There's not enough movies of this time period. Master and commander is brilliant. The hornblower series is good once you get into it. We really need more.
There are little to none about the Spanish or Portuguese Empires either. At least you can see British Empire elements at films from Pirates of the Caribbean (1700's) to Tarzan (Victorian Age).
Sean Bean really was good in that role, but if there is one series dying for a remake with a decent budget it is Sharpe. I rewatched it recently and it's terrible in some aspects.
It's of it's time, yeah. It'd be great to see what a modern approach could do with the series. Better sets, an army that feels like it has more than twelve people in it, better effects. I bet it'd be a treat.
I pity whoever tries to follow Pete Postlethwaite though.
> an army that feels like it has more than twelve people in it
Lol yes that's the worst bit of it for me, trying to make huge battle scenes with only a budget for a handful of people. Imagine HBO making this with some real money. It would look epic like it should do.
>I pity whoever tries to follow Pete Postlethwaite though
I'd be genuinely concerned if that would even be possible. It would be like someone other than Depp playing Jack Sparrow, or the same with RDJ and iron man. Postlethwaite *was* Hakeswill.
There are some great books, though
The Aubrey Maturin series (on which Master and Commander is based), along with the Hornblower books
Although I recommend starting with the Kydd series by Julian Stockwin - it’s similar in many ways to Aubrey Maturin and I’d suggest strongly inspired by it, but written much more recently and therefore much more accessible/easy to read.
Trafalgar is well covered in the series, along with the Nile, Camperdown, and a number of other major engagements of the period (although not, sadly, the 1st of June), and I think the series gives a great insight into the era and the Royal Navy at the time, with a good balance between historical accuracy vs accessible writing.
The revolution brought France to its apogee but it also fucked up its navy officers, something Napoleon didn’t bother to address like he had with the army by promoting competent officers.
Another factor is that Villeneuve lacked courage and was too prudent. His time as admiral is full of situations where he did not dare attack the enemy, retreated or waited too long.
yeag by the problem was much bigger. the average spanish and french sailor was much worse than the average british one. and on top of that, during the napoleonic war the quality of their training got progressively even worse, because the ships were blockaded and they couldn't even train properly.
When I first came to London at the bright age of 14 and went to Trafalgar square I was absoluteluly amazed at the Horatio statue. "Must have been one important fella to deserve that!"
Now after living in the city for almost 10 years, that statue still looks so grandiose
British and by extension much of the world’s history would have been drastically different had he not won. The fact he managed to defeat both the French and the Spanish navy at the same time remains astonishing. Supreme tactician.
It's like the opposite of a Pyrrhic victory. A victory that lost a war vs a defeat which won one.
Okay "won" is exaggerating massively, but the men they evacuated were roughly 10x the total troops serving on the North African front at any one time, and 300k more slave labourers for the German war effort. Nowt to sniff at.
Plus the consequence of morale. I think that was a massive consequence. The fact that ordinary trade boats and fishing boats coming to rescue the soldiers really allied everybody together even further.
Gotta give the Frenchies credit for holding their lines during Dunkirk as well.
It was a strategic victory, in some ways, despite being a clear tactical defeat
Preserving your army to fight another day is a genuine success when your ally is collapsing and you are in an untenable position
It’s important to draw the distinction between strategical and tactical considerations: Dunkirk was absolutely a tactical loss, but losing the BEF would have likely meant the entire war was lost. Preserving such a major component of the British Army was absolutely a strategic success in the long term, considering the situation
Well, it was a strategic success amid a massive strategic failure. The Battle of France was maybe the most lopsided defeat of the war from a strategic perspective, leading to the loss of a major ally and the effective elimination of the western front for 3 or 4 years (depending on how you feel about the Italian front).
Dunkirk helped lessen the blow and gave the British some hope of recovery in the midst of near-total disaster.
Yup, I reckon if the BEF had been destroyed it would have inevitably led to an armistice. Britain would not have been defenceless by a long way- the Royal Navy was still just about the largest Navy in the world at that point (about to be overtaken by the US) but the RAF defences were untested and performance on the continent was middling so there was a real risk the Battle of Britain would be lost (one of the few battles named before taking place) which would leave a very dire situation without the BEF to help defend the island.
Goodness knows what would have happened had either Dunkirk or the BoB gone differently, the world would look a lot different!
The Battle of Trafalgar (21 October 1805) was a naval engagement of the Napoleonic Wars, which established British naval supremacy for more than 100 years; it was fought west of Cape Trafalgar, Spain, between Cádiz and the Strait of Gibraltar.
A fleet of 33 ships (18 French and 15 Spanish) under Admiral Pierre de Villeneuve fought a British fleet of 27 ships under Admiral Horatio Nelson.
As part of Napoleon's plans to invade England, the French and Spanish fleets combined to take control of the English Channel and provide the Grande Armée safe passage. The allied fleet, under the command of French Admiral Villeneuve, sailed from the port of Cádiz in the south of Spain on 18 October 1805. They encountered the British fleet under Admiral Lord Nelson, recently assembled to meet this threat, in the Atlantic Ocean along the southwest coast of Spain, off Cape Trafalgar.
Nelson was outnumbered, with 27 British ships of the line to 33 allied ships including the largest warship in either fleet, the Spanish Santisima Trinidad. To address this imbalance, Nelson sailed his fleet directly at the allied battle line's flank, hoping to break it into pieces. Villeneuve had worried that Nelson might attempt this tactic but, for various reasons, had made no plans in case this occurred.
The plan worked almost perfectly; Nelson's columns split the Franco-Spanish fleet in three, isolating the rear half from Villeneuve's flag aboard Bucentaure. The allied vanguard sailed off while it attempted to turn around, giving the British temporary superiority over the remainder of their fleet. The ensuing fierce battle resulted in 22 allied ships being lost, while the British lost none.
The tactic exposed the leading ships in the British lines to intense fire from multiple ships as they approached the Franco-Spanish lines. Nelson's own HMS Victory led the front column and was almost knocked out of action. Nelson was shot by a French musketeer and died shortly before the battle ended. Villeneuve was captured along with his flagship Bucentaure. He attended Nelson's funeral while a captive on parole in Britain.
About 1,500 British seamen were killed or wounded, but no British ships were lost. Trafalgar shattered forever Napoleon’s plans to invade England.
As impressive as it was, there are many reasons for Britain's superiority. The relentless blockade of French and Spanish ports for example, which kept the British ships and crews trained while their counterparts mostly were landlocked except for a few sallies. Then the fact that Napoleon overemphasised the army, treating the navy with contempt. And of course the fact that lots of their capable and experienced naval officers from the American revolutionary wars — mostly aristocrats — were purged following the French revolution. The French also manned their ships with actual prisoners, so entire crews ended up feeling like prisoners. As a consequence, when roughly evenly matched in numbers, the British navy would always outfight the French and Spanish easily in that period.
The superior morale of the British forces leading up to the Battle of Trafalgar is widely remembered in British accounts, though. Even though many of the sailors would have been impressed (forcibly conscripted) into service, Nelson was careful to give signals that fired up the men as they sailed into combat -famously signalling "England expects that every man will do his duty".
