Nelson & His World

Does anybody go for this story? - For sale: The silver snuff box stolen from Nelson's cabin as he lay dying on the deck of the Victory

One question - Where was Nelson's cabin during the battle?

Tony

Where do these stories keep coming from?

After all these years I have never heard any suggestion of any of Nelson's possessions being "purloined" on the day he died.

And even if there is a grain of truth - the story must have become "garbled". Because surely Nelson's cabin would have been dismantled i.e. partitions removed and contents stowed - before the commencement of the battle.

It leads to the question exactly where his possessions would have been stowed. I am pretty sure they would have started in some secure place but that may not have lasted in the chaos of the battle.

I have certainly got my sceptical head on here. There is no doubt that there were scams going on regarding Nelson artefacts as early as the Victorian era.

MB

My suspisions would lead me to anywhere that the date June 1815 may get involved at the moment.

Due to the auctioneer's comments I didn't think it was worth looking at the Trafalgar Roll. But I took a look neveretheless.

And what did I find. That the coxswain on Victory was not Sims at all but Robert Bookless.

The closest to Sims is a William Simms who was an Able Seaman.

I am not a trained historian in any way - but I read some while ago that you should always be very wary of supposed events that are only documented many years after they apparently happened.

So to see something first recorded 86 years after the event goes no way to convince me of its truth.

I don't get any pleasure from being a sceptic - I just can't help it!!

MB

It will be interesting to keep an eye on the auction sale price. I'll be surprised if anyone bites with this doubtful provenance, but you never know.......

Incidentally, while it's well known that all Nelson's possessions (pictures of Emma and Horatia etc.) were stowed before the battle, didn't Hardy collect his last letters and arrange for them to be delivered to Lady Hamilton? It was customary to write to loved ones before a battle; was there a procedure for depositing letters to be collected and forwarded in the case of death?

Sorry to wander off......perhaps I should have started a new thread?

Anna

That's exactly the picture I had in my head - i.e. Hardy collecting Nelson's possessions and delivering them to Emma. Would he have noticed that items were missing? Would he have cared - with all the aftermath of the Battle still to deal with? Impossible to say.

But what on earth does it mean in the hand-written note "as was then the habit."

i.e. if your commanding officer was killed - all his possessions were "up for grabs".?!

Well if that was the case how come we never heard of this or any other incident before??!!

I am shocked that the auctioneer seemingly corroborates the story of a Sims being Coxswain. But when you look closely at his words he actually says "seaman" and maybe by that he means the character Simms. Would love to have a face-to-face discussion with him on this one.

MB

Mark

I'm now recollecting in my 'bramble bush' mode, a story that appeared in 2005. A midshipman did, apparently, purloin a signet ring belonging to Nelson, which had been passed down through the family. At the time of the 200th anniversary, when Nelson memorabilia were (was?) selling at enormous prices, they simply returned it without asking for payment - I think, to a museum. I'll Google around later to see if I can find more precise details.

And I see discussion of the 'stolen' snuff box is getting an airing elsewhere, though they seem to think it's genuine!


http://bayourenaissanceman.blogspot.com ... s-but.html

I agree with you Mark, and you are right to be sceptical! The provenance of all this is somewhat doubtful and, as you say, why haven't we heard of this before and why has it seemingly only surfaced now?

Like you I looked up the name Sims in the Victory's muster roll, which raised some suspicion. As you mention, the Victory's coxswain was a Robert Bookless - and the one 'Sims' mentioned is actually listed as 'Simms', first name William. Since the roll is pretty specific, I would think his rating as AB is also correct. It might also be worth mentioning that he is listed as being 21, came from Colchester in Essex, and joined the Victory on 11th May 1803.

As to the theft itself, on the face of it this might seem easy enough in the middle of battle, when presumably everyone else was fully occupied (which makes one wonder, why wasn't he as an ordinary AB – and wasn't he missed by those in his division?) However as has been mentioned, the officers' cabins would surely have been dismantled and all furniture and possessions stowed in the hold as was usual, so that the guns in those cabins could be used. In effect they became part of the rest of the deck, the middle gun deck in the case of Nelson's suite of cabins. In any case, if Simms was part of the crew of one of the cabin's guns, it begs the question as to how would he have found the time to steal a snuff box, and under the eye of his mates? I think this might just be a case of another wishful thinking!

