Every Regency history buff
knows about Lord Horatio Nelson's love for Emma Hamilton, and many of us have
felt sympathy for poor Sir William Hamilton, the most openly cuckolded man in
England. But few have spared a thought for Nelson's pathetic wife, the former
Frances "Fanny" Nesbit.
Fanny Nesbit
Nelson met Fanny when he was
26 and in commanded of the Boreas while it spent time in the West
Indies. Just a few months older than Nelson, Fanny had been widowed three
years previously when her son, Josiah, was only two years old. Upon her
husband's death, she returned to the Indies to live with her uncle, a planter
who was the largest land owner on the island of Nevis.
Nelson was good with the lad,
and a romance with the mother blossomed. On the outside, the plain, slender
woman appeared the perfect wife for a man who had grown up in a country
parsonage with a curate father, like the senior Nelson, who sired five sons and
three daughters. Fanny certainly was the complete antithesis to Emma Hamilton,
a former courtesan.
Lord Nelson
The romance between Nelson
and Fanny began, on his part certainly, as somewhat of a love match. Prince
William of the Royal Navy would write, "Poor Nelson is head over ears in
love." When Nelson and Fanny had to be apart, he wrote affectionately to
her with phrases like this: "At first I bore absence tolerably, but now it
is almost insupportable." Not exactly bursting with the passion that would
later scorch the pages of his letters to Emma, but affectionate nevertheless.
They married on March 22,
1787, and set sail for England. Five peaceful years at his father's parsonage
(which Edmund Nelson turned over to the newlyweds) followed before he was
called back to active duty after the French Revolution. One wonders if the
marriage may have been different had Fanny been able to conceive her husband's
children.
Horatio and Fanny Nelson
would be apart a great deal over the next six years – and indeed the remainder
of their marriage – though all that he was and all that he felt (mostly about
his career) he would impart to his wife in letters – even after he lost his
right arm.
Emma Hamilton
Then in the summer of 1798
their lives would dramatically change when he demonstrated his superiority in
naval battle strategy and gained fame across Europe as the Hero of the Battle
of the Nile. Not only did he earn a peerage, but during his subsequent posting
in Naples (while Fanny was glorying in the accompanying fame back in England)
the beautiful wife of the elderly English ambassador at Naples threw herself at
Nelson's feet – or, more appropriately, in his bed.
Nelson and his "Beloved
Emma" would remain passionately in love until a musket ball killed him at
Trafalgar in October 1805.
While Lord Nelson never had
any compunction about later shunning his own wife at every turn, strangely, he
never wished to estrange Sir William; therefore, Nelson, Lady Hamilton, and her
husband would thereafter live together in a bizarre triangle – even while Emma
attempted to conceal her pregnancy with Nelson's child (whom he later adopted –
and adored).
Nelson did not return to
England until a year and half after the Battle of the Nile, and he would return
accompanied by the Hamiltons. He would tolerate Fanny's company only for a few
weeks before he formerly separated from her. For her part, Fanny had attempted
in every way to do all that was pleasing to her hero husband.
Though Nelson's last thoughts
and last concerns were about Emma, Fanny came out the winner. Of sorts. Emma
was denied the pension Nelson begged that she receive and died in poverty.
Fanny would forever be Lady Nelson and receive a generous pension from a
grateful nation. Sadly, both women died heartbroken.-- Cheryl Bolen, whose next Brides of Bath novel, Love in the Library, can be preordered now at all sites.
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