page_title: History of the United Kingdom
section_title: Napoleonic wars
hierarchical_section_title: History of the United Kingdom / 1800 to 1837 / Napoleonic wars
caption_attribution_description: English: (unknown title) Auguste Mayer (1805-1890). Oil on canvas, 1836, 105 cm x 162 cm The actual title of the image is unknown, painted in 1836 by Auguste Mayer, it is suggested that the information about the painting was lost during WWII and it was given incorrect background and title when recovered. The picture is one of six that Mayer painted in 1836 about the struggle and fights of ship of the line Bucentaure during the Battle of Trafalgar (cf. Musée Nationale de la Marine website). The ship in the foreground on right (firing to the Bucentaure) is the British 2nd-rate Sandwich, not present at Trafalgar, actually being hulked for harbour duty at the time. It is therefore generally held that the Sandwich is actually the British 2nd-rate Temeraire, incorrectly titled by the artist, and the dismasted ship in foreground left is the French 74-gun 3rd-rate Redoutable. Research shows that the French ship in the foreground is actually Bucentaure, as the figurehead is that of Bucentaure, the ship is a two-decker fitting the description and design of Bucentaure and the men clustered around the mainmast fit with the events aboard the Bucentaure during the battle. Français&#160;: (titre inconnu) Auguste Mayer (1805-1890). Huile sur toile, 1836, 105 cm x 162 cm Le titre réel du tableau n'est pas connu. Peint en 1836 par Auguste Mayer, il est probable que l'information sur le tableau ait été perdue durant la Seconde Guerre mondiale, et que lorsque le tableau est réapparu, on lui ait attribué un contexte et un titre erronés. Ce tableau fait partie d'un ensemble de six. Les six tableaux représentaient les combats que livra le Bucentaure tout au long de la Bataille de Trafalgar (cf. le site internet du Musée Nationale de la Marine). Le navire figurant au premier plan et qui ouvre le feu sur le Bucentaure est un navire de deuxième classe, le Sandwich, qui n'était pas présent à Trafalgar, étant au port à ce moment-là. Il est généralement admis que le Sandwich est en fait le Temeraire, mal nommé par l'artiste, et que le navire démâté dans le fond à gauche est le Redoutable, un navire de troisième classe français armé de 74 canons. Les recherches montrent que le navire à l'avant-plan est en fait le Bucentaure, au vu de sa figure de proue, de sa ressemblance avec la description et la conception à double pont du Bucentaure, et de la présence des hommes attroupés autour du mât principal qui correspond avec la description des événements à bord du Bucentaure lors de la bataille.
context_page_description: The core of the United Kingdom as a unified state came into being in 1707 with the political union of the kingdoms of England and Scotland, into a new unitary state called Great Britain. Of this new state of Great Britain the historian Simon Schama said:
  What began as a hostile merger would end in a full partnership in the most powerful going concern in the world... it was one of the most astonishing transformations in European history.
  — Simon Schama,
  The Act of Union 1800 added the Kingdom of Ireland to create the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
  The first decades were marked by Jacobite risings which ended with defeat for the Stuart cause at the Battle of Culloden in 1746. In 1763, victory in the Seven Years' War led to the growth of the First British Empire. With defeat by the United States, France and Spain in the War of American Independence, Britain lost its 13 American colonies and rebuilt a Second British Empire based in Asia and Africa. As a result British culture, and its technological, political, constitutional, and linguistic influence, became worldwide.
context_section_description: During the War of the Second Coalition (1799–1801), Britain occupied most of the French and Dutch colonies (the Netherlands had been a satellite of France since 1796), but tropical diseases claimed the lives of over 40,000 troops. When the Treaty of Amiens created a pause, Britain was forced to return most of the colonies. In May 1803, war was declared again. Napoleon's plans to invade Britain failed due to the inferiority of his navy, and in 1805, Lord Nelson's fleet decisively defeated the French and Spanish at Trafalgar, which was the last significant naval action of the Napoleonic Wars.
  In 1806, Napoleon issued the series of Berlin Decrees, which brought into effect the Continental System. This policy aimed to weaken the British export economy closing French-controlled territory to its trade. Napoleon hoped that isolating Britain from the Continent would end its economic dominance. It never succeeded in its objective. Britain possessed the greatest industrial capacity in Europe, and its mastery of the seas allowed it to build up considerable economic strength through trade to its possessions from its rapidly expanding new Empire. Britain's naval supremacy meant that France could never enjoy the peace necessary to consolidate its control over Europe, and it could threaten neither the home islands nor the main British colonies.
  The Spanish uprising in 1808 at last permitted Britain to gain a foothold on the Continent. The Duke of Wellington and his army of British and Portuguese gradually pushed the French out of Spain and in early 1814, as Napoleon was being driven back in the east by the Prussians, Austrians, and Russians, Wellington invaded southern France. After Napoleon's surrender and exile to the island of Elba, peace appeared to have returned, but when he escaped back into France in 1815, the British and their allies had to fight him again. The armies of Wellington and Von Blucher defeated Napoleon once and for all at Waterloo.
caption: The British HMS Sandwich fires to the French flagship French ship Bucentaure (completely dismasted) into battle off Trafalgar. The Bucentaure also fights HMS Victory (behind her) and HMS Temeraire (left side of the picture). In fact, HMS Sandwich never fought at Trafalgar, it's a mistake from Auguste Mayer, the painter.[36]
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