Thread: Horatio's blade

Originally Posted by Doc4

Pitty he never got to try Trafalgar cream.

Not only did he shave with a straight at sea ... he did it with only one arm and one eye!!

That is an excellent point! A blunt blade, only parallax vision to judge relative distance twixt blade and face, and no ability to stretch skin!!

Of course, it's possible he had the cabin boy stretch for him. (Now there's a wide open invitation for a Lou-joke if I ever read one! )

Originally Posted by majurey

That is an excellent point! A blunt blade, only parallax vision to judge relative distance twixt blade and face, and no ability to stretch skin!!

By the time Nelson lost his arm, he was already Rear Admiral of the Blue, not to mention a knight in the Order of Bath. I'd think that by then he'd have some kind of attendant, secretary or other such flunky to shave him.

As far as I can tell, ships back then had a ship barber. Surgeons sometimes doubled as barbers, and possibly other sailors or midshipmen were barbers alongside their main job on the boat.

Originally Posted by majurey

That is an excellent point! A blunt blade, only parallax vision to judge relative distance twixt blade and face, and no ability to stretch skin!!

Of course, it's possible he had the cabin boy stretch for him. (Now there's a wide open invitation for a Lou-joke if I ever read one! )

"Kiss me, Hardy!"

At the time, ships like Nelson's 'Victory' were the supercarriers of their day: not only the most powerful thing afloat, but the largest and most organised working machinery ... collection of gear and men in one unit for one purpose ... in the world.

Going by memory, the Vicotry had 104 guns (a 'first rate' ship in the 9-layered rating system of the British Navy ... the top 3 rates being 'ships of the line' that fought in pitched battles ... where the ships line up [hence the name] and fire broadsides at each other until one side is pounded into oblivion. Third-rate ships went as low as 64 guns, but most commonly were 74 gunners. The Victory would have had over a thousand men on board.) That was pretty much the tops for ships then, although there was a spanish ship that had I think 138 guns.