Wateringbury boy at Trafalgar(1805)

Service details

Comments: From Marine Society, London.

HMS Britannia

Ship's pay book number: (B3C, no 10)

7 May 1803 to 18 June 1806 (Was at Trafalgar)

Rank/rating: Boy

HMS Royal George

Ship's pay book number: (B2C, no 10)

19 June 1806 to 12 May 1809

Rank/rating: Boy

Comments: Discharged 12 May 1809 HMS Royal George paid off.

A William Latter, born in Wateringbury, is recorded as a farm labourer in the 1851 census living at Fuller's Corner in Wateringbury with his wife, Ann, and 7 children aged 7 to 17. However, his age is shown as 50, rather than the 60 one would expect, which would imply he was aged 4 at the Battle of Trafalgar! clearly too young even then; it may be of course that he did not know his real age and that the age quoted in the census was just his best guess; or it could be that he was 60 and there was a transcription error. Latter is a common Kent name and perhaps this is not the same William Latter and the one at Trafalgar did not return to Wateringbury.

Steven McDougall comments: The William Latter at Trafalgar was a grandson of Thomas Perrin (1730-1803) by his daughter Rebecca Perrin who married Thomas Latter. William Latter was born in 1791 and was left money in his grandfather's, Thomas Perrin's will. He and his sister were apparently living with their grandfather and when Thomas Perrin died in 1803, William Latter signed up to join the Marine Society in London. After being trained there, he joined the navy at Chatham. When he left the navy he returned to Wateringbury and worked as an agricultural laborer all his life. He died before the census in 1830 after years prolonged illness and unemployment.

HMS Britannia was launched in 1762 as a 100-gun first rate ship of the line. At the Battle of Trafalgar, she carried the flag of Rear-Admiral of the White William Carnegie, Earl of Northesk, who attracted some criticism for his conduct at the battle: Collingwood's captain, Edward Rotham, noted that he 'behaved notoriously ill in the Trafalgar action'; the family of Charles Bullen told his biographer that there had been an argument between Bullen and Northesk during the approach to the French line when the admiral had ordered the captain to reduce sail. She lost 10 men killed and 42 wounded at Trafalgar; she took on board men from the captured French ship 'Aigle' and put on board 'Aigle' some 50 English crew - during the storm that followed the battlethe 'Aigle' incredibly survived being wrecked on the Spanish coast but returned to the control of its French crew. 'Britannia' was laid up in ordinary in the Hamoaze at Plymouth in 1806 and eventually broken up in 1825.

Nelson's boss was Sir Charles Middleton, Lord Barham of Barham Court, Teston, who was also the promoter/owner of the linseed crushing plant at Tutsham, built soon after Trafalgar, and I quote a paragraph from our recent booklet, Tutsham Oil Mill:

In 1805 he [Sir Charles Middleton] was chosen by William Pitt to be First Lord of the Admiralty. His explicit price for taking the job of First Sea Lord at the age of 79 was a peerage, and he was duly made Lord Barham. His predecessor as First Sea Lord, Melville, had been censured for financial misconduct in Parliament in which a speech by William Wilberforce played an important part. Although only in this position until February 1806 he was an energetic leader at this time of crisis and no mere aged figurehead. He agreed with Pitt an extension of Nelson's command, summoned Nelson to receive his orders and, two days after that meeting, Nelson left to glory at Trafalgar.

Matthias Prime Lucas (from the 1820s until his death in 1848 of Wateringbury Place) was instrumental as commander of the River Fencibles in providing men for the navy during the Napoleonic Wars and, after Nelson's death at Trafalgar, organising Nelson's funeral procession on the River Thames. For more details go to https://sites.google.com/site/wateringburylocalhistory/topics/people/mathiaslucasanobituary.

People from the surrounding area who served at Trafalgar include:

William Fry aged 27 born in West Peckham, Kent, England.

Ship: HMS Defence

Rank/Rating: Ordinary Seaman

William Sheppard aged 21 born in East Malling, Kent, England.

Ship: HMS Victory

Rank/Rating: Landsman

From Maidstone some 13 served at Trafalgar including two of similar age to William Latter: James Rawlinson, aged 14 on HMS Victory; and James Sawer, aged 16, on HMS Revenge.

Walter Burke, the purser of the Victory came from Wouldham. Retiring from the navy shortly after Trafalgar, he returned to Wouldham and bought what may well have been one of the largest houses in the village. The house still stands is now believed to be divided into two.

Walter is buried in Wouldham churchyard, with a barrel (mummy-like) tombstone. Each Trafalgar Day the children from the primary school place posies of flowers on the grave; the whole grave being covered with a floral mound. The children and their teachers and guests, including the Mayor, have a service in the church, at which the children play a major role. (Source : Susan Levett).

A study by the National Archives (quoted in The Sunday Telegraph of 13 October 2013) shows of around 13,000 (out of 18,000 total) sailors in the British fleet at Trafalgar for whom a place of birth is known 1,260 were born outside Britain (including sailors born in Brazil and China). The sailors were not just from coastal areas with 124 from Warwickshire and 62 from Staffordshire, both landlocked counties. A quarter were described as Landsmen (as was William Shepherd from West Malling) meaning they had less than a year's sea experience.