As the Duke departs, we must not lose his Nelsonian touch
The Duke of Edinburgh (2010)
When the late Duke of Edinburgh is laid to rest after tomorrow’s funeral at St George’s Chapel, Windsor, the nation will bid a final farewell not only to the Queen’s much-loved consort and a great man in his own right, but to a remarkable chapter in our history. For Prince Philip was one of the last surviving naval officers to have served in the Second World War. This fact will be commemorated at his obsequies in various ways, perhaps most movingly when mourners hear the bugler play “Action Stations” — a call to arms that he would have heard many times at sea some eighty years ago.
As I wrote here immediately after his death was announced, as a young lieutenant he saw action in some of the most important battles of the Mediterranean campaign, including Crete, Cape Matapan and the invasion of Sicily. His commander in all these actions was Admiral Sir Andrew Cunningham, later Viscount Cunningham (1883-1963). Though Philip may not have met the Commander-in-Chief of the Mediterranean Fleet during the war, he would certainly have done so later, when he married the future Queen and the admiral served as First Sea Lord. Philip was thus a handshake away from the greatest sea battle of the 20th century, the Battle of Jutland in 1916, at which Cunningham commanded a destroyer.
That connection even takes us back to the 19th century, for Cunningham had joined the navy in 1897. The last British survivor of the Battle of Trafalgar had only died in 1890 and the generation of officers who commanded at Jutland, Admirals Jellicoe and Beatty, had served since the 1870s. At that time, a few veterans of Nelson’s navy were still alive: Admiral Westphal, who saw Nelson die on the Victory, died in 1875. So Prince Philip, thanks to his long years of service, was only a few handshakes away from those who fought in the greatest naval battle of the 19th century.
Through the Royal Family, Philip was even closer to Nelson himself. Queen Victoria was only two handshakes away, via his father-in-law. King George VI had been born in 1895 and named Albert after the Prince Consort; George, his father’s and later his own regnal name, was only one of his middle names. “Bertie” was five when the Queen-Empress died. Some 63 years before, in 1837, Victoria had succeeded William IV, who was thus three handshakes away from Philip. King William, known as the “Sailor King”, had a long, if somewhat undistinguished, naval career: during the Napoleonic wars he was kept away from action by the Admiralty, but shortly before he succeeded his brother George IV he had the satisfaction of becoming the last man to hold the office of Lord High Admiral.
William IV was a contemporary and dear friend of Nelson; he gave away the future admiral’s bride Frances (“Fanny”) when she married Horatio in 1787. So Philip was only four handshakes away from the man once universally known across the British Empire and beyond simply as “The Hero”.
There is something deeply satisfying about the late Duke’s close connection with perhaps the most celebrated figure in naval history. It signifies the continuity that is rightly valued in the British Armed Services, but the link with Nelson means more than that. For more than seventy years, Prince Philip has symbolised an ethos and tradition of national service, of self-sacrifice and unsung heroism, that has been eclipsed in recent decades. We urgently need to rediscover that ethos and revive that tradition in our own public life.
There is also something uniquely valuable about the Nelsonian spirit. Nelson’s own conduct was not always above reproach: in his own day he scandalised many by his liaison with Emma Hamilton. More recently he has attracted obloquy for a letter in which he defended the slave trade — as did many of his fellow naval officers, including the future William IV in the House of Lords. (Yet Nelson Mandela was not ashamed to be named after him.)
For all his very human faults, however, Nelson will always be revered for his decency towards his men, for his dashing courage — which cost him an eye, an arm and ultimately his life — and for his genius as a commander. This was the man who, at Trafalgar, paid the ultimate price to save his country from Napoleon. As Pitt said at the time, “England has saved herself by her exertions and will, as I trust, save Europe by her example.”
Prince Philip was the latest Nelsonian figure in our history — the latest, but by no means the last. Among the countless thousands who have shaken hands with the late Duke, and the hundreds of millions of people throughout the Commonwealth and the world who admire him, that Nelsonian spirit will live on.
Nelson’s last, immortal signal before battle commenced at Trafalgar — “England expects that every man will do his duty” — sums up the code of honour by which Philip, too, lived. In paying our last respects to him, let us be sure not to consign that ethos of patriotic duty with him to the grave. As the Duke departs, we must not lose his Nelsonian touch. On the contrary: we must constantly reinvent it for our own time. The words used by another Horatio at the death of his friend Hamlet are apposite in Philip’s case, too: “Now cracks a noble heart. Good night, sweet prince, /And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest.”
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