Horatio Nelson was born on September 29, 1758, in Burnham Thorpe, England. After having some schooling he joined the navy through the influence of his uncle and he quickly began to climb through the ranks. After some civilian sailing, which included a trip close to the North Pole, as well as some time on Navy escort ships, Nelson was given command of his own ship. He was only twenty. His obvious skills soon came to the attention of Sir Peter Parker, the British commander in charge of the Caribbean area, under whose command he served for some time. Nelson was given charge of bigger and bigger ships and he sailed and fought all around the Caribbean as well as some other places in the Atlantic before returning to England in 1783. He was married in 1787 and stayed home in peace until France declared war in 1793. When this happened he was given command of a ship and fought the French navy in different skirmishes around the Mediterranean. In 1794 he lost his right eye while fighting with land forces trying to take a French held town. In 1795 Nelson routed a French attack on the Island of Corsica in what is known as the battle of Genoa. Other than that and a few small skirmishes there was not much action until the battle of Cape St. Vincent. In this battle Nelson showed his skill and bravery by sailing straight for the enemy ships instead of staying in a line with the other ships, as was British naval tradition. This was direct disobedience of orders but he captured two Spanish ships that were both much bigger than his own. Soon after this Nelson lost his arm in a failed attack on a Spanish held island. Although Nelson was partly to blame for the failure, he returned home a hero because of his bravery at Cape St. Vincent. In 1798 Napoleon was reported to be building an invasion fleet and Nelson sailed back to the Mediterranean in command of a fleet, bent on destroying Napoleon's invasion fleet. At first he didn't know where Napoleon was planning to land and he spent several months trying to locate the enemy fleet. By the time he found them, the French troops had landed safely in Egypt. He had failed to stop the invasion but Nelson still wanted to destroy the escorting French warships, which were anchored Aboukir Bay, near Alexandria. In a brilliant tactical move, Nelson managed to get some of his ships in between the shore and the French ships and then attacked them from the seaward side with the rest of his ships. Surrounded on both sides by British ships the French fleet was almost completely destroyed. He returned home but was soon called again, this time to fight in the Baltic. Several northern nations had begun to form an alliance against Britain so Nelson launched a strike against Denmark, hoping to nip this threat in the bud. He attacked the Danish fleet in Copenhagen harbor and captured or destroyed many of their ships. Nelson's last great battle came when Napoleon began planning an invasion of England. Napoleon needed the combined French and Spanish fleets to protect his invasion barges so if Nelson could destroy this fleet beforehand, the invasion would be thwarted. He pursued the combined enemy fleet for over two years before finally forcing them to fight on October 21, 1805 off Cape Trafalgar, Spain. The standard tactic of the day was to form two parallel lines of ships and fire at each other but instead Nelson formed his ships into two lines that were perpendicular to the enemy line. He then sailed these two lines of ships directly into the enemy line, cutting the French and Spanish line in three pieces. This plan worked. The French and Spanish lost 22 ships and the English didn't lose any. This was a crucial victory for England because if they had lost, it is quite likely Napoleon would have been able to carry through with his plans to invade England. But this monumental victory came at a cost. While directing the battle from his flagship the Victory, Nelson was shot by a sniper from a nearby French ship and died three hours later. He was buried on this day, January 9, 1806, in St. Paul's Cathedral, in a coffin made from the mast of the French flagship at the Battle of Aboukir Bay.
