Two hundred years ago, Napoleon Bonaparte dominated Europe and threatened Britain with invasion. Against him stood the Royal Navy and the already legendary Admiral Horatio Nelson. On 21 October 1805 a massive naval battle off Cape Trafalgar on the coast of Spain decided mastery of the seas. Then, over the following days and nights, the battleships and their exhausted crews endured a gale of awesome fury. As Captain Charles Tyler wrote to his wife Margaret, 'the wind blew a perfect storm'. Trafalgar takes readers from the claustrophobic turmoil of a gun-deck in battle, to the desperation of men pumping water from sinking hulks adrift in hurricane force winds. Having fought in the most confused and bloody naval conflict that any had known, English, American, Irish, Spanish and French seamen then had to endure a terrifying combination of weather and circumstances - the stuff of every mariner's nightmare. Intriguing characters abound: Geannette, wife of a Flemish 'main topman'; Louis Infernet, propelled to success by the French Revolution; Dionisio Galiano , sailor, scientist and explorer of the New World, and many more. The demands of life at sea - and what this extraordinary mix of people had suffered and achieved in the turbulent years that led up to Trafalgar - make compelling reading.
Tim Clayton, a former research fellow at Worcester College, Oxford, is a specialist in eighteenth-century history and the author of numerous articles and books, including THE ENGLISH PRINT: 1688-1802. Phil Craig is an award-wnning producer of historical television documentaries. The pair met at St Catharine's College, Cambridge and have collaborated on two acclaimed books about Britian in the Second World War, the bestselling FINEST HOUR, and END OF THE BEGINNING.
Title: TRAFALGAR the men, the battle. the storm
Author: Craig, Phil,Clayton, Tim,Clayton & Phil Craig, Tim
ISBN: 9780340830260
Binding:
Publisher: Hodder & Stoughton
Publication Date: 2004-10-11
Number of Pages: 464
Weight: 0.8848 kg
'Reveal[s] the breathtaking gamble that Nelson was taking in this climactic battle of the era of sail. Tim Clayton and Phil Craig...have found, among a great trove of participants' vivid letters and diaries, support for a revisionist approach to the Trafalgar legend which reminds readers that Nelson brought the enemy to bay with a hurricane threatening and while six of his men o'war were on detachment, seeking fresh provisions' -- The Sunday Times 'Drawing on new archive material, this bloody account of the carnage that was Trafalgar reveals why Nelson was truly Britain's God of war.' -- Daily Mail 'Excellent...comprehensively researched, vividly written and judiciously argued. Wonderfully detailed pen portraits...Much new material from French and Spanish sources gives a rounded picture...and it is this perspective from both sides of the battle that makes the book so compelling ...Clayton and Craig have written about conflict before and it shows.' -- Saul David, Daily Telegraph 'If you want just one book that will show how this flood of new material can transform a story you thought you knew, while at the same time keeping you gripped like a page-turner novel, buy Trafalgar: The Men, the Battle, the Storm by Tim Clayton and Phil Craig. A landmark book.' -- Observer 'A balanced account. Clayton and Craig painstakingly point out that the legendary Nelson and the men of his fleet were not the only heroes of Trafalgar...One of the book's greatest strengths is the attention paid to the perfect storm that began only hours after the fighting had stopped and gave rise to incredible acts of heroism and self-sacrifice.' -- Glasgow Herald 'Excellent...Clayton and Craig score with their almost minute-by-minute detail of the fighting on 21 October' -- Independent 'It reads like a novel and is the most fluent account of Trafalgar for a generation.' -- Ships Telegraph 'Vivid and compelling...an account of significant importance.' -- Naval Review