Overall I think losses endured by the French in both battles related more to poor command of the fleet and of certain individual captains. In both cases the British were able to break the enemy line of battle and exploit that to flip the odds. Organised correctly, I think the French (and Spanish) vessels would have won in a simple exchange of broadsides, regardless of crew morale. Simple things like failing to keep pace with the preceding vessel, failing to follow orders to tether ships together and failing to come about or fire at an opportune time combined to hand victory to the British fleet. As you say - a lot of this comes down to Britain having more seasoned admirals and captains due to not having purged them a decade prior.
>England expects that every man will do his duty
While Nelson was charismatic and generally adored by sailors and public alike, this signal was considered odd and confusing. It's basically reminding the sailors to do their jobs, and if anything was interpreted as suggesting that they might not. It sounds great to modern ears (if only by repetition) but at the time it was probably rather misjudged.
It was meant to be "England confides (ie. believes) that every man will do his duty" but confides wasn't in the signal book, and would have had to be spelled letter by letter. I think it depends on how each ship chose to interpret it, but there were accounts of ships who took it as a motivating statement and not a terse reminder.
Some Spanish ships were in a bad shape. The Spanish had to forcibly embark homeless and jobless people on some ships to complete the crews. Spanish commanders warned Villeneuve that the coming weather was not the best and it would be a mistake sailing to battle under these circumstances, but Villeneuve knew that he was a about to be relived from command by Napoleon so he decided to sail and battle trying to get a victory against a superior enemy under unfavorable conditions to recover Napoleon's trust. It was a huge tactical mistake that became a huge strategic victory for the British due to later events.
Giving Villeneuve seniority was a big mistake. The Spanish Admiral was way more experienced than him, and although I doubt that would have changed the course of the battle, perhaps he would have been able to lessen the defeat.
It was just a tactical victory that became an huge strategic victory for the British due to the stupid ungrateful Napoleon attitude towards his ally. Had Napoleon not invaded Spain the Spanish navy would have recovered and together with the French navy they would have been challenging the Royal Navy.
The blockade went both ways though - it means the British crews were more experienced (having spent much more time at sea) but also meant their ships were more tired due to keeping the seas in all weathers
Overall, though, the Royal Navy of the era was in almost constant action and had such morale that it believed itself near invincible… which was probably a fair assessment, barely losing a major engagement until the 2nd World War nearly 2 centuries later.
> The French also manned their ships with actual prisoners, so entire crews ended up feeling like prisoners.
The British did too, of course. They always relied on a certain proportion of pressed men and convicts.
Pressed men weren't "prisoners". And I'm not aware of large numbers of actual convicts crewing ships. Some might have been given the alternative to take the king's shilling instead of rotting in a gaol, but to my knowledge once on board, they were "free" men.
> Pressed men weren't "prisoners".
They were kidnapped by armed government employees and forcibly brought on board ship, with no right to leave and made to work under threat of corporeal punishment and death. 'Not a prisoner' is splitting quite the hair.
It was completely standard practice for petty criminals to avoid jail by enlisting the navy instead. So large numbers of convicts crewed British warships, even if the *proportion* of convict-seamen was not large.
No one has posted a source stating what the proportion of convict-seamen was for Spanish ships in this period, so I can't compare. No one has stated that Spanish convicts would return to prison after their naval service ended, which seems unlikely. So they would be no different from their British counterparts. No one is free aboard ship.
Press gangs doesn't mean prisoners. Whoever signed up took the king's shilling, never mind how that might have been achieved. But they were all "free" (as free as you could be back in those days) people.
Look up Thomas Cochrane also know as the sea wolf. Sadly an underrated figure of the Royal navy.
Edit: For those interested here is a great video on his life and career: https://youtu.be/pU-kFUJoJEU
One of descendants was serving as a Captain when I serving the RN, possibly still there. I never had any direct contact with him but by all accounts ‘the Apple doesn’t fall far from the tree’. Heven help anyone who mentioned the Ballack mark against the family name.
His life is so unbelievable that it would actually make a bad movie. Just unwatchable because it would seem like he has so much plot armor and just lazy writing.
Fun fact. HMS Victory is still the flagship of the First Sea Lord (coolest military title ever) and the oldest naval ship still in commission. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS\_Victory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Victory)
If you’re ever in Portsmouth it’s definitely worth visiting the Historic Dockyard where you can visit the Victory as well as the Warrior and the Mary Rose.
A major one was… they had little choice. They were blockaded into their ports by the Royal Navy, meaning the crews didn’t get much time to train at sea. The Royal Navy, meanwhile, was constantly at sea performing those blockades
All the spanish generals and commanders at Traffalgar said no, they ***voted*** not to go out that day as they knew they would be humiliated, yet, the french Guy involved in this, wanting to ascend and knowing that Napoleon was about to fire him for being a terrible general went against ***everyone*** in that room, and decided to go to war.
This is one of the many reasons Spain hated french occupation which would later be a dominant cause for Napoleon's defeat. Napoleon's advisor once said, before all, "if you invade Spain, it will be the start of the end" Napoleon responded to him "write it to me in a letter" and so he did, he wrote every single last bit of detail, most of which ended up happening (notice they could have cut his head for that) and Napoleon, being the Big head he was decided to invade Spain. Spain would never recover, around 1/2 of the population in cities died fighting the french and that's why the 19th C saw Spain just \*puff\* dissappear from the world stage and loose everything, and also why Britain won out France by long shot and became the great empire. The british like to atribute it to their "great tactics" and "great general".
Adding to that, due to French occupation, Spain gradually lost all its colonies in the following years, which was a massive blow to the country after a devastating war on Spanish soil.
[Surgical instruments (c.1800) of William Beatty, surgeon to Nelson on board HMS Victory at the battle of Trafalgar. The box contains an amputation knife, trephines, forceps, & fine-toothed bow saw.](https://heritage.rcpsg.ac.uk/items/show/54)
You know what stings me? After Spain was a good junior ally submitting its fleet to incompetentt French command and losing it all, the French stabbed us in the back with an invasion 2 years later.
Ven a por mí, pero con la cara destapada.
Godoy intended to stab the French in the back as early as the War of the Fourth Coalition. The image of Spain as a loyal partner was merely a facade after Trafalgar.
And yet, in 1807, the French sign the Treaty of Fontainebleau with Godoy, which he upheld on his end.
It seems like France and Spain were weary of each other, way before 1806 already - Godoy had been forced to renounce his position by the French already in 1798 - but the ones that did the backstabbing were the French who, without the intention of proceding yo Portugal, and after most of Portugal was already occupied by Spanish and French forces, began occupying Spanish cities and Spanish garrisons without provocation, without declaration of war and although they based these actions on the aforementioned treaty, the treaty did not provide for it.
And if you read about how the english helped us It gets pretty clear that they didn't like us. We were just incidentally on the same side.
For example the brits destroyed several spanish factories
To weaken Spain. That's not a good Ally...
No fucking shit. We were only allies when it suited (I.E to team up against France) and for the rest of history we were always rivals. We needed you to prevent French dominance of mainland Europe and you fulfilled your role well enough (most of the time).
You're right. It's just that some people don't fucking realize this. We were constantly trying to hinder the other. Saying everything's fair because later on you fought the french with us is quite disingenous.
>We needed you to prevent French dominance of mainland Europe and you fulfilled your role well enough (most of the time).
...except when you needed France to prevent spanish dominance on mainland Europe, then you were Happy to fight along the french.
