Horatio, Viscount Nelson (1758-1805) - photo 1
Horatio, Viscount Nelson (1758-1805) - photo 2
Horatio, Viscount Nelson (1758-1805) - photo 3

Horatio, Viscount Nelson (1758-1805)

Lot 53
10.07.2024 10:30UTC +00:00
Classic
Starting price
£ 5 000
AuctioneerCHRISTIE'S
Event locationUnited Kingdom, London
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ID 1249839
Lot 53 | Horatio, Viscount Nelson (1758-1805)
Estimate value
£ 5 000 – 8 000
Horatio, Viscount Nelson (1758-1805)
Autograph letter signed (‘Horatio Nelson’), with his right hand, to William Suckling, HMS Agamemnon, Leghorn [i.e. Livorno], 31 October 1794
Two pages, 247 x 190mm, integral address leaf. Provenance: Stan V. Henkels auction, Philadelphia, 9 July 1923, lot 161; Walter R. Benjamin Autographs, 21 December 1963 (accompanying note of authenticity).

Nelson on the threat from the French fleet at Toulon, and the ‘burden’ of Britain’s continental allies. Having just been ‘drove back to this port last night by a gale of wind’, Nelson expresses his gratitude for Suckling and his family’s kindness towards his wife Frances (Fanny) Nelson. He goes on ‘I shall only tell you what may not be believed in England that the French have put together a fleet at Toulon which could hardly be credited although many [of] them are old, yet they have fitted them [well] enough for an action if it should be [ne]cessary … we don’t seem to make much of this War, our Allies are our burden, had we left the Continent to themselves we should have done well and at half the expense’. He ends the letter with a list of the French vessels at Toulon with their guns.

Nelson’s gratitude for Suckling’s care for his wife comes after Nelson’s health, following his eye injury during the siege of Calvi, had caused her increasing worry: she was also unaccustomed to his extended absence, as he had been (reluctantly) unemployed on shore and therefore living together with her in Norfolk for much of the first six years of their married life until war broke out at the beginning of 1793. After Nelson’s close involvement with the capture of Corsica that summer, the ‘Agamemnon spent the winter cruising between Leghorn, Genoa, and Corsica or blockading the coast of Provence, refitting as necessary at Leghorn, where Nelson took comfort with a local mistress and occasionally brought her to sea with him’ (ODNB). William Suckling (1720-1798) was Nelson’s maternal uncle and brother of the British Naval Officer Captain Maurice Suckling (1726-1778), who launched Nelson’s career.
Address of auction CHRISTIE'S
8 King Street, St. James's
SW1Y 6QT London
United Kingdom
Preview
10.07.2024 – 10.07.2024
Phone +44 (0)20 7839 9060
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