Even the failure at Tenerife had not dented his reputation, because his earlier Mediterranean exploits had been so memorable, and his conduct in defeat was as stirring as his most daring moments at St Vincent. Yet he remained the hero of another man’s battle – as he had told Clarence a decade earlier, he would not be thenational hero until he had led the fleet to victory. The war was changing rapidly from an eighteenth-century question of provinces, islands and indemnities into a struggle for survival. The collapse of the first coalition left Britain with little prospect of an ally capable of defeating the French and restoring the pre-war frontiers, let alone the pre-war regime. Britain’s coalition partners generally failed to see the war in such absolute terms: they continued to run balance sheets of profit and loss, a trifling game that Britain was forced to play because she had no war-winning strategy of her own. The two core adversaries, Britain and France, remained in an uneasy stalemate, each side victorious in part, but unable to find a settlement of their differences that could bring long-term security.
What do You think about Nelson: Britannia's God Of War?