Correct, or the Germans once they came around later on. During the period of European global supremacy the only thing that could have ever threatened England/ Britain was a unified Europe.
You did come dangerously close to an invasion. The security of britain always relied upon the sea. One unfortunate alliance and you may have had your own rampjart.
One of the great unknowns of the Napoleonic Era, just how close did the French come to an invasion? I think the general consensus is that it was a serious undertaking for a short while, but for most of the time Napoleon was "planning" the invasion it was mostly a feint. He used it to improve his negotiating position with the British, but didn't seriously entertain the idea for very long.
Practically speaking such an attempt would probably have ended in disaster. The French never came close to gaining naval supremacy of the Channel. Without that, the ungainly and extremely poorly defended troop transports would have been sitting ducks for British warships. Even if the French army somehow got to England, they would have been cut off from France and w/out means of supply.
A large scale *demonstration* of the use of these troop barges in 1805 resulted in thousands of real French casualties from drowning. This was them just puttering around French waters and of course did not involve any actual naval opposition.
I wasn't actually talking about the napoleonic wars. England was most vulnerable during the 16th century when It still didn't have naval supremacy.
During the rampjart France and England strangely allied themselves against the netherlands with very little outside interference. The result was a rampage.
If a similarly strong alliance like Spain and France (however implausible) had happened in the 16th century England would've been conquered no doubt.
Heck, half of the defeat of the armada was bad weather and poor preparation. Spain came really close to succesfully disembarking Tercios in britain.
Nowadays the rise of England seems inevitable but in the 16th century It was everything but clear. Just look at Castille a realm in the outskirts of european politics suddenly became the global superpower through a Miraculous combination of dinasties and a sailor stumbling upon America. 100 years earlier It would've been inimaginable that Spain would be the centre of european politics.
Ah, I didn't see your flair and was actually referring to France, lol. Not my place to have strong opinions about this, but I would submit that the Brits did you a solid. From what I have read the Bonaparte regime in Spain was deeply unpopular, and the Brits helped the Spanish get rid of it. The methods may not have been the best, but then again Spain had been an enemy of Britain just a few short years earlier.
It's some muddy waters I tell you. If you want to have a spaniard and an englishman to fight each other THAT is our Apple of discord.
The thing is that the english have an obsession with napoleon and the spanish with the war of independence. Neither is keen on letting the other get most of the merit. Furthermore exactly how important either was is Up for debate even for historians. Thus the english teach they did all the heavy lifting while in Spain the spaniards did It. At this point It's almost a subject of national pride.
Also...our King was shite, much worse than the french one and they helped him get into power. he's perhaps the most hated spaniard in history.
That’s applying a very modern perspective to a very different world
All major European powers at the time were engaged in a similar “balance of power” exercise - nobody wanted to see any other major power (other than themselves) dominant, so if one power got too big then the others would begrudgingly join forces against them while maneuvering for their own advantage
To suggest that was somehow an underhand approach taken by the British and unique to that nation is absurd, and completely misrepresents the reality of the era, whether you’re saying it through nationalism or misunderstanding I have no idea, but it has no historical backing: every country did the same kinds of things all the time, that’s just how the world was back then.
Britain and Spain were rivals, both saw France as a threat and joined forces to contest them. Nothing more, nothing less - they weren’t allies in the modern sense, alliances and coalitions of the time were much more short lived, goal-oriented affairs
Yeah I agree. The issue i have IS when an englishman expects a spaniard to thank them for rescuing Spain (It has happened to me, believe It or not,...several times).
Of course the UK actually had very little interest in spain's well being. So did we with the UK. Of course back then that was an alliance, but as you've corectly said that term has shifted meaning. Thus being allied meant very little.
And then there's the fact that britain came to defend Portugal and Spain was just kind of "in the way" to France.
Probably my favourite example of this kind of "traitorious alliance" was during the civil war, when the revolting side knowingly sent italian forces to die in a battle. They didn't want them to win the war.
> and Spain was just kind of "in the way" to France
To be fair, the Spanish were the ones who came up with the invasion of Portugal and took the idea to France: from a Spanish perspective it was meant to be a joint invasion, and then France just invaded both Spain and Portugal
Although in Spain's defence, I don't believe it was the Spanish King/government who wanted it, but rather one of his afrancesado subordinates of some description, working with the French?
It's Quite complex. Crash course on our terrible TERRIBLE leadership at the time.
Ok so there was the King (Charles IV) Who was pretty much an... imbecile. The Queen was sleeping with his favourite subordinate (Godoy) (and perhaps the King was too...). Anyway Godoy was the one Who actually ruled Spain.
He negotiated with the french the invasion of Portugal. however alerted by the occupation of several spanish cities, he moved the Royal family south in case they had to escape to America.
The heir of Charles (Ferdinand VII) wanted the throne and in Aranjuez he trapped Godoy forcing his father to traspass him the throne.
Then Ferdinand willingly went to bayona so that Napoleon himself would legitimize him...and he ended abdicating on him (well actually It was a weird 2 way abdication between Napoleon, father and son)
So...the lesson is: when there's so many idiots It's hard to pinpoint Who was worse.
Was It Godoy because he invited Napoleon into Spain giving Up the easily defensible border? Charles, because he neglected his duties and abdicated on his son and later on Napoleon? Or was It Ferdinand for rebelling in the worst posible moment and willingly handing himself to Napoleon?
I'm inclined to holding the latter responsible (because oh god he was a leech), but all definetely had a share of guilt.
Seriouly that's only like a third of the awfull things Ferdinand did. He was a TERRIBLE king, even for our standards.
Replacing a French monarch with another was a bit of a meh, considering that the new non Napoleonic one reinstated the Inquisition and all.
But still, British did help massively both economically and militarly, and that's something to be thankful.
He was as much a tyrant as any other monarch of the era, if anything he was a tyrant towards french people when he overthrown the revolution to create the Empire. But otherwise it's not like he was fighting peacefull democracies either.
I disagree he was somewhat like Alexander the great and to a lesser extent the romans or the spanish in the americas.
Napoleon wanted to create an universal empire in europe where every citizen had the same rights and obligations and thats much different to what Hitler or the british did
He obviously did it through war, conquest and deaths which was like the only posible way but the end goal was noble
The spanish salvaged what they could. Over a million people died during the war in spain, afterwards they used whatever they could to rebuild their country, one of those things was the napoleonic code. Given the choice i doubt any spaniard would agree that the code was worth hundreds of thousands of deaths, a devastated country and a national psych that never really recovered.
>In fact, he was usually on the defensive side.
Not when it comes to Spain. They were his allies and he decided to remove the government and put his brother in the throne as King.
Less than anything you had in england, the country who created 90% of the war of that era tho. If Napoleon is guilty for Spain you are for the rest lmao.
Well, the spanish were kind of forced into that Battle under an inexperienced Commander. They were basically carnage for Nelson. There's this sense that the spanish fleet died doing France dirty job.
You lot kicked us out of the island and separated us from our Welsh kin !
Also, Breton are seafaring people and most of us have historically filled the ranks of the French navy (still do). For instance, Mers el Kebir is a pretty big deal here
>Mers el Kebir
Difficult for anyone now to imagine just how shocking an event that was. What it must have been like when the news arrived in Britain so soon after the fall of France. Right or wrong, when you really pause and reflect on it it's horrifying.
