MONDAY, Octr. 21st, 1805. At day light saw the Enemy’s Combined Fleet from East to ESE. Bore away, made the signal for order of sailing and to prepare for Battle, the Enemy with their heads to the Southward.
At 7 the Enemy wearing in succession.* May the Great God whom I worship Grant to my Country and for the benefit of Europe in General* a great and Glorious Victory, and may no misconduct in anyone tarnish it, and may humanity after Victory be the predominant feature in the British Fleet. For myself individually I commit my life to Him Who made me, and may his blessing light upon my endeavours for serving my Country faithfully. To Him I resign myself and the just cause which is entrusted me to Defend. Amen, Amen, Amen.
* ‘Wear’ in this context is a nautical term equivalent to gybe, that is, to change tack with the wind crossing behind the vessel. As battle approached, Nelson ordered the breakable fixtures in his cabin to be removed for safekeeping. “A portrait of Lady Hamilton hung in his cabin” Southey tells us; “and no Catholic ever beheld the picture of his patron saint with devouter reverence. The undisguised and romantic passion with which he regarded it amounted almost to superstition; and when the portrait was now taken down, in clearing for action, he desired the men who removed it to ‘take care of his guardian angel.’”
* In his correspondence, Nelson wrote more than once that he believed Napoleon was bent on a quest to ‘degrade’ and ‘humble’ the nations of Europe; his own quest, as he stated during his pursuit of the French Fleet to the West Indies, was ‘not only the honour and glory of our country, but possibly its safety, and with it that of all Europe, from French tyranny and oppression.’ Napoleon’s conviction that Europe would be happier if its diverse peoples were brought under one Government, and their daily lives closely regulated by his Napoleonic Code, was regarded with very much more horror, outrage and disbelief than similar ideas today.