HMS Victory - Pretty in Pink?

It was reported in the weekend papers that HMS Victory, Admiral Lord Nelson’s flagship, has had a historically accurate repaint and is now pink, which was the colour it was at the time of the Battle of Trafalgar. Previously the ship had been a mustard colour, which I thought was the standard Royal Navy paint colour for 18^th century warships, but apparently not. When Victory was first built in 1765 it was plain varnished timber but later in the century, captains were permitted to paint their ships whatever colour they chose.

Whilst richer captains chose more ornate and expensive colours, Thomas Hardy, captain of the Victory, could not afford to customise his ship and so opted for one of the free pigments that the Royal Navy offered.  These would typically have included black, yellow ochre and red ochre. It was only after Trafalgar that Nelson’s famous yellow and black checkerboard design became standard. Earlier ships also had lots of decoration; The Royal George, for example, had a bust of King George II on its stern, and figures of Britannia, Neptune, Ceres, Mercury and Hercules. It also had rich interior decoration with mother of pearl handles on the cabin doors.

It was whilst conservationists were working on restoring Victory that they examined all the layers of paint on the ship – 72 – and discovered it’s original pink hue. Some have called the colour smoked trout, others pale terracotta. Ships like the Hermione, pictured right, were bright blue. Personally I see nothing wrong in pink. It was good enough for Nelson. What do you think?

Visiting Nelson's Birthplace

Norfolk, where I live, is ‘Nelson’s County’. Horatio Nelson was born at the Rectory in the little village of Burnham Thorpe near the North Norfolk coast in September 1758. His father was the rector of the parish, the living of which was in the gift of his wife’s influential relative, Horace Walpole. Catharine Nelson died in 1767 leaving Edmund with eight children to raise. 

Horatio, the sixth child, preferred to be called Horace when young - in the church is a copy of a wedding certificate he witnessed as youth, signing himself with that name. It was changed to Horatio in his father’s hand. A second copy of a rather later certificate that he witnessed shows the first known example of the signature, “Horatio Nelson”.

When Horatio married Fanny Nesbit they eventually came to live at the Rectory for a while.

Horatio Nelson therefore knew the church at Burnham Thorpe very well both as a child and an adult and it remains an atmospheric place, filled with Nelson references. There is a monument to him in the chancel, below that to his father and over the spot where his parents are buried.

The flag that flies from the church tower is not, as is usual in English churches, the cross of St George, but the Navy ensign in the form used before 1801 – that is, before the union with Ireland. This is the ensign that would have flown on all of Nelson’s ships until 1801 – but not of course, at Trafalgar.

The church has been rather rigorously ‘tidied up’ inside by the Victorians who rebuilt parts of the nave and installed a pulpit carved from a beam from HMS Victory. More recent additions are the flags from HMS Nelson, presented by the navy in 1955 to commemorate the 150^th anniversary of the battle of Trafalgar.

The 13^th century font that Nelson was baptised in remains, although the stem is a replacement. Outside, the exterior has many features that would have been very familiar to Nelson – the handsome East end or the charming little medieval carvings that survive in severl corners.

The Rectory was demolished in 1802 and all that remains is a roadside plaque. It can be seen in this painting in the National Maritime Museum

http://collections.rmg.co.uk/collections/objects/13252.html

Across the green you can see the village pub, built in 1637 as The Plough and renamed The Lord Nelson in 1798 following his victory at the Battle of the Nile. Nelson held a dinner here for the men of the village prior to his departure to join HMS Agamemnon and the interior is remarkably well preserved, right down to the worn brick floors you can easily imagine Nelson walking on.

Fourteen inches and fug

I’m currently researching naval life in the Regency period for a series of books I’m starting to write. So a trip to Portsmouth was absolutely essential. We are so lucky that HMS Victory has been preserved, essentially as she was. Writers can get a real feeling for what life on board might have been like. The only thing that hasn’t been preserved is the chaos of war — and the smell. Sailors apparently preferred to have the gunports closed, and to live in the dark and the fug!

Life on board was exceedingly cramped, unless you were the Admiral, or the Captain. Nelson’s cabin, on the upper gun deck, occupied about a quarter of the length of the ship. In his dining cabin, you can see the polished mahogany table laid for 20, with room to spare. The Captain’s cabin, on the quarterdeck above, was about half that size. There were guns everywhere and the sailors’ quarters, in particular, were dominated by them. Everything else — eating, sleeping in a hammock in 14 inches of hanging space — had to be squeezed in between.

Photography isn’t allowed on board HMS Victory, but here is a shot of an officer’s cabin on board HMS Warrior, launched in 1860, which was actually much more spacious than HMS Victory. In HMS Victory, officers’ cabins were smaller and the guns took up far more of space. When a ship cleared for action, everything was dismantled and stowed away, leaving guns and crews.

The museum at the historic dockyard includes some interesting exhibits of the reality of warfare. I’d learned at school about how the young Napoleon Bonaparte dispersed a Paris insurrection in 1795 with a “whiff of grapeshot” but I didn’t actually know what grapeshot was. Given the name, I’d imagined shot about the size of a grape. Wrong! This is grapeshot as used in naval canon. Each of the balls is about the size of a tennis ball and as the shot is fired, the canvas bursts and the balls fly in all directions. Terrifying. No wonder the Paris mob was dispersed.

It’s all grist to the writer’s mill and I am thoroughly enjoying becoming immersed in naval life. Though I really don’t think I’d have enjoyed living it! Would you?

Joanna
http://www.joannamaitland.com