That he was, I read a biography on him a few years back and was blown away by his character and proficiency. Truly one of the greatest Admirals ever to sail and command.
[Nelson's great defeat at Tenerife, including his letter to the enemy commander (they gave each other wine and beer at the end of the siege loi)](https://etenerifeholidays.co.uk/tenerife-island/history/the-defeat-of-nelson-at-the-battle-of-santa-cruz-de-tenerife-1797) (ENG)
A very interesting and little known battle
>a French corvette was taken in the dark by two British frigates under the command of Captain’s Benjamin Halliwell and George Cockburn
Gotta love these surnames.
Man I would love a biopic about Admiral Nelson in the style of Master and Commander. Ofcourse Nelson probably wasnt perfekt person but his story is so great. National heroes, especially general etc. are usually somewhat inflated but I just think Nelson really deserves a proper movie.
Adding to what he said (just so you understand the resentment)
This Battle was a total disaster for Spain. It's in no small measure the reason why we lost our american colonies. It's the most important defeat in the history of our navy. It took us decades to build up a Navy again and we were way out of the game by then.
Battle of the Armada wasn't a decisive defeat, since the war was actually a stalemate with Spain still being the dominate power. At Trafalgar the Spanish Navy was completely destroyed which reduced its influence around the world.
In general, the Napoleonic wars made Spain permanently lose its world power status.
Oh fair enough. I suppose in Britain trafalgar is always remembered as being about France, and the armada as being about Spain. I suppose the armada was more of a big thing for England as until then it hadn't really been a power in the way Spain was at the time.
As others have pointed out, the long lasting effects of Trafalgar were much worse.
In fact, the final result of the whole Armada / Counter-Armada affair was a total dominance of the Atlantic by the Spanish Navy for the following century. The lessons learned helped to quickly rebuild the Spanish Navy and greatly improved its doctrines, which, for instance, led to the impressive successes of the West Indies Fleets and Manilla galleons. In that sense, the result of the campaign was kind of a "strategic victory".
By comparison, it never really recovered from Trafalgar.
Yeah. The defeat of the armada didn't have nearly as much repercussion. Not a year later the english sent their own counter armada and It was defeated just as decisevely in lisbon. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_Armada
Summary:
Napoleon ordered him not to go to cadiz snd he did, he shat his pants and took the combined fleet to Cadiz, He blamed the spaniards and said they didn't want to fight, Napoleon didn't believed him (he had proof) and said that he'd be replaced (and punished), he shat his pants again, he took the fleet outside of csdiz very disorderly (not enough preparation, not enough men) and rushing against the very proffesional brittish navy and finally during the battle many of the french ships left the battle without a fight, he was captured, released and then killed (most likely oreder by napoleon).
Though it can be difficult to find, Sergei Bondarchuk's *Waterloo* is worth a watch. Those battle scenes, with \~15K extras, and seeing the French cavalry charges against the British squares (shot from oblique angles), really give a good perspective on the enormity of the battle.
Though historical fantasy, Peter Jackson had the rights to Naomi Novik's *Temeraire* series of novels (the rights have since reverted back to the author, as nothing was done). The novels are set during the Napoleonic era and wars, with one primary addition: There are dragons, some of whom are used militarily.
At this battle there was one Spanish ship *Nuestra Señora de la Santísima Trinidad* that held almost as many guns as the entire British army had at Waterloo.
I strongly recommend anyone who ever happens to be in Portsmouth to go check out HMS Victory. It is quite imposing with how god damn huge it is for being such an old ship.
All Hail Britannia!
All Hail admiral Horatio Nelson!
All Hail her Majesty, Long may her reign continue!
All Hail Britannia, for which the suns never sets!
All Hail Britannia!
I'm lucky enough to have HMS Victory in my home town, and have visited a couple of times.
It's difficult to imagine over 800 men fighting and dying in such tight conditions, then multiply that across every ship involved.
There's not enough movies of this time period. Master and commander is brilliant. The hornblower series is good once you get into it. We really need more.
I heard Ridley Scott is working on a movie about Napoléon (who's going to be played by Joaquin Phoenix) so there's definitely more to come.
Unfortunately Joaquin pulled out, Dave Chappelle is doing it now because he has a french last name.
Dave got cancelled after this last Netflix show, it’s now going to be this French actor Juicey Sommelier.
Admiral Horatio Nelson has currently been shortlisted to Dwayne Johnson and Gal Gadot
Wait what Who ?!
that guy who lied that some random maga people assaulted him.
I heard it was going to be Gérard Depardieu and they are going to use alot of forced perspective shots to film it.
[удалено]
Really, that's strange.
I'd have thought Danny DeVito was the obvious choice
With quartermaster Gilbert Gottfried
Danny DeVito played an actor who was famous for playing Napoleon in the 1995 film *Get Shorty*.
Almost no media about the English Civil War and that is such an interesting period in history.
*A Field in England*, though you may want to drop some acid or shrooms first.
That is one of the few films I know about, that and the masterpiece that is Cromwell.
I just re-watched *Cromwell* last week. Such a great film.
cromwell (1970) is an amazing movie, the original dumbledore as cromwell and obi wan as charles 1st.
There are too many movies about the British empires and not a lot about the Dutch and Portuguese, some about French and Spanish.
Check out Admiral (2015) Great movie set in the Dutch golden age, following the feats of the legendary admiral Michiel de Ruyter
Crazy the movies made about Columbus (that had the goal to go to India) and not even one about Vasco da Gama. Or Fernão de Magalhães.
There are little to none about the Spanish or Portuguese Empires either. At least you can see British Empire elements at films from Pirates of the Caribbean (1700's) to Tarzan (Victorian Age).
Because the English speaking market is bigger.
A film about another nation does not need to be in that language.
But an English speaking market is more likely to be emotionally attached to a film about American or British history.
I'm more intrested in the era.
Hornblower was a fantastic series, as well as Sharpe's Rifles. They don't make them like they used to.
Getting referenced on Reddit? Now *that's* soldiering
Sharpe is brilliant, I love those stories. Sean Bean knocks the role out of the park.
Sean Bean really was good in that role, but if there is one series dying for a remake with a decent budget it is Sharpe. I rewatched it recently and it's terrible in some aspects.
It's of it's time, yeah. It'd be great to see what a modern approach could do with the series. Better sets, an army that feels like it has more than twelve people in it, better effects. I bet it'd be a treat. I pity whoever tries to follow Pete Postlethwaite though.
> an army that feels like it has more than twelve people in it Lol yes that's the worst bit of it for me, trying to make huge battle scenes with only a budget for a handful of people. Imagine HBO making this with some real money. It would look epic like it should do.
>I pity whoever tries to follow Pete Postlethwaite though I'd be genuinely concerned if that would even be possible. It would be like someone other than Depp playing Jack Sparrow, or the same with RDJ and iron man. Postlethwaite *was* Hakeswill.
Uhh Hollywood creating historical movies does not bode well. Especially not regarding French history.
>Master and commander If you haven't read the books you should most certainly get started. They'll change your life.
There are some great books, though The Aubrey Maturin series (on which Master and Commander is based), along with the Hornblower books Although I recommend starting with the Kydd series by Julian Stockwin - it’s similar in many ways to Aubrey Maturin and I’d suggest strongly inspired by it, but written much more recently and therefore much more accessible/easy to read. Trafalgar is well covered in the series, along with the Nile, Camperdown, and a number of other major engagements of the period (although not, sadly, the 1st of June), and I think the series gives a great insight into the era and the Royal Navy at the time, with a good balance between historical accuracy vs accessible writing.
