Horatio, Viscount Nelson | Autograph letter signed, to Emma Hamilton, 13 February 1800

Property from the Jean Hart Kislak Collection

Vice Admiral Horatio, Viscount Nelson

Autograph letter signed ("Bronte Nelson"), to Emma Hamilton

warning that he will include no "news or opinions, as this letter goes by post and may be opened" but expressing his deep love for her and her husband, complaining that his newspapers are being stolen in Gibraltar and passing on the British government's intransigent attitude to France ("...I see in Lord Grenville's note to Paris he concludes with saying that the best mode he can recommend for France to have a Solid Peace is to replace its ancient Princes on the Throne..."), 2 pages, 4to, [HMS Foudroyant, en route to Malta], 13 February 1800, lacking integral address leaf or blank, small tear at lower left corner affecting c.1 letter, edge-mounted onto a modern leaf

"...To say how I miss your house and company would be saying little; but in truth you and Sir William has [sic] so spoil'd me that I am not happy anywhere else but with you, nor have I an idea that I ever can be..."

Nelson wrote this ill-humoured letter, acknowledging his emotional dependence on Lady Hamilton, whilst returning to the blockade of the French garrison at Malta in the company of Lord Keith, the newly appointed Commander in Chief of the Meditteranean station, following a week with Keith at the court in Palermo. Nelson, who had previously been acting Commander in Chief, was disgruntled at Keith's appointment; Keith had been appalled by the "Scene of fulsome Vanity and Absurdity" in Palermo; and the British were finding it much harder than expected to dislodge the French from Malta. Within a few weeks Nelson and the Hamiltons were on their way back to Britain.

LITERATURE

Nelson's Letters to Lady Hamilton and Related Documents, ed. M. Czisnik (2020), no. 44

PROVENANCE

Thomas Joseph Pettigrew ("Mummy Pettigrew"), 1791-1865; Sotheby's, July 1887 [FULL DETAILS]; Alfred Morrison; Sotheby's, New York, 2 December 1987, lot 40