It is 1793 and France has declared war on Britain, meaning that the British navy must serve as both sword and shield to Europe. Horatio Nelson is at this time a slim and sickly 34 year old captain who nevertheless burns with the zeal to serve his king and country, and has recently taken over command of the impressive Agamemnon. Meanwhile, the British navy has taken Toulon by the summer of 1793 through diplomatic means - its foothold in the Mediterranean - but is struggling to hold it. Upon arriving in the city Nelson is shocked to find it besieged by the French, under the leadership of one Napoleon Bonaparte - the first time that these two titanic rivals of history will brush shoulders, but not the last. At last the city falls to the French, and the British must go in search of another Mediterranean base. They settle upon Corsica - Bonaparte’s homeland. It is there, on the morning of the 12th of July that during the siege of Calvi that Nelson is struck in the face by a spray of stone and shrapnel, severely blinding his left eye forever more. Will this critical injury prematurely end his promising career? Just as a great armada of Spanish and French ships gathers on the horizon, heralding the coming one of history's bloodiest naval battles... Join Dominic and Tom as they discuss the Siege of Toulon, Nelson’s heroic early forays into the Mediterranean, and the dramatic aftermath of his first near fatal injury. _______ 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
What was Nelson's perspective on the Siege of Toulon?
There we disagree.
She is a lady with a colourful past. You've put down here, strumpet.
Well, okay. I mean, she was. Yeah. Yeah, am I wrong? Tell me I'm wrong. No, but you know, a girl's got to do what she's got to do. And again, we mentioned Goethe. Goethe's a big fan of her. She does these kind of classical poses. She's very brave. She's very loyal. She's very warm hearted. And I think above all, she is fun.
She's also narcissistic, cruel, attention seeking and incredibly annoying. Well, you can't be everything. We're going to do a future episode on this. Let's not get bogged down. This is clearly going to be the point at which the rest of this history falls apart. They really take to Nelson. They think Nelson is brilliant. And they promote his interests with the king and queen.
They say, come on, make sure you give him everything he needs. So off he goes back to Toulon. When he gets back to Toulon, he discovers... Oh no, terrible scenes. A fellow called Bonaparte, Corsican artillery officer, has got all these guns up to the heights. He's bombarding the forts. The defences of Toulon are cracking. Nelson's not there to see the fall of the city.
Hood sends him off to patrol the coast of Italy, but he's in Livorno. Leghorn. Leghorn, as the British call it. where the first boatloads of refugees arrive. And he is shocked by their condition. He writes to Fanny. He says, fathers are here without families, families without fathers. Terrible scenes. They've had to evacuate Toulon. The French have seized it.
And of course, the French, they sack the city. Well, because it's full of counter-revolutionaries. And this is the kind of the peak of the terror. So actually, I thought this might be a chance to think about those two characters, because Nelson and Napoleon are often thought of in opposition to each other, aren't they?
Well, you know, the Abel Gantz films. The famous black and white film. And there's a sequence where Napoleon is fleeing Corsica with his family and a Royal Navy ship. An officer sees it through his telescope and says, should we fire? And his captain says, no, let's not. Let them be. They won't do any harm. It's Nelson. It's Nelson. And Nelson had wanted to finish off Napoleon.
So even in France, I guess there's a kind of recognition that Nelson is perhaps Napoleon's only worthy adversary.
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