Who was Lord Horatio Nelson? What did he stand for? What did he believe in? Answering these questions in full would require lengthy biographies—and rightly so. One effective way to provide a legitimate short answer is to highlight a selection of quotes attributed to the man himself. So here they are …

With Napoleon's hopes of a British invasion quashed at Trafalgar, he sought to force his archenemy into submission through economic warfare: the Continental System. He aimed to bring Denmark into his alliance of nations denying British shipping access to their ports while also seizing its considerable fleet at Copenhagen. Alarmed by this threat, the Royal Navy and British Army responded swiftly.

Thomas Foley played a crucial role in Nelson's engagement off Aboukir in 1798 and later became Nelson's flag captain at the Battle of Copenhagen in 1801.

HMS Devastation was a ship that redefined naval warfare, proving that masts were no longer essential for warships. Her design set a precedent for modern battleships, embodying the transition to steam-powered, turret-armed vessels that would dominate the seas in the decades to come.

When war broke out with Revolutionary France in 1793, Britain's main concern was preventing French troops from landing on British soil. Despite the political turmoil, the French army remained a formidable and well-trained foe. Although battles like Trafalgar and the Nile diminished France's ability to launch such an expedition, it was the continuous blockade of French naval bases that effectively kept the enemy away from the British Isles.

Despite Spain's neutrality during the early years of the Seven Years' War, the country ultimately allied with France in 1762. The British sought to strike quickly against Spanish forces in the Pacific, aiming to act before news of the war reached the region. The Battle of Manila serves as a prime example of the effectiveness of strong cooperation between the army and navy, even with limited resources.

The Boxer Rebellion was a Chinese nationalist movement that aimed to remove all christian and foreign influence from China. This prompted the formation of the Eight-Nation Alliance, with the British Empire as one of its members. The alliance sought to suppress the rebellion and restore the Western-dictated order in China. Britain sent its most lethal weapon to the war zone: the Royal Navy.

The construction of ships of the line in the 18th century was a long and complex process. Read more about how these ships were built, from the design in the mind of a shipwright to the final product: a vessel armed to the teeth, made from hundreds of felled oak trees.