However, Villeneuve took his fleet through the Strait of Gibraltar, rendezvoused with the Spanish fleet, and sailed as planned for the Caribbean. Nelson commenced a search of the Mediterranean, erroneously supposing that the French intended to make for Egypt. However, Villeneuve's fleet successfully evaded Nelson's when the British were blown off station by storms. Unlike William Cornwallis, who maintained a close blockade off Brest with the Channel Fleet, Nelson adopted a loose blockade in the hope of luring the French out for a major battle. Pursuit of VilleneuveĮarly in 1805, Vice Admiral Lord Nelson commanded the British fleet blockading Toulon. They would then return, assist the fleet in Brest to emerge from the blockade, and together clear the English Channel of Royal Navy ships, ensuring a safe passage for the invasion barges. Napoleon's naval plan in 1805 was for the French and Spanish fleets in the Mediterranean and Cádiz to break through the blockade and join forces in the Caribbean. Villeneuve had shown a distinct lack of enthusiasm for facing Nelson and the Royal Navy after the French defeat at the Battle of the Nile in 1798. There had been more competent officers but they had either been employed elsewhere or had fallen from Napoleon's favour. Vice-Admiral Pierre-Charles Villeneuve had taken command of the French Mediterranean fleet following the death of Latouche Treville. By contrast, some of the best officers in the French navy had either been executed or had left the service during the early part of the French Revolution. The British possessed an experienced and well-trained corps of naval officers. France and Spain were allied, so the Spanish fleet based in Cádiz and Ferrol was also available. Other ports on the French Atlantic coast harboured smaller squadrons. The main French fleets were at Brest in Brittany and at Toulon on the Mediterranean coast. To do so, he needed to ensure that the Royal Navy would be unable to disrupt the invasion flotilla, which would require control of the English Channel. When the Third Coalition declared war on France, after the short-lived Peace of Amiens, Napoleon was determined to invade Britain. Despite several successful evasions of the blockade by the French navy, it failed to inflict a major defeat upon the British, who were able to attack French interests at home and abroad with relative ease. During the course of the war, the British imposed a naval blockade on France, which affected trade and kept the French from fully mobilising their own naval resources. In 1805, the First French Empire, under Napoleon Bonaparte, was the dominant military land power on the European continent, while the Royal Navy controlled the seas. Villeneuve attended Nelson's funeral while a captive on parole in Britain. Admiral Federico Gravina, the senior Spanish flag officer, escaped with the remnant of the fleet and succumbed months later to wounds sustained during the battle. Villeneuve was captured along with his ship Bucentaure. Nelson was shot by a French musketeer during the battle and died shortly after, becoming one of Britain's greatest war heroes. Nelson instead divided his smaller force into two columns directed perpendicularly against the enemy fleet, with decisive results. Conventional practice was to engage an enemy fleet in a single line of battle parallel to the enemy, to facilitate signalling in battle and disengagement, and to maximise fields of fire and target areas. The British victory spectacularly confirmed the naval supremacy that Britain had established during the eighteenth century and was achieved in part through Nelson's departure from the prevailing naval tactical orthodoxy. It was the most decisive naval battle of the war, conclusively ending French plans to invade England. The Franco-Spanish fleet lost twenty-two ships, without a single British vessel being lost. Twenty-seven British ships of the line led by Admiral Lord Nelson aboard HMS Victory defeated thirty-three French and Spanish ships of the line under the French Admiral Villeneuve in the Atlantic Ocean off the southwest coast of Spain, just west of Cape Trafalgar, near the town of Los Caños de Meca. The Battle of Trafalgar (21 October 1805) was a naval engagement fought by the British Royal Navy against the combined fleets of the French and Spanish Navies, during the War of the Third Coalition (August–December 1805) of the Napoleonic Wars (1803–1815). 3,000 prisoners drowned in a storm after the battle (France: 18 ships of the line and eight othersĪpx. Lua error in Module:Coordinates at line 668: callParserFunction: function "#coordinates" was not found. The Battle of Trafalgar, as seen from the starboard mizzen shrouds of the Victory. For the painting, see The Battle of Trafalgar (painting).
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