The Nelson Touch
The Life and Legend of Horatio Nelson
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- $18.99
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- $18.99
Publisher Description
Admiral Horatio Nelson captures our imaginations like few other military figures. A mixture of tactical originality, raw courage, cruelty, and romantic passion, Nelson in action was daring and direct, a paramount naval genius and a natural born predator. Now, in The Nelson Touch, novelist Terry Coleman provides a superb portrait of Britain's most revered naval figure.
Here is a vivid account of Nelson's life, from his childhood and early career at sea--where a high-placed uncle helped speed his advancement to post captain--to gripping accounts of his greatest sea battles. Readers will witness the Battle of the Nile, where Nelson crushed a French squadron of thirteen ships of the line, and the Battle of Trafalgar, where he died at the moment of his greatest triumph. What emerges is a man of strength of mind amounting to genius, frequently generous, always fascinated with women, often uneasy with his superior officers, and absolutely fearless. Nelson was a ruthless commander, whose instinct was not just to defeat the enemy but to annihilate him.
Sure to appeal to readers of Patrick O'Brian and other seafaring fiction, as well as all military history and naval history buffs, this is a superbly written biography that gives readers the texture and feel of this magnificent life.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Veteran British historian Coleman (Going to America) now tackles the life of Horatio Nelson, Britain's most celebrated naval hero. Admiral Nelson (1758 1805), whose glory was sealed with his death at the battle of Trafalgar, has been celebrated in various hagiographies, and his dashingly carried-off love affair with Lady Emma Hamilton has been Hollywood fodder. Coleman offers 27 short, solid chapters with lively headings like "I Shall Come Laughing Back," "Fiddlers, Poets, Whores, and Scoundrels," "Natural Born Predator" and "Well Then, I Will Be a Hero," making Nelson's Romantic renown seem deserved, but he also lays bare the admiral's faults, concluding "that Nelson was often ruthless, there is no doubt." (On one voyage he had fully half of the crew flogged, some of them merely for "mutinous language.") The book's title refers to Nelson's description of his special approach or talent for winning battles, a bit of self-praise that was deserved, even if immodest. Without seeming to have a scholarly axe to grind, Coleman offers a useful corrective to writers so enamored of maritime history and its heroes that they lose sight of the importance of accuracy. There are clearly written analyses of the major battles, as well as the admiral's complex private life, such as his dumping of his wife, Fanny, although supporting her for the rest of his life and retaining her affection. His passion for the wife of a nobleman, Sir William Hamilton, was less well received by the snobby Brit society of his day, but perhaps least popular of all was Nelson's endless careerism and appetite for honors. Coleman points out Nelson's bravery in the face of wounds that would have retired many a lesser sailor, including the loss of an eye and an arm. Nelson, who was always convinced he would be a famous man, would certainly be pleased by this renewed attention.