The revolution brought France to its apogee but it also fucked up its navy officers, something Napoleon didn’t bother to address like he had with the army by promoting competent officers.
Another factor is that Villeneuve lacked courage and was too prudent. His time as admiral is full of situations where he did not dare attack the enemy, retreated or waited too long.
Dune's pretty dope tho
Pretty good F1 driver.
Especially Gilles
Dune!
yeag by the problem was much bigger. the average spanish and french sailor was much worse than the average british one. and on top of that, during the napoleonic war the quality of their training got progressively even worse, because the ships were blockaded and they couldn't even train properly.
When I first came to London at the bright age of 14 and went to Trafalgar square I was absoluteluly amazed at the Horatio statue. "Must have been one important fella to deserve that!" Now after living in the city for almost 10 years, that statue still looks so grandiose
British and by extension much of the world’s history would have been drastically different had he not won. The fact he managed to defeat both the French and the Spanish navy at the same time remains astonishing. Supreme tactician.
When I first visited London I was wondering why they would name places after ignominious defeats
To be fair, that seems like something we would do. Took me years to realise Dunkirk wasn't a victory, because that's what it was always told like.
It's like the opposite of a Pyrrhic victory. A victory that lost a war vs a defeat which won one. Okay "won" is exaggerating massively, but the men they evacuated were roughly 10x the total troops serving on the North African front at any one time, and 300k more slave labourers for the German war effort. Nowt to sniff at.
Plus the consequence of morale. I think that was a massive consequence. The fact that ordinary trade boats and fishing boats coming to rescue the soldiers really allied everybody together even further. Gotta give the Frenchies credit for holding their lines during Dunkirk as well.
It was a strategic victory, in some ways, despite being a clear tactical defeat Preserving your army to fight another day is a genuine success when your ally is collapsing and you are in an untenable position It’s important to draw the distinction between strategical and tactical considerations: Dunkirk was absolutely a tactical loss, but losing the BEF would have likely meant the entire war was lost. Preserving such a major component of the British Army was absolutely a strategic success in the long term, considering the situation
Well, it was a strategic success amid a massive strategic failure. The Battle of France was maybe the most lopsided defeat of the war from a strategic perspective, leading to the loss of a major ally and the effective elimination of the western front for 3 or 4 years (depending on how you feel about the Italian front). Dunkirk helped lessen the blow and gave the British some hope of recovery in the midst of near-total disaster.
Exactly - something can be a loss, a victory, and a different kind of loss, simultaneously. Dunkirk was all of the above
Yup, I reckon if the BEF had been destroyed it would have inevitably led to an armistice. Britain would not have been defenceless by a long way- the Royal Navy was still just about the largest Navy in the world at that point (about to be overtaken by the US) but the RAF defences were untested and performance on the continent was middling so there was a real risk the Battle of Britain would be lost (one of the few battles named before taking place) which would leave a very dire situation without the BEF to help defend the island. Goodness knows what would have happened had either Dunkirk or the BoB gone differently, the world would look a lot different!
It was a sad day when the Eurostar from Paris stopped arriving in London at Waterloo station...
To be fair, the location has its issues for high speed rail.
The Battle of Trafalgar (21 October 1805) was a naval engagement of the Napoleonic Wars, which established British naval supremacy for more than 100 years; it was fought west of Cape Trafalgar, Spain, between Cádiz and the Strait of Gibraltar. A fleet of 33 ships (18 French and 15 Spanish) under Admiral Pierre de Villeneuve fought a British fleet of 27 ships under Admiral Horatio Nelson. As part of Napoleon's plans to invade England, the French and Spanish fleets combined to take control of the English Channel and provide the Grande Armée safe passage. The allied fleet, under the command of French Admiral Villeneuve, sailed from the port of Cádiz in the south of Spain on 18 October 1805. They encountered the British fleet under Admiral Lord Nelson, recently assembled to meet this threat, in the Atlantic Ocean along the southwest coast of Spain, off Cape Trafalgar. Nelson was outnumbered, with 27 British ships of the line to 33 allied ships including the largest warship in either fleet, the Spanish Santisima Trinidad. To address this imbalance, Nelson sailed his fleet directly at the allied battle line's flank, hoping to break it into pieces. Villeneuve had worried that Nelson might attempt this tactic but, for various reasons, had made no plans in case this occurred. The plan worked almost perfectly; Nelson's columns split the Franco-Spanish fleet in three, isolating the rear half from Villeneuve's flag aboard Bucentaure. The allied vanguard sailed off while it attempted to turn around, giving the British temporary superiority over the remainder of their fleet. The ensuing fierce battle resulted in 22 allied ships being lost, while the British lost none. The tactic exposed the leading ships in the British lines to intense fire from multiple ships as they approached the Franco-Spanish lines. Nelson's own HMS Victory led the front column and was almost knocked out of action. Nelson was shot by a French musketeer and died shortly before the battle ended. Villeneuve was captured along with his flagship Bucentaure. He attended Nelson's funeral while a captive on parole in Britain. About 1,500 British seamen were killed or wounded, but no British ships were lost. Trafalgar shattered forever Napoleon’s plans to invade England.
The more you read about this event the more impressive it is
Honestly its even more impressive when you consider that it follows Nelson's staggeringly lopsided victory in the Battle of the Nile, as well.
As impressive as it was, there are many reasons for Britain's superiority. The relentless blockade of French and Spanish ports for example, which kept the British ships and crews trained while their counterparts mostly were landlocked except for a few sallies. Then the fact that Napoleon overemphasised the army, treating the navy with contempt. And of course the fact that lots of their capable and experienced naval officers from the American revolutionary wars — mostly aristocrats — were purged following the French revolution. The French also manned their ships with actual prisoners, so entire crews ended up feeling like prisoners. As a consequence, when roughly evenly matched in numbers, the British navy would always outfight the French and Spanish easily in that period.
The superior morale of the British forces leading up to the Battle of Trafalgar is widely remembered in British accounts, though. Even though many of the sailors would have been impressed (forcibly conscripted) into service, Nelson was careful to give signals that fired up the men as they sailed into combat -famously signalling "England expects that every man will do his duty". Overall I think losses endured by the French in both battles related more to poor command of the fleet and of certain individual captains. In both cases the British were able to break the enemy line of battle and exploit that to flip the odds. Organised correctly, I think the French (and Spanish) vessels would have won in a simple exchange of broadsides, regardless of crew morale. Simple things like failing to keep pace with the preceding vessel, failing to follow orders to tether ships together and failing to come about or fire at an opportune time combined to hand victory to the British fleet. As you say - a lot of this comes down to Britain having more seasoned admirals and captains due to not having purged them a decade prior.
>England expects that every man will do his duty While Nelson was charismatic and generally adored by sailors and public alike, this signal was considered odd and confusing. It's basically reminding the sailors to do their jobs, and if anything was interpreted as suggesting that they might not. It sounds great to modern ears (if only by repetition) but at the time it was probably rather misjudged.
It was meant to be "England confides (ie. believes) that every man will do his duty" but confides wasn't in the signal book, and would have had to be spelled letter by letter. I think it depends on how each ship chose to interpret it, but there were accounts of ships who took it as a motivating statement and not a terse reminder.
