I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command . . .
Horatio, Admiral Lord Nelson, died in 1805 at the Battle of Trafalgar. His Dublin alter ego, however, survived for a century-and-a-half. The Nelson Pillar was erected on Sackville Street in 1808 to commemorate the admiral, but 35 years ago today, on March 8th, 1966, it crumbled to leave Nelson's image, like that of Shelley's Ozymandias, in ignominious fragments on the ground.
Cape Trafalgar lies about 40 miles west of Gibraltar along the Spanish coast. It was near here, on October 21st, 1805, that Nelson encountered the Combined Fleet of the French and Spanish navies sailing from Cadiz, and gave his famous signal "England expects every man to do his duty".
Despite the Combined Fleet's superiority of numbers, Nelson won the day; the victory at Trafalgar proved to be a turning-point in the Napoleonic Wars, inaugurating a century of British naval domination. But there were two serious down-sides to the escapade.
The first, of course, was the demise that produced the most famous dying words since "Et tu, Brute?" - Nelson's invitation "Kiss me, Hardy". But the weather had an even nastier jolt in store for the survivors. One of the great advantages of victory in naval war in those days was "the prize". Captured ships, and all that they contained, were eagerly impounded by the winning side, the booty to be shared, pro rata , by officers and men alike. After Trafalgar, the British found themselves in possession of no fewer than 17 such prizes.
Meteorology, unfortunately, intervened. During the battle itself the wind had been a moderate south-westerly. That evening, however, it increased dramatically, and from October 22nd until the 25th, galeto storm-force on-shore winds, and a powerful swell, pounded the British fleet and captured ships alike. The English all survived, albeit only just, but the captives, being in poor condition and manned by only skeleton crews, were tantalisingly, one-by-one, driven aground on to the rocky Spanish coast and wrecked.
Only three "prizes" struggled into Gibraltar five days later, leaving the immediate spoils of victory so meagre that many of the victors must have wondered why they bothered.
My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!