Nelson at Naples
Jonathan North
Hardcover: 304 pages
Publisher: Amberley Publishing (15 July 2018)
ISBN-13: 9781445679372

During the wars which followed in the wake of the French Revolution, France’s armies turned on Britain’s last ally in Italy, the kingdom of Naples. The French chased out King Ferdinand and Queen Maria Carolina and established a revolutionary republic, governed by scholars and philosophers. It lasted six months before an Army of the Holy Faith besieged them. There, in June 1799, the revolutionaries capitulated, after a promise of safe escape to France.

Shortly afterwards Horatio Nelson's fleet sailed into the bay. At first, the admiral permitted the republicans and their families to troop out of their forts and down to the harbour. But then he struck, violating the treaty of surrender by seizing the would-be exiles in their transports. Hundreds of Neapolitans, having trusted the treaty, found themselves delivered up to a merciless enemy.

In Italy the event became synonymous with betrayal, and Nelson's honour was even questioned in his native land. Nelson's early biographer, Southey, called the episode 'a deplorable transaction, a stain on the memory of Nelson and upon the honour of England'.

This book concludes that Nelson did indeed commit a war crime. Not only that, but Sir William and Lady Hamilton encouraged him.

Biography

I'm Jonathan North (see more about me at http://www.jpnorth.co.uk). I was drawn early on to the period which followed the French Revolution and to the era of Napoleon, roughly 1789 to 1815. It was a time of tremendous upheaval in which the world seemed to advance at great speed, sometimes in a measured and rational way (the Code Napoleon), sometimes lurching and stumbling (the anarchy and the long wars). The period is also one of enormous historical significance, with the countries of Europe shaped and reshaped, political systems destroyed and refashioned, and the world, effectively, turned upside down and shaken.

Great historical figures dominated, with Napoleon, Nelson, Metternich and Beethoven, and others whose lives and actions remain significant, shaping the age. But, if I am honest, for me the lives of ordinary people was always more compelling, the way in which grand events sweep people up or simply pass them by. The accounts by soldiers and sailors, and of civilians caught up in some of the drama, are particularly revealing. My work has mainly looked at those accounts, and sought to bring them to a wider audience.

I've been a student of the Napoleonic age for many years but started publishing 15 years ago. You can see some of my books on these pages, or visit my website (http://www.jpnorth.co.uk/publications/) for more detail and for an insight into what I'm working on now. Thanks for reading.