonks and Mouldys are.

Commute with Napoleon

A plug for the continuing entertaining podcast on the life of Napoleon by Cameron Reilly (who asks the questions) and David Markham (who supplies the answers).....ideal for listening on the way to work.
Get Napoleon 101 via ITunes or direct from Podcast Network.

Execution of Marshal Ney, 1815

This blog occasionally makes an excursion into the Napoleonic period (see previous posts on Napoleon's final surrender to the English Navy and Napoleon's death on St.Helena ), and today's post commemorates the death by firing squad (commanded by himself - how's that for guts) of Marshal Ney in December 1815.

Ney was knows as "le Rougeaud" (he had ginger hair), and was a popular general, but attracted enemies firstly by siding with the Bourbons while Napoleon was on Elba, and secondly poor tactics at Quatre-Bras and Waterloo.

Bruno Nackaerts's article on the lack of opposition to Ney's execution includes mention of two good conspiracy theories - one that Wellington felt guilty and arranged for a mock execution with Ney spirited away to America where he became Peter Ney, a schoolteacher; the other conspiracy theory is another mock execution arranged by the masons, complete with stage blood!

Incidentally, the excellent Fondation Napoleon site has an interesting article on Napoleon's famous hat ('whilst most of his officers wore their hats "en colonne", that is, perpendicular to the shoulders, Napoleon wore his "en bataille", that is, with the corns parallel to shoulders').
There is also a link to various primary sources on the Napoleonica site, as well as some fun stuff - how about a classy Napoleonic e-card to your history buddies?.

Capture of Napoleon, 15th July, 1815.

Napoleon in fact surrendered to the British man-of-war Bellerophon (known as the Billy Ruffian to its crew), after realising that the possibility of escape through the British sea blockade was remote.

On being transported back to the UK, en route to St Helena and exile, crowds turned out every day to view the former Emperor's daily walk on deck.

See previous post covering his death on St Helena in 1821.

The history of the Bellerophon is desribed in the gripping ship's biography "Billy Ruffian" by David Cordingly.

Napoleon dies in exile, 5th May 1821

Napoleon Bonaparte dies in exile on the island of St. Helena

Some telling quotes from the great man:

"It is always your next move"
"Don't wait. The time will never be just right"
"It is literally true that you can succeed best and quickest by helping others to succeed"