Like you also Mark, I picked up on some of the phrases used, especially 'as was then the custom'. This must be an unfortunate off-the-cuff remark, since surely this kind of behaviour would not have been tolerated even amongst the ordinary men, where I believe that if a seaman died, his possessions normally were sold at a ship's 'auction' to raise money for his widow and dependants. I don't think that anyone was at liberty to just purloin them, 'as was the custom'! If that was the proceedure for even an ordinary seaman and which had some measure of dignity to it, I would think that's Nelson's possessions would have been treated with rather more delicacy! I would think too that all of Nelson's possessions were listed and that procedures were already in place for them to be disposed of if and when neccessary. One other point, is that it is possible that a small group of trusted men were detailed to handle the Admiral's personal possessions when the ship cleared for action. I don't know this for certain it's just a theory, but I would imagine that if true they had been doing this for sometime and thus learnt the best way of stowing them and in the quicket time. I suppose there is the possibility that if Simms was one of this group, he may have had the opportunity to steal the snuff box – but then if he were suspected of being 'light fingered' he would surely have been removed from the group!

I've located a reply to the descendant of the man who stole the signet ring that appeared in The Daily Telegraph on 23 September 2005:



Sir - Mr King-Fretts's rather pious appeal (letter, September 21) for owners of Nelson memorabilia to follow his family's example and return such items might carry a little more weight if he hadn't told us that his ancestor had stolen the signet ring from Nelson's cabin in the first place.

but can't seem to find the letter itself. I'll keep trying - perhaps someone more skilled than I am might have time to trace it.

Got it! Tony, I'm sorry to cut across your original thread like this - maybe I should have started a new one; but the comment by Mr King-Fretts about his ancestor's theft from Nelson's desk does have some bearing on the discussion about where things were kept during a battle, so I hope you'll forgive me!




Bequest to the nation

Sir - I read Art Sales (Arts, September 19) with a touch of sadness. When Nelson died, Lieutenant Andrew King (my great-great-great-grandfather and the Victory's fourth lieutenant) ran from the cockpit where he had just witnessed the admiral's death to his cabin, where he took from the writing desk a signet ring bearing an Egyptian motif that had been given to Lord Nelson by the Hamilton family.

For almost 200 years the ring remained with our family, removed from the darkness of the safe on special occasions to be wondered at and returned. Two years ago, my father thought that this was a ridiculous situation and that such items were the property of the nation rather than of private individuals or wealthy collectors. He decreed that it should be returned to the place from whence it came, namely to Lord Nelson's writing desk, which now resides in the Royal Naval Museum at Portsmouth. I was given this task and was overwhelmed by the deep gratitude shown by the museum curator and his staff. What it might have fetched had we offered it for sale on the open market never crossed our minds.

If all such memorabilia were surrendered to the safekeeping of the Royal Navy, then the nation as a whole would be the beneficiary. Might I appeal to any of your readers who have it in mind to cash in on the forthcoming anniversary to examine their consciences?

Paget King-Fretts, South Molton, Devon

What a sour reply in the letter quoted in my previous post! The family deserve full credit for refusing to profit from the crime.

Interesting discussion. Could i ask one question...Did Nelson take snuff?

There's a link to a website here, P-C, which states that 'Nelson used to take vast quantities of snuff to sea'. Can anyone confirm this? And even if he did, it doesn't mean that he used it himself - as the host he could have simply passed it round after dinner to those who fancied it:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/33386 ... heeze.html

Anna

Thanks for that other report. I absolutely had not heard that story before - so that is two supposed thefts of Nelson's personal possessions as he lay dying and a hand-written note from 1891 that this was "then the habit".

It certainly increases the possibility the stories are true - but how bizarre!

At the moment I can't get my head round anybody thinking it was appropriate behaviour - especially a commissioned officer??!!

In response to PC's question - I can't recall any contemporary report/description of Nelson taking snuff. But I may be wrong. I've got a copy of those household accounts from Merton somewhere. I can't remember any purchase of snuff being recorded on them. I will see if I can find them and check it out.

Apologies again for my scepticism. I can only say I would need a better provenance before I shelled out for this item.

But good luck to anyone who is more trusting than me.

MB

I'm still a bit sceptical on this whole question, but I think Anna is right. I have never read that Nelson took snuff himself, and certainly not in 'vast quantities', but I suppose he may have tried it. I'm inclined to Anna's view, that the snuff was intended for those of his captains and the many others who had formed the habit and who's business took them to the Victory.