This Week's Great Day

Hawke's Bay Tribune, Volume XVII, 1 October 1927, Page 15

This Week's Great Day

MomojaHe Events tn the history of the Empire*

By

Charles Conway

SEPT. 29th.—THE BIRTH OF NELSON (Copyrighted.)

ONE HUNDRED and sixty-nine years ago, on the 29th September, 1758, Horatio Nelson, the most popular of Britain's numerous naval heroes, was born in the Norfolk village of Burnham Thorpe, of which his father was the rector.

He entered the Royal Navy at the age of 12, and during the first seven years of his life at sea he acquired a great aversion to the duties of a sailor, but he eventually became imbued with an intense spirit of patriotism, which he retained until the end ot his life, and which caused him to throw his whole heart and soul into his work.

He secured his lieutenancy in 1777, after which his advancement was a speedy one, and at the age of 21 he attained the rank of post-captain. Prior to 1793 he only had two brief experiences of active service, and he owed his earlier promotions in a large measure to his wonderful power of gaming the affection of Ins associates and superiors. With the outbreak of war with France in 1793 he entered upon the busiest and most glorious period oi his career, and for seven years he was almost continuously engaged on active service. His right eye was destroyed at the taking of Corsica in 1794, and three years later he lost an arm from wounds received during an attack on Santa Cruz. He served under Admiral Jervis at the famous Battle of St. Vincent on the 14th Feburary, 1797, when his brilliant services were rewarded with a knighthood, and the British public became aware for the first time ol his great genius and daring, which had hitherto been little known outside official circles. At the commencement of 1798. at the early ago of 40, he was promoted to thq rank of rear-admiral, and on the Ist August of that year he per-

formed the most notable achievement of his career at the Battle of the Nile, when his destruction of the French fleet gave Britain the command of the Mediterranean Sea and put an end to Napoleon’s carefullylaid plans lor the conquest of India, fins great victory gamed him his peerage, and ever since that day he has held the foremost place among our national heroes. He added to his laurels in the Baltic Sea in 1801, when his refusal to obey his superior officer’s orders to retire in the middle of the Battle of Copenhagen saved the British fleet from disaster. His crowning triumph came at the glorious Battle of Trafalgar on the 21st October, 1805, when the grief of Britain at his death in the moment of victory almost neutralised the national rejoicing at the destruction of the combined fleets of France and Spain. This memorable victory shattered Napoleon’s long-cherished dream of invading Britain and firmly established Britain in her proud position of Mistress of the Seas, a position which has enabled her to spread her Empire far and wide and to build up her trade all over the world. Honours were lavishly bestowed upon the members of Nelson's family His brother, a clergyman, was made an earl and given a perpetual pension of . six thousand pounds a year and the sum of one hundred thousand pounds to buy an estate; while ten thousand pounds was given to each of his sisters. Nine thousand sailors marched at mourners behind the great funeral ear which carried the dead body of the hero through the streets of London to its resting-place beneath the dome of St. Paul's Catbwliwi. »nd the black silk scarves e-Heh these men wore as a sign of ■WMrteg on thnt. occasion have em* siaM formed l«rt of tho uniform of Ae British