Nelson & His World

Here's the first one.

I never imagined that anyone had written a poem to commemorate Nelson rejoining the fleet in September 1805!




MB

What an interesting find, Mark. Do you have a source?

I'm intrigued by the claim that it's by 'an old tar'. It's quite a polished poem - the metre is exact and the vocabulary - he uses words like 'perdition' and 'ponderous' - rather ambitious, in sharp contrast to the simple vocabulary and irregular rhythms you find in the sea shanties and ballads of the day. I could be wrong, though. Not all common seamen were illiterate and many were intelligent. Maybe this chap picked up a little learning along the way.

Anna,

As you say, quite a polished poem, and points to the author as having had an education. Although many from the lower deck had some learning I wonder if the 'old tar' wasn't in fact a retired officer, but using the term in its widest sense to encompass both officer and man.

I may be wrong too, but it seems just a little too polished.

Anna

Early in the 1800's there was an annual publication called "The Spirit of the Public Journals". It came out at the end of the year and was made up of selected items from other newspapers, magazines etc. which had been published during the year.

As you can imagine, the edition for 1805 had several Nelson-related poems. It is a bit unclear where the first poem here was originally published but I think it was in something called the Lewes Journal.

The second one is also quite unusual as it describes the home-coming of the Victory.

If you want to see all the poems go to Google Books and search on "The Spirit of the Public Journals" 1805. That will bring it up somewhere on the first page. The poems are mostly quite near the end but if you want you can check out the index at the beginning of the book.




MB

An interesting angle - a poem of praise to Nelson via an address to his ship. Thanks for the tip on Google books, Mark.

I always feel it is such a pity that the poetry that was being written at the time of the Napoleonic wars didn't actually measure up to the splendour of the subject matter. Almost always the form used was 'the heroic couplet': endless pairs of rhyming lines in iambic pentameter (five beats to a line, going 'ti-tum. ti-tum') in rather grandiose language. To read poem after poem with no variation of form or metre does become a monotonous exercise. Still, the sincerity and sadness do manage to come through, and are interesting from the historical, if not the literary, point of view.