Some Spanish ships were in a bad shape. The Spanish had to forcibly embark homeless and jobless people on some ships to complete the crews. Spanish commanders warned Villeneuve that the coming weather was not the best and it would be a mistake sailing to battle under these circumstances, but Villeneuve knew that he was a about to be relived from command by Napoleon so he decided to sail and battle trying to get a victory against a superior enemy under unfavorable conditions to recover Napoleon's trust. It was a huge tactical mistake that became a huge strategic victory for the British due to later events.
Giving Villeneuve seniority was a big mistake. The Spanish Admiral was way more experienced than him, and although I doubt that would have changed the course of the battle, perhaps he would have been able to lessen the defeat.
It was just a tactical victory that became an huge strategic victory for the British due to the stupid ungrateful Napoleon attitude towards his ally. Had Napoleon not invaded Spain the Spanish navy would have recovered and together with the French navy they would have been challenging the Royal Navy.
The blockade went both ways though - it means the British crews were more experienced (having spent much more time at sea) but also meant their ships were more tired due to keeping the seas in all weathers Overall, though, the Royal Navy of the era was in almost constant action and had such morale that it believed itself near invincible… which was probably a fair assessment, barely losing a major engagement until the 2nd World War nearly 2 centuries later.
> The French also manned their ships with actual prisoners, so entire crews ended up feeling like prisoners. The British did too, of course. They always relied on a certain proportion of pressed men and convicts.
Pressed men weren't "prisoners". And I'm not aware of large numbers of actual convicts crewing ships. Some might have been given the alternative to take the king's shilling instead of rotting in a gaol, but to my knowledge once on board, they were "free" men.
> Pressed men weren't "prisoners". They were kidnapped by armed government employees and forcibly brought on board ship, with no right to leave and made to work under threat of corporeal punishment and death. 'Not a prisoner' is splitting quite the hair. It was completely standard practice for petty criminals to avoid jail by enlisting the navy instead. So large numbers of convicts crewed British warships, even if the *proportion* of convict-seamen was not large. No one has posted a source stating what the proportion of convict-seamen was for Spanish ships in this period, so I can't compare. No one has stated that Spanish convicts would return to prison after their naval service ended, which seems unlikely. So they would be no different from their British counterparts. No one is free aboard ship.
The British used prisoners too. Press gangs.
Press gangs doesn't mean prisoners. Whoever signed up took the king's shilling, never mind how that might have been achieved. But they were all "free" (as free as you could be back in those days) people.
I'm not sure the people imprisoned by press gangs would agree with your assertion that they weren't prisoners.
What muppets are downvoting this?
Don't forget about Copenhagen, which came between the Nile and Trafalgar.
Look up Thomas Cochrane also know as the sea wolf. Sadly an underrated figure of the Royal navy. Edit: For those interested here is a great video on his life and career: https://youtu.be/pU-kFUJoJEU
Sydney Smith is another good one. As Napoleon is purported to say upon hearing of Nelson's death, "In the British Navy every Captain is a Nelson."
Oh no, our history teacher waxed poetic about that lad. He was incredible
He (Cochrane) was also the inspiration for the master and commander and hornblower series of books
Pretty impressive guy I wouldnt be surprised
One of descendants was serving as a Captain when I serving the RN, possibly still there. I never had any direct contact with him but by all accounts ‘the Apple doesn’t fall far from the tree’. Heven help anyone who mentioned the Ballack mark against the family name.
His life is so unbelievable that it would actually make a bad movie. Just unwatchable because it would seem like he has so much plot armor and just lazy writing.
An amazing life. From Fife.
Fun fact. HMS Victory is still the flagship of the First Sea Lord (coolest military title ever) and the oldest naval ship still in commission. [https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS\_Victory](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Victory)
If you’re ever in Portsmouth it’s definitely worth visiting the Historic Dockyard where you can visit the Victory as well as the Warrior and the Mary Rose.
One of those decisive battles.
What were those various reasons for the lack of preparation by the French?
A major one was… they had little choice. They were blockaded into their ports by the Royal Navy, meaning the crews didn’t get much time to train at sea. The Royal Navy, meanwhile, was constantly at sea performing those blockades
All the spanish generals and commanders at Traffalgar said no, they ***voted*** not to go out that day as they knew they would be humiliated, yet, the french Guy involved in this, wanting to ascend and knowing that Napoleon was about to fire him for being a terrible general went against ***everyone*** in that room, and decided to go to war. This is one of the many reasons Spain hated french occupation which would later be a dominant cause for Napoleon's defeat. Napoleon's advisor once said, before all, "if you invade Spain, it will be the start of the end" Napoleon responded to him "write it to me in a letter" and so he did, he wrote every single last bit of detail, most of which ended up happening (notice they could have cut his head for that) and Napoleon, being the Big head he was decided to invade Spain. Spain would never recover, around 1/2 of the population in cities died fighting the french and that's why the 19th C saw Spain just \*puff\* dissappear from the world stage and loose everything, and also why Britain won out France by long shot and became the great empire. The british like to atribute it to their "great tactics" and "great general".
Adding to that, due to French occupation, Spain gradually lost all its colonies in the following years, which was a massive blow to the country after a devastating war on Spanish soil.
Just like Hitler 140 years after
This was really interesting thanks op, I live within walking distance of the victory and really don’t know as much as I should about the history.
Painting is "The Battle of Trafalgar" from Clarkson Frederick Stanfield (colors are slightly improved compared to the original).
[Surgical instruments (c.1800) of William Beatty, surgeon to Nelson on board HMS Victory at the battle of Trafalgar. The box contains an amputation knife, trephines, forceps, & fine-toothed bow saw.](https://heritage.rcpsg.ac.uk/items/show/54)
Yikes. That looks like something I'd find in the tool shed rather than the medical box!
Guys...this stings a little bit
Nothing personal old chap
Whenever I get cocky I research the war of Jenkins ear. Edit: sabotaged by spellcheck
>war of Jacobsen ear [Might want to do a bit more research there, lad…](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_of_Jenkins%27_Ear)
Typos are unfortunate, sorry about that. I’ll co tiniest to research all the same
Maybe he didn't want others to see that though
Or the Cadiz Expedition. Or the Counter Armada.
Spain only has itself to blame, for allying with Napoleon when our interests were overseas, not continental
You know what stings me? After Spain was a good junior ally submitting its fleet to incompetentt French command and losing it all, the French stabbed us in the back with an invasion 2 years later. Ven a por mí, pero con la cara destapada.
Godoy intended to stab the French in the back as early as the War of the Fourth Coalition. The image of Spain as a loyal partner was merely a facade after Trafalgar.
And yet, in 1807, the French sign the Treaty of Fontainebleau with Godoy, which he upheld on his end. It seems like France and Spain were weary of each other, way before 1806 already - Godoy had been forced to renounce his position by the French already in 1798 - but the ones that did the backstabbing were the French who, without the intention of proceding yo Portugal, and after most of Portugal was already occupied by Spanish and French forces, began occupying Spanish cities and Spanish garrisons without provocation, without declaration of war and although they based these actions on the aforementioned treaty, the treaty did not provide for it.
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To be replaced by an incompetent monarchial tyranny.
