Some really excellent illustrations in this guide to the Navy in the time of Nelson. The illustrations are taken from the collection of the National Maritime Museum and the book is intended as a companion to the opening of the new gallery of the same name. The book gives an excellent all round picture of the Navy showing us a cross section of the times – the people who made the navy from the humblest sailor to the highest Admiral, the men who made the ships, the women who watched their men sail away.
Click here to find out more about the new permanent gallery, Nelson, Navy, Nation, which opens at the National Maritime Museum on Trafalgar Day, 21 October 2013.
Nelson, Navy and Nation The Rise of British Sea Power, 1688-1815 Synopsis
Nelson, Navy and Nation seeks to explore the Royal Navy's relationship with Britain from the Glorious Revolution to the Napoleonic Wars, encompassing three central themes: the realities of naval life in this period, the navy's connection to society, culture and national identity, and the story of Nelson's life and career. A series of chapters contributed by a distinguished panel of leading authors and historians will illuminate these themes through discrete but interconnected topics to give a fascinating contextual overview of life in Nelson's Navy, internal and external perceptions of the Royal Navy and changes in these perspectives throughout the period 1688-1815, and the life and career of Admiral Horatio Nelson himself.
Quintin Colville is Curator of Naval History at the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich. His work focuses on the social and cultural identity of the Royal Navy during the late 19th and 20th centuries, and explores notions of class, masculinity and gender within the service. This research has contributed to wider debates in modern British history relating to masculinity and gender, class, domesticity, consumption and institutional cultures. His article on naval uniform and identity was awarded the Royal Historical Society's Alexander Prize in 2002.
Dr James Davey is a Curator of Naval History at the National Maritime Museum. He was recently lead curator on the NMM exhibition 'Broadsides: Caricature and the Navy 1750-1815' having previously contributed to the Maritime London gallery. James is co-Curator of the Museum's forthcoming Navy, Nation and Nelson gallery. Nicholas Rodger was educated at University College, Oxford. Following seventeen years as Assistant Keeper in the Public Record Office, he became the Anderson Senior Research Fellow of the National Maritime Museum, and subsequently Professor of Naval History at Exeter University. He is a Senior Research Fellow of All Souls College, Oxford, and a Fellow of the British Academy. His many publications include The Safeguard of the Sea: A Naval History of Britain 660-1649 (1997), and The Command of the Ocean: A Naval History of Britain 1649-1815 (2004).
