It’s 1758 and Britain’s greatest naval commander has just been born. The young Horatio Nelson has inherited his father’s love of god and his mother’s hatred of the French. At age 12, he leaves Norfolk for a life on the high seas. As a teen, Nelson narrowly avoided death on multiple occasions. He survives a nasty encounter with the Sultan of Mysore, the blistering cold on a failed expedition in the North Pole, a nasty bout of Malaria contracted in India, and far more besides. Propelled by his excellence and bravery, he rose quickly to become a captain.This brings us to 1788 where Nelson, now a married man in his thirties and back in his childhood home, learns that England is going to war with France. Without hesitation, he swaps the simple domestic life for the thrill of the high seas once more… Join Tom and Dominic as they discuss Nelson's early life and adventures, as he sets out along a path that would eventually enable British domination of the seas; and the world. _______ LIVE SHOWS *The Rest Is History LIVE in the U.S.A.* If you live in the States, we've got some great news: Tom and Dominic will be performing throughout America in November, with shows in San Francisco, L.A., Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington D.C., Boston and New York. Tickets on sale now at TheRestIsHistory.com _______ Twitter: @TheRestHistory @holland_tom @dcsandbrook Producer: Theo Young-Smith Assistant Producer: Tabby Syrett Executive Producers: Jack Davenport + Tony Pastor Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chapter 1: Who is Horatio Nelson and why is he significant?
Yeah. And so he packs up his trunk and goes off. And Dominic, where does he head to to join the Navy and embark on his adventures at sea?
I hope you're not going to bring this up every time this place recurs in the story. This is the one time you're out to say it. He goes to Chatham, which is Tom's favorite place. He goes to Chatham by coach. And yes, we will one day do a podcast all about Chatham as Tom and the Chatham tourist board desperately are hoping. So he goes down to Chatham, which is the great dockyard.
Chatham is the epitome of modernity, I guess, isn't it? With its rope works and its kind of systems for building the ships and providing for the ships and repairing them and all of that kind of thing.
Yeah, I always remember a phrase that I picked up when I read NAM Roger, who's the great historian of the Royal Navy.
When we did our episode on Trafalgar, he said that the naval establishments represented in many respects so many islands of the 19th century in the 18th century countryside, that a place like Chatham or Portsmouth, that this is the cutting edge of technology and industrialization anywhere in the world. This is the absolute smithy of British greatness because the Royal Navy is incomparable.
It's the future.
It's a preview of the future. It is the future. Yeah. So Nelson goes down there and he gets on the ship, the Raisinable. And Dominic, the Raisinable, I mean, that's French. So presumably this is a captured French ship. It must be a captured ship. And you'll often see that, that their ships have the wrong names because they've been captured.
Of course, each ship, just to stress this, each ship is an exceedingly expensive and modern piece of kit, of hardware. So one thing that's important to remember from the very beginning is the one thing most people don't want to do is to lose their ship because they're so expensive. So to capture, an enemy's ship is the ultimate. And it's quite rare.
It doesn't happen as often as you would think because often sea battles are a bit inconclusive, aren't they? And as we'll see in Nelson's career, one of the extraordinary things about him is that his sea battles are never inconclusive.
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Chapter 2: What challenges did Nelson face in his early life?
But we know that Edmund Nelson was the kind of man who would have no business with a polar bear skin.
And as you say, we know that this didn't actually happen because we have the log. The log simply says a bear came close to the ship on the ice, but on the people's going towards him, he went away, which is a good deal less dramatic. It is. But you will always see in books about Nelson. The polar bear.
Kind of dramatic images of the young hero. I actually had to really restrain myself when I did this book. Heroic forbearance. From not having, you know, the bear strikes at chapter seven or something. But anyway, he doesn't fight the bear in the book.
So basically what they were going to have to do was unload the ship and drag everything on these launches towards where they hoped they would find the sea and then wave and basically hail a whaler. I mean, a terrible scene. I mean, probably they would have died, I would say, unless they were very lucky. But he is fortunate.
Dame Fortune smiles on him, I think it's fair to say, throughout his career because they've been dragging these launches for two days or one and a half days, I think it is, and going back to the ship to sleep. And then one day they get up to do it again, have another go. And they hear this great cracking sound. The ice is breaking up.
And what is better, the current is carrying their ship towards the sea. Southwards. So tremendous scenes. They end up making it back home. They haven't found the Northeast Passage. But again, for a teenager, what is he, 14, 15? 15, yeah. It is an unbelievable experience. And he gets a silver watch out of it, doesn't he?
Yes, he's given by the commanders of the expedition a silver watch that he treasures for the rest of his life. It's engraved with the details of this kind of Arctic expedition. So this is an amazing training. So today, while lads will be doing GCSEs, he's off braving the Northeast Passage. Exactly. And then as if that's not enough…
When he gets back, Captain Suckling says, oh, well, I found you another little trip, actually. Little berth. One of my friends is looking for a midshipman on his ship, the Seahorse, to go to India. And there, their job is to, the Royal Navy is basically providing protection. It's escorting East India Company trading ships from local pirates and raiders and so on and so forth.
And this is Nelson's introduction to the fact that being in the Royal Navy obliges you to have a sense of geopolitics. Yes, absolutely. Because he's kind of dealing with the local bigwigs along the Indian coast and so on.
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