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Q — Did Nelson really say "blind eye" at Copenhagen

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Q — Did Nelson really say “blind eye” at Copenhagen

Generated illustration. Not a historical photograph. A telescope on a quarterdeck rail. Not a portrait.

Overview

The episode is already on the Battle of Copenhagen 1801 — Overview. Around 1pm on 2 April 1801, when Hyde Parker — British Admiral hoisted Signal 39, Nelson Horatio — Biography Overview put a telescope to his blind right eye. He kept Signal 16 flying. Stewart William — Lt-Col and Foley Thomas — British Captain were with him on HMS Elephant — 74-gun Third Rate.1

The Wording

This note covers that wording question only. The battle note already says the episode is well-attested but the canonical phrasing is a literary smoothing, and that wording varies across Stewart’s Cumloden Papers and Foley’s later recollections. The spoken line stays on the battle note. Cumloden Papers is not written here as its own document.2

The object is on Telescope — Copenhagen 2 April 1801. The army presence is on Stewart at Copenhagen — Army Presence 1801. The right-eye wound is on Nelson — Loss of Eye at Calvi 1794.

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Footnotes

  1. Telescope to the blind right eye; Signal 39; Signal 16 kept flying; Stewart and Foley on Elephant about 1pm, 2 April 1801: Battle of Copenhagen 1801 — Overview, Telescope — Copenhagen 2 April 1801, and Stewart William — Lt-Col. ↩

  2. Well-attested; canonical phrasing a literary smoothing; wording varies across Stewart and Foley: same battle note, footnote 1. Do not recopy the spoken line. Do not write Cumloden Papers as its own document. Do not invent a regiment. ↩

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