< Florence Nightingale

TOPIC 1 Sept-Dec 1979

FAIRBURN The place where I wrote all this rubbish

The Forgotten World John and Mick fall foul of some extreme potholing

TERM 2 The birth of the 1980s - Blake’s 7, Blondie and battles in space

Ward’s 7 John Ward and his band of rebels fight the evil Federation

The Fugitive A man runs - but who is he? And what is he running from?

The Flame in the Desert An evil fire threatens the safety of the world

Florence Nightingale What if Florence Nightingale had lived in the Year 2000?

The Story of Nelson

Part Four

Tuesday March 11th, 1980

Back to Nelson after a week off with Florence Nightingale, and things haven’t improved. This time the young Horatio is in India, where we’re supposed to imagine the hustle and bustle of a colourful market, rather than the subjugation of an entire population by colonialist forces. Those wily Eastern merchants with their cruel bargains, trying to get paid for the goods we’re stealing from them! We’re drawn to feel sorry for Nelson again when he falls dreadfully ill - he is “very ill” and “very unhappy” because the climate was “too much for him” and he would “never be strong enough” to be a sailor. Poor mite. This conveniently overlooks the fact that he’s already been there two years, during which time his main job was to act as naval security for the private company which had already conquered India and was set to systematically strip it of its resources for most of the next century, before passing the job on to Queen Victoria. After being struck down with malaria - which admittedly can’t have been fun - Nelson spent the next six months returning home to Britain, during which the text here tells us he had a moment of doubt. Not about the morality or rightness of what he was doing, but doubt that he was hardy enough to stick it out. Fortunately for us though (because he’s a hero and, you know, Britain and all that), he was overcome with “a sudden glow of patriotism” which helped steer him on his path to immortality. We’re not told whether this was brought on by a realisation that it must of course be morally right that a private company of warmongering ultracpitalists should subjugate the Indian subcontinent to its whims and steal all its wealth in order to make future generations of a handful of lucky Brits obscenely rich at India’s expense, or if it was because he’d had news that his Uncle was now Comptroller of the Royal Navy and was about to use his considerable influence to get him promoted to Lieutenant. Wow. I didn’t expect this but I’m quite enjoying writing about Nelson. I started out just a few pages ago with no expectation other than it would bore me rigid, smelling something iffy about this entire story and look where it’s brought me. I’ve gone from slight suspicion to full-throated displeasure. Horatio Nelson is coming across as an insipid, overprivileged slave-driver who gets his kicks from helping his mates subjugate the weak and only rose to prominence because of nepotism. I really don’t like him at all. Let’s hope the next few chapters give me a better understanding of why they built that statue.

Nelson: 5 >