Talk:HMS Royal Sovereign (1786)

Trafalgar

First of all, lets not get involved in any accusations of nationalistic bias. Making those sorts of attacks really doesn't help anyone, and will needlessly escalate the situation. Looking at the facts:

• Royal Sovereign is badly damaged in her duel with Santa Ana, losing two masts, and sustaining damage to her third. Adkin calls her 'almost unmanageable' at this point. Despite this she is 'not out of the fight', Collingwood has Euryalus tow her round to support the centre against Pelley's van, and Royal Sovereign exchanges fire with them until the arrival of more British ships drives them away. Being unmaneuverable did not put a ship out of the fight. Belleisle was completely dismasted at 2.30 pm, but fought on alone for 35 minutes until more British ships were able to come to her aid.
• Collingwood does not shift his flag until the end of the battle, after the fighting is finished, just before 6 pm. He has Blackwood send the order to take the prizes and disabled ships in tow, as Royal Sovereign's lack of masts makes signalling his orders, vital for the commander in chief, impossible. He then transfers to Euryalus himself to be able to communicate with his fleet. Clayton & Craig attribute this decision directly to the need to make signals, rather than the loss of manoeuvrability on Royal Sovereign's part. Roy Adkins in Trafalgar: Biography of a Battle writes: 'By a quarter past six in the evening, Collingwood had transferred to the frigate Euryalus, because the Royal Sovereign no longer had any masts from which signal flags could be flown...' Benea (talk) 14:35, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

Common sense please. A three decker of 100 guns with more than 2100 tonnes of weight almost fully dismasted -only with half of her foremast standing (and tottering)- with a huge percent of her crew disabled -including officials- and with its sails blinding her batteries after a duel of 6 hours is completely unmaneobravle. I called the Euryalus to me, while the action continued, which ship lying within hail, made my signals. In my opinion "Out of combat" doesn't really mean that a ship had to have all of his crew killed and wounded. But when did Collingwood transfer of ship? when he received the news that nelson had been hurt, when he called the euryalus for the first time or when he transfered to the Euryalus at the end of the action?

I've been reading this [[1]] and all the information u have written up there seem to be really ok. (Anyway sources can vary depending on the point of view) Pietje96 (talk) 16:27, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

I'm delighted you think its ok. Undoubtedly Royal Sovereign had been heavily damaged. As noted, Adkin described her as 'almost unmanageable', Goodwin says that she was in 'terrible condition'. But despite your opinion, the facts show that she was by no means out of combat, and Collingwood had her brought round to continue in the battle by helping to beat off Dumanoir's thrust. Collingwood did not transfer out of Royal Sovereign until just before 6pm. Until then he had been continuously on Royal Sovereign, which remained his flagship up until he struck his flag to go over to Euryalus and oversee the gathering up of the prizes. Prior to then he had Blackwood make signals on his behalf.

As to your latest edit, Santa Ana did not battle with Mars and Tonnant in close action as well, though she perhaps received long range fire from these ships as they came through the line. Mars tried to come through the line astern of Fougueux and ahead of Monarca, but was caught by Pluton surging forward. Mars battled her for some time, before Tonnant came through to her aid. Fougueux then came up to replace Pluton and the two ships duelled for the rest of the battle. Tonnant broke the line even further astern, between Monarca and Algésiras, and fired broadsides into them. Monarca soon struck, and Tonnant went on to rake Pluton, but was then engaged by Algésiras coming up astern. Algésiras and Tonnant fought a bitter battle, until Algésiras finally struck. Tonnant then engaged the already battered San Juan Nepomuceno, forcing her to surrender as well. Benea (talk) 17:47, 3 April 2010 (UTC)

This sentence near the bottom of the article on the aftermath of the Battle of Trafalgar: "Royal Sovereign had lost one lieutenant, her master, one lieutenant of marines, two midshipman, 29 seamen, and 13 marines killed, and two lieutenants, one lieutenant of marines, one master's mate, four midshipman, her boatswain, 69 seamen, and 16 marines wounded." This sentence doesn't make sense and seems to contradict itself. Achimmer (talk) 13:25, 16 June 2016 (UTC)

Having just stumbled across this, the sentence on casualties makes perfect sense to me. What seems to be the problem with it? Gog the Mild (talk) 19:27, 8 August 2021 (UTC)

Santa Ana striking her colours

"Santa Ana struck at 14:15 ... At 2.20 pm Santa Ana finally struck". Probably only one of these is correct. If the sources are contradictory this needs stating in a single sentence, not both being given as facts. Plus an article should be consistent in how it gives times. Gog the Mild (talk) 19:21, 8 August 2021 (UTC)

The Clayton source says "at two twenty she surrendered". Despite citing the "14:15" sentence, the Adkin source doesn't actually note a time on the page given, p. 323. On p. 424 he does however say that "...was forced to strike her colours at around 2:30 p.m." As the Adkin source only provides an approximation (which is close to Clayton's time as well) I'd lean towards 2.20 p.m. as the correct time, but don't have any other sources to corroborate this. Pickersgill-Cunliffe (talk) 19:35, 8 August 2021 (UTC)

Thank you for the prompt response. I have boldly tweaked the wording. Feel free to retweak. Gog the Mild (talk) 19:39, 8 August 2021 (UTC)

No problem. Am likely going to end up expanding this article with more service details at some point, will look to figure it out in more detail then. Pickersgill-Cunliffe (talk) 19:57, 8 August 2021 (UTC)