Polychrome painted bust-length figurehead of HMS 'Horatio'. It represents Admiral Lord Nelson (1758-1805), in uniform, wearing a laurel wreath. Nelson lost effective sight in his right eye in 1794, though not the eye itself, at the siege of Calvi, Corsica. With rather naive charm, the figurehead represents this by showing the right eye shut. The ship, a 38-gun frigate (a fifth-rate), was strictly speaking the first Royal Naval one to commemorate him but the only one ever called 'Horatio' (apart from a couple of 20th-century armed trawlers). It was built on contract by Parson's at Bursledon, Hampshire, in 1807 and saw active service thereafter, including - unusually - on the north-western coast of Norway in about 1810 against the Danes. With the 'Eurotas' it was converted to an auxiliary steam (screw) vessel in 1850 until sold in 1865 and broken up by Castle's at Charlton, on the Thames below Greenwich. The 'Nelson' - a 120-gun first-rate built at Woolwich in 1814 - began the longer tradition of major ships of that name commemorating the admiral.
Credit: National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London