England's Mistress: The Infamous Life of Emma Hamilton (54 page)

Emma received letters from Nelson on October 1, 7, and 13. Every day she longed for his return. If he defeated the French, the government would heap him with gratitude and money (after Waterloo, Wellington was given cash sums and awarded an estate worth nearly £300,000). Ministers might even assist him to get a divorce. Emma believed his promise that he would win and return to her, three times a victor.

The English fleet had been preparing to tackle the French fleet throughout the autumn. When Nelson arrived, he ordered the English captains to station their vessels outside the port of Cadiz, near Cape Trafalgar, off the coast of southern Spain, waiting for Admiral Villeneuve and his ships to emerge. When they heard that Villeneuve's fleet of thirty-three had left port, Nelson and his twenty-seven ships prepared to attack. There was plenty of time to prepare, for warships moved no faster than a stately walking pace. Now he was about to go into battle, Nelson had finally realized that he had not made adequate provision for Emma. On the morning of Monday, October 21, Nelson wrote a codicil to it in his pocketbook.

I leave Emma, Lady Hamilton, therefore, a Legacy to my King and Country, that they will give her an ample provision to maintain her rank in life. I also leave to the beneficence of my Country my adopted daughter, Horatia Nelson Thompson; and I desire She will use in future the name of Nelson only. These are the only favours I ask of my King and Country at this moment when I am going to fight their Battle.
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He had already written his final letters. He congratulated Horatia that "you are so very good a girl, and love my Dear Lady Hamilton, who most dearly loves you, give her a kiss from me."
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He promised Emma he loved her "as much as my own life; and, as my last writing before the battle will be to you, so I hope in God that I shall live to finish my letter after the Battle." All around him, men were packing his furniture and removing the pictures from the walls. The ship was being made ready for war.

Before battle, most ordinary men removed boots, heavy coats, and unnecessary jewelry and exchanged socks for silk stockings, to give the surgeon less trouble. Because snipers tried to pick off commanders, officers divested themselves of decorations. Nelson was determined to wear his stars, despite the concerns of his subordinates that he was making himself a target. His officers begged him to assume the traditional position of an admiral, on a ship toward the back of the fleet, ensuring relative safety and a good overall view of the battle. He refused, resolving to lead the attack from the front, resplendent on the
Victory.
Aware this was probably his last battle, he wanted to head it like a hero: swathed in glory, an inspiration to his men.

On November 6, Emma was in bed with a skin complaint and Susanna Bolton was visiting her. When they heard the sound of gunfire from the Tower of London (a signal that a battle had been won), Susanna wondered if it was "news from my brother." Emma thought there could not be a result so soon and it must be a victory elsewhere. Five minutes later a carriage arrived, and Captain Whitby from the Admiralty was shown in. Emma believed he was bringing her letters. As she later told Lady Foster:

He came in, and with a pale countenance and faint voice said, "We have gained a great Victory." "Never mind your victory," I said, "My letters— give me my letters"—Capt. Whitby was unable to speak—tears in his eyes and a deathly paleness over his face made me comprehend him. I believe I gave one scream and fell back, and for ten hours after I could neither speak nor shed a tear—days have passed on and I know not how they end or begin—nor how I am to bear my future existence.

She had to steel herself to tell little Horatia about her father's death. A week later, Lady Foster visited Emma in Clarges Street and found her weeping in bed with Nelson's letters strewn across the coverlet. "She had
the appearance of a person stunned and scarcely as yet able to comprehend the certainty of her loss. ‘What shall I do?’ and ‘How can I exist?’ were her first words." Emma was eager for news about Nelson's death, and Lady Foster told her what she knew, extrapolating her information from reports in the newspapers. Emma burst into further floods of tears, and when she was calmer, Bess asked her if she thought he "had any presentiment of his fate." Emma replied, no, not until their parting. "He had come back four different times, and the last time he had kneeled down and holding up his hand had prayed God to bless her." Nelson, Emma told Bess, had requested her to take the sacrament with him at Merton, "for," he said, "we both stand before our God with pure hearts and affection."
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Emma lay in bed prostrate with grief for three weeks. She told anyone and everyone about her misery. A heartfelt lament landed on the desk of Alexander Davison:

I have been very ill all Day my Heart Broken & my Head Consequently weak from the agitations I Suffer—I tell you Truly—I am gone nor do I wish to Live—He that I loved more than Life He is gone Why then shou'd I Live or wish to Live I Lived but for Him all now is a Dreary prospect before me I never lamented the Loss of a Kingdom (for I was Queen of Naples) for
seven years,
nor one Sigh ever Escaped me for the Loss I Sustained When I fell from Such a height of grateness & Happiness of Naples to misery and wretchedness—But all I lov'd have sustained with firmness but the Loss of Nelson under this Dreadfull weight of Most wretched Misery that I suffer.
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She struggled out of bed to receive visits from Nelson's steward William Chevailler, and his secretary and chaplain Alexander Scott, as well as Dr. Beatty, his surgeon. Nelson had begged his good friend Captain Hardy to give Emma his personal effects, and he sent, via Chevailler, Nelson's "hair, lockets, rings, breast-pin, and all your Ladyship's pictures." Most sorrowfully of all, she received her letters to him about Horaria and Lord Douglas's tobacco. The letters above are the only ones from Emma to Nelson that he did not burn, for he never saw them.

