The Battle of Trafalgar

The Battle of Trafalgar, fought on October 21, 1805, was a decisive naval engagement during the Napoleonic Wars between the British Royal Navy and the combined fleets of France and Spain. Commanded by Admiral Lord Nelson, the British fleet secured a significant victory that confirmed British naval supremacy. The battle took place off the coast of Cape Trafalgar, Spain. Nelson’s innovative tactics and leadership were pivotal, though he was mortally wounded during the conflict. The victory thwarted Napoleon’s plans to invade Britain and had a lasting impact on European history.

Trafalgar: Nelson Thwarts Napoleon

Introduction

On January 8, 1806, an unprecedented funeral was held in England. The casket was conveyed down the Thames in a royal funeral barge; the next day, it was transferred to a hearse shaped like a warship that sailed through the streets to St. Paul’s Cathedral. Tens of thousands of weeping onlookers filled the cathedral and lined the roads. The man who had been granted these honors was a warrior who had won a spectacular and crushing victory over a superior force and delivered his nation from years of desperate fear of invasion by an implacable and terrifying foe. At the very moment of his triumph, this hero, Horatio Nelson, had been struck down in battle.

Naval War in the Age of Sail

• (1) Since the galleys had clashed at Lepanto, naval warfare had undergone rapid change.
  (a) Deep-hulled ships propelled by square-rigged sails that could tack against the direction of the wind were capable of carrying enough supplies to cross the oceans.
  (b) When heavy cannons were mounted on these ships, the new technology marked a new era of naval warfare.
  (c) But only one or two cannons could be mounted at the front or stern of a ship; thus, guns were positioned mainly along the sides. Ships could not shoot in the same direction that they were moving and could not fire more than half their guns at any one enemy ship.
• (2) In the line-of-battle formation, the fleet of one adversary would line up in a long column, all sailing in the same direction. The two opposing lines of warships sailed in opposite directions, firing broadsides at one another. The two sides simply pounded one another until a ship sank, caught fire, or suffered so many casualties that it had to surrender.
• (3) A typical warship of this period had two or three decks for guns. The largest warships carried between 64 and 120 guns. These warships represented an enormous investment of money and resources to construct, were extremely costly to operate, and incorporated the most cutting-edge technology of the day.

England versus France

• (1) The dominant power in naval warfare in the 18th and 19th centuries was England. This nation possessed a large number of excellent natural harbors from which the main sea routes to Europe could be controlled. England developed the largest merchant marine in the world, as well as the largest and most efficient navy to protect it.
• (2) England’s greatest enemy during this time was France, which had just undergone the chaos of the French Revolution and had fallen under the rule of an ambitious military genius, Napoleon Bonaparte. Through a series of astonishing and swift campaigns, Napoleon extended his dominion over much of Europe, from Spain to the borders of Russia. The instrument of his success was his Grand Army, a highly trained, unified force that, at its peak, numbered more than 700,000 men.
• (3) By 1804, Napoleon’s army stood poised along the French coast, and he had thousands of barges constructed to ferry his troops across the English Channel. What stood in his way were the warships of the English navy.
• (4) Against this menace, the English strategy was to preserve control of the seas by not allowing the French navy to leave its harbors. Outside of every major French harbor, a squadron of English ships kept up a constant blockade, maintained even during storms, placing an enormous strain on the ships and their crews.

The Opponents

• (1) Many of the ships and men that sustained this vigil against the French and fought in the war at sea have become legendary, but none more so than Horatio Nelson. He was born in 1758 to a prosperous family and was sent to sea at the age of 12 as a midshipman.
• (2) Nelson rose through the ranks to lieutenant and eventually captain and fought in a number of battles, in which he established a reputation as a particularly innovative and aggressive officer. He was also one who led from the front, a practice that took a physical toll: In one battle, he lost an eye, and in another, his right arm was shattered by a musket ball and had to be amputated. The loss did not impair the success of his career, however.
• (3) By 1798, Napoleon had conquered most of Europe and decided to lead an expedition to Egypt. He amassed a large fleet of warships and transports to carry his army and personally took charge, sailing to Egypt, landing near Alexandria, and subduing the country after fighting several battles. While Napoleon fought in Egypt with the army, his fleet anchored in a line close to the shallow water in a strong defensive position near the mouth of the Nile at Aboukir Bay.
• (4) Nelson was sent with a smaller force of ships to attempt to destroy the French fleet and strand Napoleon in Egypt. In a typically aggressive fashion, he sailed to Aboukir Bay, arriving near dusk and, rather than waiting for the next day, attacking immediately.
• (5) The action that followed is known as the Battle of the Nile. The French vessels were larger and more heavily armed, but the British were better trained and attacked enthusiastically. The most dramatic moment of the battle came when the French flagship (the Orient), an enormous three-decker with more than 100 guns, caught fire, and the gunpowder magazine exploded, blowing the ship apart. By the morning, the English fleet had won a decisive victory, and the majority of the French ships were either captured or destroyed.
• (6) This was an important victory for England. Without the support of his fleet, Napoleon was forced to give up the expedition. In the end, he had to abandon most of his army in Egypt and sneak back to France alone. Although Napoleon might be dominant on land, as long as England controlled the sea, his dreams of world conquest would remain unrealized.