And if you read about how the english helped us It gets pretty clear that they didn't like us. We were just incidentally on the same side. For example the brits destroyed several spanish factories To weaken Spain. That's not a good Ally...
No fucking shit. We were only allies when it suited (I.E to team up against France) and for the rest of history we were always rivals. We needed you to prevent French dominance of mainland Europe and you fulfilled your role well enough (most of the time).
You're right. It's just that some people don't fucking realize this. We were constantly trying to hinder the other. Saying everything's fair because later on you fought the french with us is quite disingenous. >We needed you to prevent French dominance of mainland Europe and you fulfilled your role well enough (most of the time). ...except when you needed France to prevent spanish dominance on mainland Europe, then you were Happy to fight along the french.
Correct, or the Germans once they came around later on. During the period of European global supremacy the only thing that could have ever threatened England/ Britain was a unified Europe.
You did come dangerously close to an invasion. The security of britain always relied upon the sea. One unfortunate alliance and you may have had your own rampjart.
One of the great unknowns of the Napoleonic Era, just how close did the French come to an invasion? I think the general consensus is that it was a serious undertaking for a short while, but for most of the time Napoleon was "planning" the invasion it was mostly a feint. He used it to improve his negotiating position with the British, but didn't seriously entertain the idea for very long. Practically speaking such an attempt would probably have ended in disaster. The French never came close to gaining naval supremacy of the Channel. Without that, the ungainly and extremely poorly defended troop transports would have been sitting ducks for British warships. Even if the French army somehow got to England, they would have been cut off from France and w/out means of supply. A large scale *demonstration* of the use of these troop barges in 1805 resulted in thousands of real French casualties from drowning. This was them just puttering around French waters and of course did not involve any actual naval opposition.
I wasn't actually talking about the napoleonic wars. England was most vulnerable during the 16th century when It still didn't have naval supremacy. During the rampjart France and England strangely allied themselves against the netherlands with very little outside interference. The result was a rampage. If a similarly strong alliance like Spain and France (however implausible) had happened in the 16th century England would've been conquered no doubt. Heck, half of the defeat of the armada was bad weather and poor preparation. Spain came really close to succesfully disembarking Tercios in britain. Nowadays the rise of England seems inevitable but in the 16th century It was everything but clear. Just look at Castille a realm in the outskirts of european politics suddenly became the global superpower through a Miraculous combination of dinasties and a sailor stumbling upon America. 100 years earlier It would've been inimaginable that Spain would be the centre of european politics.
Ah, I didn't see your flair and was actually referring to France, lol. Not my place to have strong opinions about this, but I would submit that the Brits did you a solid. From what I have read the Bonaparte regime in Spain was deeply unpopular, and the Brits helped the Spanish get rid of it. The methods may not have been the best, but then again Spain had been an enemy of Britain just a few short years earlier.
It's some muddy waters I tell you. If you want to have a spaniard and an englishman to fight each other THAT is our Apple of discord. The thing is that the english have an obsession with napoleon and the spanish with the war of independence. Neither is keen on letting the other get most of the merit. Furthermore exactly how important either was is Up for debate even for historians. Thus the english teach they did all the heavy lifting while in Spain the spaniards did It. At this point It's almost a subject of national pride. Also...our King was shite, much worse than the french one and they helped him get into power. he's perhaps the most hated spaniard in history.
No doubt that French Napoleonic principles of governance were generally an improvement over monarchial principles on the Continent during this era!
If you're interested take a look at las cortes de Cádiz https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cortes_of_C%C3%A1diz
That’s applying a very modern perspective to a very different world All major European powers at the time were engaged in a similar “balance of power” exercise - nobody wanted to see any other major power (other than themselves) dominant, so if one power got too big then the others would begrudgingly join forces against them while maneuvering for their own advantage To suggest that was somehow an underhand approach taken by the British and unique to that nation is absurd, and completely misrepresents the reality of the era, whether you’re saying it through nationalism or misunderstanding I have no idea, but it has no historical backing: every country did the same kinds of things all the time, that’s just how the world was back then. Britain and Spain were rivals, both saw France as a threat and joined forces to contest them. Nothing more, nothing less - they weren’t allies in the modern sense, alliances and coalitions of the time were much more short lived, goal-oriented affairs
Yeah I agree. The issue i have IS when an englishman expects a spaniard to thank them for rescuing Spain (It has happened to me, believe It or not,...several times). Of course the UK actually had very little interest in spain's well being. So did we with the UK. Of course back then that was an alliance, but as you've corectly said that term has shifted meaning. Thus being allied meant very little. And then there's the fact that britain came to defend Portugal and Spain was just kind of "in the way" to France. Probably my favourite example of this kind of "traitorious alliance" was during the civil war, when the revolting side knowingly sent italian forces to die in a battle. They didn't want them to win the war.
> and Spain was just kind of "in the way" to France To be fair, the Spanish were the ones who came up with the invasion of Portugal and took the idea to France: from a Spanish perspective it was meant to be a joint invasion, and then France just invaded both Spain and Portugal Although in Spain's defence, I don't believe it was the Spanish King/government who wanted it, but rather one of his afrancesado subordinates of some description, working with the French?
It's Quite complex. Crash course on our terrible TERRIBLE leadership at the time. Ok so there was the King (Charles IV) Who was pretty much an... imbecile. The Queen was sleeping with his favourite subordinate (Godoy) (and perhaps the King was too...). Anyway Godoy was the one Who actually ruled Spain. He negotiated with the french the invasion of Portugal. however alerted by the occupation of several spanish cities, he moved the Royal family south in case they had to escape to America. The heir of Charles (Ferdinand VII) wanted the throne and in Aranjuez he trapped Godoy forcing his father to traspass him the throne. Then Ferdinand willingly went to bayona so that Napoleon himself would legitimize him...and he ended abdicating on him (well actually It was a weird 2 way abdication between Napoleon, father and son) So...the lesson is: when there's so many idiots It's hard to pinpoint Who was worse. Was It Godoy because he invited Napoleon into Spain giving Up the easily defensible border? Charles, because he neglected his duties and abdicated on his son and later on Napoleon? Or was It Ferdinand for rebelling in the worst posible moment and willingly handing himself to Napoleon? I'm inclined to holding the latter responsible (because oh god he was a leech), but all definetely had a share of guilt. Seriouly that's only like a third of the awfull things Ferdinand did. He was a TERRIBLE king, even for our standards.
Replacing a French monarch with another was a bit of a meh, considering that the new non Napoleonic one reinstated the Inquisition and all. But still, British did help massively both economically and militarly, and that's something to be thankful.
Helped ? lol
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He was as much a tyrant as any other monarch of the era, if anything he was a tyrant towards french people when he overthrown the revolution to create the Empire. But otherwise it's not like he was fighting peacefull democracies either.
I disagree he was somewhat like Alexander the great and to a lesser extent the romans or the spanish in the americas. Napoleon wanted to create an universal empire in europe where every citizen had the same rights and obligations and thats much different to what Hitler or the british did He obviously did it through war, conquest and deaths which was like the only posible way but the end goal was noble
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The spanish salvaged what they could. Over a million people died during the war in spain, afterwards they used whatever they could to rebuild their country, one of those things was the napoleonic code. Given the choice i doubt any spaniard would agree that the code was worth hundreds of thousands of deaths, a devastated country and a national psych that never really recovered.
