Trafalgar Day

Today is significant in Britain in that it's the 200th anniversary of Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson's victory and death at the Battle of Trafalgar. I am not a great one for anniversaries and regularly forget birthdays and other important dates, but Nelson is rather special in the eyes of Englishmen and deserves to be remembered at this time. Beyond his sometimes incredible achievements in naval warfare, he also presents us with deeds and qualities that resonate with our modern sensibilities. He was, perhaps, the first and most prominent British hero of our age.

I am not going to give a potted history of Nelson's life (apart from anything else, that would be blog suicide). For those who are interested, there are good summaries provided by the BBC and the Royal Navy. I want to concentrate more on what makes the man so dear to British hearts.

There are many heroes in British history who achieved just as much military success as Nelson; the Dukes of Marlborough and Wellington, Sir Francis Drake and even good old Monty. But I can think of only two who have the same charisma as Nelson - King Henry the Fifth and Alfred the Great. What is the secret of these few who have become heroes of legendary fame and earned the enduring love of a nation?

The most obvious common denominator between the three is that they won their battles in the face of overwhelming odds. Alfred fought the Danes to a standstill after having his kingdom reduced to a tiny island in the marshes of Somerset; at Agincourt Henry beat an army of between 20,000 and 30,000 Frenchmen with a force of 5,000 archers and 900 men-at-arms. And Nelson repeatedly defeated the combined French and Spanish fleets with daring tactics and indomitable courage.

Yet there have been others who have achieved as much with just as little. There is more to these three than just military prowess. As brilliant a commander as he was, Alfred hated war and used the peace to reinstate learning in his country, to rebuild what had been destroyed and to make fair and sensible laws. And the story of his burning of the cakes, whilst probably not true, does give a hint that he was a man of the people, not above menial tasks in the service of others.

Henry was one of the first of the Norman kings to see himself as English first and foremost. He spoke the language (something that the Normans had not bothered to do before) and endured the same harsh conditions as his soldiers when on campaign. And they loved him for that, not only because he gave them victories. Shakespeare's portrayal of Henry at Agincourt may be a romanticized version of the truth but it reflects the way the English saw him at a time that was still close to his day. Henry was a man of the people as much as was Alfred.

And what of Nelson? He, of course, was more a man of the people than either of his great predecessors. A commoner, he began his career in the navy as a cabin boy and worked his way up by sheer ability. Slight of stature and sickly, he survived the hard conditions of life at sea and somehow rose above them. He seemed impossible to kill, frail as he was. To have an arm hacked off by the surgeons of the time might have killed stronger men, but not Nelson. To lose an eye in battle should have slowed him down at least, but not Nelson. It seemed that the more of him you shot away, the more determined and courageous he became.

His love affair with Lady Hamilton also earns our sneaking admiration. "Yeah," we think, "stick it to those snooty aristos!" And this demonstrates Nelson's willingness to break the rules, to go against accepted ways of thinking. In naval tactics he was an innovator, the first to cut through the line of battle orthodoxy of a hundred years. It makes perfect sense that he should have been a rebel in his private life too.

So Nelson becomes a hero in so many ways. He strikes a blow for the little guy, the under-nourished weakling of the old Charles Atlas advertisements. He gives hope to the common man, pushing in amongst the ranks of the high and mighty and tweaking their noses with a few spicy adventures with one of their ladies. Along the way, he amuses us with a sense of humor too, putting his blind eye to the telescope to avoid seeing an unwanted signal, enticing a foreign fleet out of port with insolent and unexpected raids. And, of course, any Englishman loves a man who puts one over the French.

His final act sets the seal on his greatness. To die at the moment of his greatest victory is the finest thing any hero can do. Not for Nelson the slow degeneration into a bristling curmudgeon, ranting against political developments beyond his time, as was the lot of Wellington. Not for him the eccentric lifestyle in a country cottage, writing self-congratulatory memoirs, as did Monty. Not even a disappearance into obscurity and an unnoticed death in some banal accident, as befell T.E. Lawrence, the famous Lawrence of Arabia.

No, Nelson did it properly, leaving us no memory of declining years, no later indiscretions to dull his bright legend. We have no option but to remember him at the height of his fame and greatness. Small wonder that we set him upon a pedestal so high in the middle of a square named for his finest hour. The man just couldn't lose.

So here's to Trafalgar Day and good old Lord Nelson. He gave us something to remember as the politicians drag us reluctantly into Europe.