Emma pieced together the events of the battle from the newspapers and accounts from her visitors. By twenty minutes before noon on October 21, the French ships were firing, but
Victory,
with Nelson standing on deck, broke through their line of ships, and attacked the French vessel
Bucentaure.
Then
Victory
met the French ship
Redoubtable.
The French captain
armed his men with guns, sent them to scale the rigging, and told them to aim for the officers. Covered in stars, walking around the main deck of a flagship, Nelson blazed through the smoke. At quarter past one, a single musket ball fired from a gun on the French ship struck Nelson's left shoulder. He was carried down to the cockpit below the waterline, now the ship's hospital, and laid on a sheet on the bare wood, painted red to disguise the blood. Nelson realized the ball was lodged in his spine and said he "felt it break my back." He knew he was dying.

"My sufferings are great, but they will be soon over," he said, but he took until four o'clock to die. All around him, hundreds of men were dying while others screamed in agony as surgeons removed shrapnel, musket balls, and splinters and amputated mangled limbs. The only anesthetic was rum, and officers took laudanum. Fifteen minutes after Nelson was hit, the
Redoubtable
surrendered. Nelson ignored his purser's promise that he would take the news of the victory home. Stripped to his shirt, his head resting on the discarded coat of a midshipman, he felt gushing in his chest and was numb in the lower half of his body. His lungs filled with blood as he slowly drowned in his own fluids. By three o'clock, fourteen ships had surrendered. Nelson begged Captain Hardy not to throw him overboard and to "take care of my dear Lady Hamilton, Hardy, take care of poor Lady Hamilton." Although Hardy then heard him say "Kiss me, Hardy," it seems likely that Nelson, already on the subject of Emma, was trying to say, "Kiss Emma for me, Hardy."

Alexander Scott and William Beatty rubbed his chest in an attempt to dull the pain. They helped him to drink a little and fanned him until he died. In a letter written in the previous May, Nelson promised Emma she was "my first and last thoughts." She was his last thought. Dr. Scott dashed off the news to Mrs. Cadogan: "Hasten the very moment you receive this to dear Lady Hamilton, and prepare her for the greatest of misfortunes."
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It was some weeks before Emma heard that Nelson's last words were of her and that he had begged the nation to care for her and Horatia. Dividing her time between London and Merton, she was overcome by grief In the absence of William, Sarah, and Charlotte Nelson, who were busy separating themselves from her, she relied on Nelson's sisters. Kitty Matcham complained to her son, George, that Merton was "very dull; quite the reverse to what you knew it." She wanted to leave, but "it really
is cruel to mention our going to my Lady at present."
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Emma often took to her bed with Nelson's belongings, receiving her visitors in tears. Abraham Goldsmid, her neighbor, a wealthy Jewish banker, brought his large family to console her and found her sobbing and passing Nelson's gifts of shawls, rings, and bracelets to a solemn group of fifteen, gathered theatrically at the bottom of the bed. She showed Nelson's coat with a flourish, pointing out how the bullet hole was stiff with congealed blood. Emma found that elaborate expression helped temper her anguish. She took Horada to see the wax model of Nelson at Westminster Abbey and wept copiously as she rearranged the hair.

Lady Foster tried to encourage Emma to focus on practical matters. She wondered if Nelson's family had been kind. Emma praised George Matcham, Kitty's husband, who "scarcely leaves me, but tries to make me take some food, or medicine—something to do me good—and with the greatest affection." She was, however, surprised that William Nelson often seemed elated. Emma did not guess it, but William was exhilarated to hear that Nelson had died without changing his will. Bess thought Emma too trusting. Emma, she reported, told her that her lover had "left her Merton, that at first she would have given it up to [William Nelson] but then she thought not. I advised her not by any means." Emma was plagued by worries. Nelson had promised that his last breath would be "occupied in leaving you independent of the World." As she owed astronomical sums of money, she could only hope he had kept his word.

Nelson's will was read in November. William Nelson inherited the estate, excluding Merton but including Bronte, and he also received Nelson's bank accounts and possessions. The government had already made William an earl and his son Horace a viscount, the titles Nelson had so desperately desired, and now he was also Duke of Bronte. Emma received £2,000, plus Merton with all its furniture and fittings and the seventy acres of land, including all the hay, and also £500 a year from the Bronte estate. She would have much less than she had when Nelson was alive.

She tried to assuage her grief for her lover by helping others. Like her, the Boltons and the Matchams had spent lavishly in expectation of Nelson's victorious return. Emma gave them money and deputized her mother to write to Mr. George Rose, Nelson died "leaving behind his favourite Sister with a large family unprovided for." Mrs. Cadogan declared, "Lady Hamilton who's situation is beyond description only prays that you good Sir will do all you can for this Worthy Family it will give the greatest Relief to her Mind… as a Mark of your true & Real attachment
to our Lamented Hero." She wrote that the Boltons "at this Moment surround her Ladyships Bed bewailing their sad loss & miserable state." After Nelson's death, his friends, relations, and colleagues were frantic to ensure they did not miss out when the government handed out honors and money. Most demanded Emma's help.

Emma had no idea of the intrigues that swirled around her. Many ordinary people blamed the war for inflation and high taxes, and there had been an outcry at the sheer numbers of servicemen who had lost their lives. The government wanted to make Nelson's funeral into a rallying call for British patriotism. Apotheosized as the perfect hero, his love life and his personal flaws would be erased.

Backlash

CHAPTER 49
Mistress of a Mourning Nation