A Story From 1803 about the Battle of Trafalgar
I HAVE LIVED WITH THESE MINIATURES FOR OVER 40 YEARS
THEIR STORY STARTED IN 1803
with a young couple in love, a Petty Officer in the Royal Navy, Mr. Nicholson and Miss R. Yates, they were about to be separated as the Petty Officer was posted to a ship leaving for sea, the Neptune of 98 Guns, Captain Thomas Francis Freemantle, this ship fought in the Battle of Trafalgar, 1805, of the compliment in this battle a very vicious battle 10 were killed and 34 wounded of which Mr. Nicholson was one and this is how an artifact survived the Battle of Trafalgar, it was the miniature of his fiancé painted by Slous, G. That he was wounded and the name of his ship was the “Neptune” as told by sister of the last surviving ancestor of the young girl, R. Yates, who had recently died, the rest I researched, (but was unable to confirm the story from the records available of the Battle of Trafalgar) the sister was very distraught and could not live with her things around reminding her of their life together, they were quite old and did not have any children.
My wife and I in the spring of 1960 were out driving in West Sussex, we were down a little country lane when we saw a notice saying “Come in Artifacts for Sale”. An unusual sign especially the word artifacts in this context so we went in and found a small but delightful very old mansion, we were greeted by the sister who welcomed us offered us tea and cakes and we sat down to talk. Everything for sale, she said, is marked by a black bow and she took us round to see what was there we looked and then my wife saw the two miniatures and asked if we could buy those. Come let us sit down and she told us the story and it started with the words I used to write this page, she said: “I can see you are a young couple in love, I would love to sell them to you”. In those days when an engaged couple were separated miniature portraits were painted of each, the girl would have the boy and the boy would have girl, thus it happened, despite his wound the miniatures came back together after his experience in the Battle of Trafalgar, his boat being third in line after HMS Victory with Lord Nelson. They were married and the Portrait Miniatures have remained together ever since. My wife and I loved them and always kept them by our bed, my wife considered that they would bring us luck, and they did. My wife died after 32 years and I put them away until today.
I was not into antiques at that time, looking back from now I would have bought everything if I had been. If you are interested in Real Antiques CALL me at - 1-905-434-8259
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