The Battle

• (1) By the middle of 1805, the English blockade had been going on for years, and Napoleon was getting tired of waiting. By capturing Spain, he had also gained control of the Spanish fleet, and his new plan was to combine the French and Spanish fleets into a force so large that it could overwhelm any English opposition.
• (2) This combined fleet would sweep up from Spain, push aside or destroy the English ships in the channel, and give his army the chance it needed to cross. The admiral put in charge of this mission, Villeneuve, amassed a combined fleet of 33 ships of the line, including a number of particularly large battleships, including the biggest, most powerful ship in the world, the colossal four-deck, 136-gun Santissima Trinidad. On October 20, 1805, the combined fleet set out from Cadiz.
• (3) Nelson was charged with stopping the fleet, and he had 27 English ships to oppose it, including his flagship, the 102-gun victory. At a meeting of his captains, Nelson outlined a bold new strategy: Rather than using the line of battle, Nelson planned to form his ships into two shorter lines perpendicular to the French and charge straight at them, cutting the French line of battle in two places. His ships would then cluster around those of the enemy and attempt to overwhelm them.
• (4) The two fleets met off Cape Trafalgar in Spain. It was the biggest battle of the age, involving 60 ships of the line and 50,000 men. As Nelson sailed toward the enemy, he used signal flags to send a message to his crews that has since become one of the most famous in military history: “England expects that every man will do his duty.”
• (5) The battle unfolded much as Nelson had intended, with the two columms of English ships having to endure the combined fleets’ fire as they approached. Nelson and the Victory led one of the English lines, and one of his trusted captains led the other. Both succeeded in breaking the combined fleets’ line of battle, and the conflict turned into a confused melee of ships blasting at each other at point blank range.
• (6) As the battle raged, the victory was surrounded by several enemy ships. Nelson was pacing back and forth on the deck when a musket ball shot from the mast of the French ship Redoubtable struck him in the shoulder, passed through his chest, and lodged in his spine. Nelson immediately realized the wound was fatal, and he died later that day. He lived long enough, however, to hear the news that his fleet had won a crushing victory over the enemy.
• (7) Of the French and Spanish ships, all but 11 were captured or sunk. The combined fleet suffered 7,000 casualties. On the English side, not a single vessel was lost, though many were heavily damaged, and there were 1,600 casualties.

Outcomes

• (1) Trafalgar was one of the keys to defeating Napoleon’s goal of universal domination. Although Napoleon’s power was as yet unchallenged on the continent, Trafalgar put an end to his plans to invade England. By ensuring England’s survival, the battle guaranteed that there would always be a strong European nation that could and would provide a focal point for opposition to Napoleon.
• (2) After Trafalgar, Napoleon pulled his armies away from the English Channel and instead committed them, disastrously, to the invasion of Russia. Although it would still take much to defeat Napoleon, Trafalgar was the battle that checked his ascendency and marked the beginning of his decline.

Conclusion

The Battle of Trafalgar stands as one of the most significant naval engagements in history, marking a turning point in the Napoleonic Wars. The decisive victory by the British Royal Navy under Admiral Nelson not only thwarted Napoleon’s plans to invade Britain but also established a century-long dominance of British naval power. Nelson’s innovative tactics and ultimate sacrifice cemented his legacy as one of the greatest military leaders. The battle’s outcome reshaped the balance of power in Europe, ensuring Britain’s security and influence over the seas for generations.

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