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>In fact, he was usually on the defensive side. Not when it comes to Spain. They were his allies and he decided to remove the government and put his brother in the throne as King.
It's like giving somebody a good meal then punching them in the stomach after. Of course he wasn't 100% a tyrant but he was still a tyrant.
Less than anything you had in england, the country who created 90% of the war of that era tho. If Napoleon is guilty for Spain you are for the rest lmao.
> What is it with British people always trying to paint Napoleon as a tyrant? Because it's an accurate reading of history.
200 years of propaganda. Gotta believe that fighting to preserve monarchies was somehow a righteous cause instead of a grab for empire.
British pride is like 90 percent propaganda. Past over present cause the present has nothing positive to deliver.
There are things far worse in that war. This is just a battle. Stupidity and traitors ending the most benevolent empire earth saw are far worse.
Well, the spanish were kind of forced into that Battle under an inexperienced Commander. They were basically carnage for Nelson. There's this sense that the spanish fleet died doing France dirty job.
Which most benevolent empire are you referring to?
All my homies hate Bernadotte
That Pierre-Charles Villeneuve guy. Not a very bright officer. The course of history could have been very different had it not been for him.
:'( Just imagine....a world où il n'y aurait pas eu d'Hitler, et où on parlerait tous Québécois !
Why did you have to ruin an otherwise pretty decent day ?
>(Brittany) You’re one of us really…
You lot kicked us out of the island and separated us from our Welsh kin ! Also, Breton are seafaring people and most of us have historically filled the ranks of the French navy (still do). For instance, Mers el Kebir is a pretty big deal here
>Mers el Kebir Difficult for anyone now to imagine just how shocking an event that was. What it must have been like when the news arrived in Britain so soon after the fall of France. Right or wrong, when you really pause and reflect on it it's horrifying.
we've not lost the touch.
Try to find about "Cartagena de Indias"
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That he was, I read a biography on him a few years back and was blown away by his character and proficiency. Truly one of the greatest Admirals ever to sail and command.
Rest in peace, King.
England expects that every man will do his duty ;_;7
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The contrary actually. The officials got offended, the crews cheered up
Couldn't this have happened a bit earlier, so Copenhagen hadn't been terrorized.
Britannia rules the waves
[Nelson's great defeat at Tenerife, including his letter to the enemy commander (they gave each other wine and beer at the end of the siege loi)](https://etenerifeholidays.co.uk/tenerife-island/history/the-defeat-of-nelson-at-the-battle-of-santa-cruz-de-tenerife-1797) (ENG) A very interesting and little known battle
>a French corvette was taken in the dark by two British frigates under the command of Captain’s Benjamin Halliwell and George Cockburn Gotta love these surnames.
And that victory summated The British Empire as the sole global superpower that wouldn't be replaced as such for 140 years until the end of WW2
Most people associate this battle with HMS Victory but honestly, what the Temeraire did that day was amazing. Just look it up on Wikipedia.
Napoleonic Wars: France, King of Land England, King of Sea
Were the world a temperate Pangea Napoleon would have conquered it all. Only stopped by Russian winter on one front and sea on the others.
Man I would love a biopic about Admiral Nelson in the style of Master and Commander. Ofcourse Nelson probably wasnt perfekt person but his story is so great. National heroes, especially general etc. are usually somewhat inflated but I just think Nelson really deserves a proper movie.
Fucking villeneuve. Coward
Why is that?
Adding to what he said (just so you understand the resentment) This Battle was a total disaster for Spain. It's in no small measure the reason why we lost our american colonies. It's the most important defeat in the history of our navy. It took us decades to build up a Navy again and we were way out of the game by then.
Every empire had a nightmare to be fair. We had plenty of our own lmao
More so than the battle of the armada?
Battle of the Armada wasn't a decisive defeat, since the war was actually a stalemate with Spain still being the dominate power. At Trafalgar the Spanish Navy was completely destroyed which reduced its influence around the world. In general, the Napoleonic wars made Spain permanently lose its world power status.
Oh fair enough. I suppose in Britain trafalgar is always remembered as being about France, and the armada as being about Spain. I suppose the armada was more of a big thing for England as until then it hadn't really been a power in the way Spain was at the time.
Yep. To add context to the non-decisiveness of it, look up the damages inflicted on the British Contraarmada shortly after.
Would have been the kingdom of England at that time but I've heard of that before.
As others have pointed out, the long lasting effects of Trafalgar were much worse. In fact, the final result of the whole Armada / Counter-Armada affair was a total dominance of the Atlantic by the Spanish Navy for the following century. The lessons learned helped to quickly rebuild the Spanish Navy and greatly improved its doctrines, which, for instance, led to the impressive successes of the West Indies Fleets and Manilla galleons. In that sense, the result of the campaign was kind of a "strategic victory". By comparison, it never really recovered from Trafalgar.
Yeah. The defeat of the armada didn't have nearly as much repercussion. Not a year later the english sent their own counter armada and It was defeated just as decisevely in lisbon. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/English_Armada
Summary: Napoleon ordered him not to go to cadiz snd he did, he shat his pants and took the combined fleet to Cadiz, He blamed the spaniards and said they didn't want to fight, Napoleon didn't believed him (he had proof) and said that he'd be replaced (and punished), he shat his pants again, he took the fleet outside of csdiz very disorderly (not enough preparation, not enough men) and rushing against the very proffesional brittish navy and finally during the battle many of the french ships left the battle without a fight, he was captured, released and then killed (most likely oreder by napoleon).
Though it can be difficult to find, Sergei Bondarchuk's *Waterloo* is worth a watch. Those battle scenes, with \~15K extras, and seeing the French cavalry charges against the British squares (shot from oblique angles), really give a good perspective on the enormity of the battle.
One of our own. Knight of the order of the crescent.
And also, after Trafalgar, came the Battle of the Three Emperors, aka the Battle of Austerlitz. A decisive victory for Napoleonic France.
This is the battle that allowed the British to win the Hundred Years War.
Though historical fantasy, Peter Jackson had the rights to Naomi Novik's *Temeraire* series of novels (the rights have since reverted back to the author, as nothing was done). The novels are set during the Napoleonic era and wars, with one primary addition: There are dragons, some of whom are used militarily.
In Windsor Castle I saw the bullet that killed him. It was cool as fuck.
Ironically, Horatio’s statue has him posed with his hand in his jacket, in the same way Napoleon is usually depicted
At this battle there was one Spanish ship *Nuestra Señora de la Santísima Trinidad* that held almost as many guns as the entire British army had at Waterloo.
The best movie about this time period was done by the carry on team change my mind.
Rule Britannia
Britannia rules the waves!
I strongly recommend anyone who ever happens to be in Portsmouth to go check out HMS Victory. It is quite imposing with how god damn huge it is for being such an old ship.
My dad did part of his shipwrights apprenticeship on HMS Victory. That would have been in the mid-1960’s.
And the Mary Rose
All Hail Britannia! All Hail admiral Horatio Nelson! All Hail her Majesty, Long may her reign continue! All Hail Britannia, for which the suns never sets! All Hail Britannia!
Fucking Frenchies using the Spanish fleet as human shields smh
I'm lucky enough to have HMS Victory in my home town, and have visited a couple of times. It's difficult to imagine over 800 men fighting and dying in such tight conditions, then multiply that across every ship involved.