Volume 58, Number 4 (2005) Autumn

An etching by James Gillray (1756–1815), considered the leading British caricaturist of the late eighteenth century: “Immortality— the Death of Admiral Lord Nelson—in the moment of Victory!—this Design for the Memorial intended by the City of London . . . humbly submitted to the . . . Lord Mayor.” It appeared on 23 December 1805, the day the body of Nelson, killed on 21 October at Trafalgar, was transferred from his flagship, HMS Victory, on its way to the Royal Naval Hospital, Greenwich, where it would lie in state. The veneration for the admiral evident even in this somewhat tongue-in-cheek image, and still strong in the United Kingdom today at the bicentennial of his death, has not been afforded by Americans to any of their own great naval leaders— for reasons, and with implications, explored in our lead article by James Holmes.