Nelson & His World

Paint detectives have uncovered HMS Victory's true colours.

"What you see today is largely an early 20th century invention of what an 18th century warship looked like," said Michael Crick-Smith, a founder with his partner Ian Crick-Smith of the conservation institute at Lincoln University specialising in historic decorative finishes.

The pair claim that the colour they describe as "that hideous orange" is part of much later attempts to restore the ship when it had become a symbol of British naval power.

More: http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2014 ... n-flgaship

The so called 'hideous orange' is just a point of view.
Dare say in the heat of the moment it was the most glorious colour on earth.

Is it 'hideous orange'? I would call it deep ochre. But colour, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. And colours can be contentious. After all, how do we know that what you see as blue/green/yellow etc. is what I see?


PS: did anyone notice the howler in the link - that Nelson 'died in Hardy's arms'? Hardy was on deck at the time. Nelson died supported by Mr Burke, the purser.

Also incorrect is the statement that Victory is the flagship of the Second Sea Lord. She is now the flagship of the First Sea Lord.

I can't see anything 'hideous' about it at all – and in any case the whole British fleet was painted with it. It probably also wasn't Nelson's favourite colour – it's what was available. If the other had been the case, then I would imagine the ship may have been a delightful shade of pale green or blue. (Do we actually know what Nelson's favourite colour was?)

I believe captains often paid for any additonal shade, over and above the ordinary dockyard supply. I have also read that the use of the duller shade of yellow ochre was perhaps down to the cash-strapped situation of Hardy, and indeed Nelson himself – and they decided to go for the ochre 'magnolia' of the day rather than the lighter shades that other captain's could afford! (Apologies for the exclamation mark.)

This is an interesting survey though, even though some of their findings were to be expected.

Btw, if by Hardy's arms, they mean the Admiral Hardy pub in Greenwich, I think it's known for a fact that Hardy wasn't there that day – he being somewhere else entirely.

I think the point is that in Nelson's time the British fleet wasn't painted in Victory's present deep ochre (or 'hideous orange'). The paint analysis shows that it was actually a much paler ochre.

The present colour has only been on Victory since the 1990s when the previous chrome yellow paint used since the 1920s was banned because of its lead content. But chrome yellow was also inaccurate and was not available in Nelson's time. The colours have been known to be inaccurate for some years after Peter Goodwin's research showed that in 1805 Nelson specified a mix of six parts white to one part yellow. In collaboration with Peter Goodwin, artist Gordon Frickers tested a variety of yellows to find the most likely result. See here: http://www.frickers.co.uk/blog/2012/06/ ... ht-yellow/

The recent paint sample analysis seems to confirm their theory.

I know it's easy to say now but I have never been totally comfortable with that recent colour used on Victory. But I thought it was just because I had got used to the previous colour scheme. So I for one won't be too sad if it reverts to a lighter colour. Especially if it is in the name of correctness!!

Even then I bet there was quite a bit of colour variation going on in Nelson's day. The ochre pigments are natural products, and can vary from yellow through to red. I doubt there was a strict Quality Control department checking all new pigments purchased to a standard colour chart.

Although there might have been !!

Its a favourite with the navy!

Seems to me the ships colour scheme was largely up to the captain.
I can imagine he would think about that for a few minutes then order what needed to be done.
HMS Victory was a fighting machine, so, nice colours were not really necessary.
It was supposed to scare the enemy, like symbols did in the Ottoman Army, more 'hideous' the better.
Nelson WAS a 'top' man of those times.
Rightly or wrongly tobacco was used to 'calm' nerves.

David.

Seems to me the ships colour scheme was largely up to the captain.
I can imagine he would think about that for a few minutes then order what needed to be done.
HMS Victory was a fighting machine, so, nice colours were not really necessary.
It was supposed to scare the enemy, like symbols did in the Ottoman Army, more 'hideous' the better.
Nelson WAS a 'top' man of those times.
Rightly or wrongly tobacco was used to 'calm' nerves.

David.

Was the 'chequerboard' pattern on Victory Nelson's particular choice for that ship or was it general in the Mediterranean fleet? I've often wondered if he got the design from the chequerboard arrangement of the stones of All Saints' Church in Burnham Thorpe where he grew up.

http://www.norfolkstainedglass.co.uk/bu ... /home.shtm

Good question Anna,
It was to confuse and frighten the enemy, remember there lives were at stake.

David.

Anna

I'm 99% certain it was all the ships in the Med. Fleet.

Marzy

As an extension to my comment above I am pretty sure that the painting of the ships was so that they would be recognised by other British ships - rather than to frighten the enemy. i.e. to minimise the damage to ships from friendly fire.

I think maybe Mark is right here. Victory was only one ship of the fleet, albeit the flagship, and probably uniformity was partly the name of the game. The other important factor, as he again mentions, was for identification purposes in the dense smoke of battle. Hence also the painting over of the black mast bands just before Trafalgar (the French had them too) and the union flags hoisted on the topgallant stays. 'Friendly fire' is nothing new and I think there had been instances of this at the Nile which, due to the circumstances, was perhaps not entirely to be unexpected. I am sure Nelson was well aware of this.

Anna,

I like the idea of Nelson getting the idea of the chequer effect from Burnham Thorpe church, but I'm not sure this was how it came about – even though one would love to believe it. The idea of painting the lines of the gundecks ochre (dull, yellow, orange, or whatever) was perhaps not Nelson's, but it would seem that the painting the outside of the actual gunport lids themselves black (so producing the well-known 'Nelson chequer') was. It would appear to be documented.

Kester

As I was writing my post I was thinking about the masts being painted a uniform colour. I hope I haven't extrapolated from that and just assumed the whole ships were painted uniformly.

I will be happy if anyone can say definitively one way or the other.

Meanwhile the Daily Mail have come up with their own article (haven't read it yet!) I think I have said on here before that the Mail loves a Nelson story. I think their journos are on a bonus for every story that mentions his name!!

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2584110/Nelson-livid-Britains-famous-warship-HMS-Victory-WRONG-colour-historians-realise-distinct-bumblebee-patten-just-restoration.html