From a supplement to ‘Holly Leaves, The Illustrated Sporting and Dramatic News’ Christmas Number, 1905. This large print, from the painting by Fred Roe, shows Lord Nelson leaving Portsmouth to join ‘Victory’, before the Battle of Trafalgar. He stands in the stern of the ship’s boat as he is being rowed out to the flagship in the distance behind him, looking back towards the crowd cheering him from the shore and waving his hat in response. By such gestures and imagery, including a draped Union flag, the print seeks dramatic and patriotic effect but the appearance of the sailors and crowd on the quayside owes more to the Edwardian era than the early 19th century. This was one of many interpretations of Nelson that appeared in 1905, the centenary year of his death. The print carries an inscription taken from Robert Southey’s ‘Life of Nelson’, 1814, which was the most accomplished early one in literary terms and was reprinted throughout the 19th century.

‘They pressed upon the parapet to gaze after him when his barge pushed off, and he was returning their cheers by waving his hat … for the people would not be debarred from gazing upon the darling hero of England’ – ‘I had their huzzas before’; he said to Captain Hardy, who sat beside him in the boat, ‘now I have their hearts.’

The artist, Fred Roe, was a genre painter and illustrator best known for period paintings and historical compositions.