England expects that every man will do his duty " England expects that every man will do his duty " was a signal sent by Admiral Horatio Nelson , 1st Viscount Nelson , from his flagship as the Battle of Trafalgar was about to commence on 21 October 1805 . Trafalgar was the decisive naval engagement of the Napoleonic Wars . It gave the United Kingdom control of the seas , removing all possibility of a French invasion and conquest of Britain . Although there was much confusion surrounding the wording of the signal in the aftermath of the battle , the significance of the victory and Nelson ' s death during the battle led to the phrase becoming embedded in the English psyche , and it has been regularly quoted , paraphrased and referenced up to the modern day . Signals during the battle . As the British fleet closed with the opposing combined fleets of France and Spain , Lord Nelson signalled all the necessary battle instructions to his ships . However , aware of the momentousness of events to come , Lord Nelson felt that something extra was required . He instructed his signal officer , Lieutenant John Pasco , to signal to the fleet , as quickly as possible , the message " England confides [ i . e . is confident ] that every man will do his duty . " Pasco suggested to Nelson that " expects " be substituted for " confides " , since the former word was in the signal book , whereas " confides " would have to be spelt out letter - by - letter . Nelson agreed to the change ( even though ' expects ' gave a less trusting impression than ' confides ' ) : Thus , at around 11 : 45 am on 21 October 1805 , the most famous naval signal in British history was sent . The exact time the signal was sent is not known ( one account puts it as early as 10 : 30 ) , as the message was repeated throughout the fleet and logs would have been written up after the battle , but Pasco puts it at " about a quarter to noon " and logs from other ships of the line also put it close to this time . The signal was relayed using the numeric flag code known as the " Telegraphic Signals of Marine Vocabulary " , devised in 1800 by Rear Admiral Sir Home Popham , and based on the signal books created earlier by Admiral Lord Howe . This code assigned the digits 0 to 9 to ten signal flags , which were used in combination . Code numbers 1 – 25 represented letters of the alphabet ( omitting J and with V = 20 before U = 21 ) ; higher numbers were assigned meanings by a code book . The code numbers are believed to have been hoisted on the mizzenmast , one after another , with the " telegraphic flag " also being flown to show that the signals employed Popham ' s code . As well as digit flags , the code used " repeat " flags so that only one set of digits was needed ; thus the word " do " , coded as " 220 " , used a " 2 " flag , a " first repeat " flag here serving as a second 2 , and a " 0 " flag . The word " duty " was not in the codebook ( and was not replaced as " confides " had been ) , so had to be spelt out , and the whole message required twelve " lifts " . It is believed that it would have taken about four minutes . A team of four to six men , led by Lt . Pasco , would have prepared and hoisted the flags onboard Lord Nelson ' s flagship . The message shows one of the shortcomings of Popham ' s code — even the two - letter " do " required three flags hoisted for the signal . It is reported that a great cheer went up as the signal was hoisted and repeated throughout the fleet . The message " engage the enemy more closely " was Nelson ' s final signal to the fleet , sent at 12 . 15 pm , before a single British cannon had been fired at the enemy . This message was signalled using the telegraphic flag and flags 1 and 6 . Nelson ordered this signal hauled up and kept aloft . It remained up until shot away during the battle . After the battle . Almost immediately , the signal began to be misquoted . A number of ships in the fleet recorded the signal as " England expects every man " to " do his duty " ( omitting " that " and replacing " will " with " to " ) . This version became so prevalent that it is recorded on his tomb in St . Paul ' s Cathedral . The word " that " is also omitted on the version around the base of Nelson ' s Column , as seen in the photo above . However , the " Victory " ' s log and the accounts of signal officer John Pasco and Henry Blackwood ( captain of the frigate " Euryalus " ) , both present at the preparation of the signal , agree on the form given here . In 1811 , the tenor John Braham composed a song , " The Death of Nelson " , including the words of the signal . The song became popular almost immediately and was performed throughout the British Empire during the 19th century . To make the words fit the metre , they were altered to " England expects that every man this day will do his duty " . This version of the wording is also persistent . Between 1885 and 1908 it was believed that the signal had been sent using the 1799 code book , as in 1885 it was pointed out that this had not been replaced until 1808 . In 1908 it was discovered , the Admiralty had , in fact , changed the signal code in November 1803 , after the 1799 version had been captured by the French , and new code books had been issued to Nelson ' s fleet at Cadiz in September , 1805 . As a result , books published between these two dates show the signal using the wrong flags . The signal is still hoisted on the " Victory " at her dry dock in Portsmouth on Trafalgar Day ( 21 October ) every year , although the signal flags are displayed all at once , running from fore to aft , rather than hoisted from the mizzenmast . Similar signals . Nelson ' s famous signal has been imitated in other navies of the world . Napoleon ordered the French translation , " " La France compte que chacun fera son devoir " " , to be displayed on French vessels . At the opening of the Battle of Plattsburgh in September 1814 , Commodore Thomas MacDonough of the U . S . Navy flew the signal " Impressed seamen call on every man to do his duty " , referring to the fact that impressment of U . S . mariners had been a popular cause of the War of 1812 . Before the Battle of Tsushima , Japanese Admiral Togo ( who had studied naval science in England from 1871 to 1878 ) signalled to his fleet : " " The fate of the Empire depends upon today ' s battle : let every man do his utmost " " . References in popular culture . Charles Dickens quotes it in Chapter 43 of " Martin Chuzzlewit " : In Lewis Carroll ' s " The Hunting of the Snark " , the Bellman says : In Ogden Nash ' s collection of poems " I ' m a Stranger Here Myself ( 1938 ) " there is a short poem " England Expects " In Flann O ' Brien ' s At Swim - Two - Birds ( 1939 ) during the battle of cowboys in downtown Dublin " In no time wasn ' t there a crowd around the battlefield and them cheering and calling and asking every man of us to do his duty " ( p . 58 ) It was also referenced by Margaret Thatcher during her crucial speech to the cabinet which finally persuaded them to rally behind her over the divisive issue of the poll tax . Further afield , it has been used by James Joyce in his novel , " Ulysses " , which contains numerous repetitions of Nelson ' s message , including several that are deliberately fragmented or misquoted ( even as " Ireland expects every man will do his duty " ) . In the United States , former Secretary of the Navy of the United States of America Gordon R . England wore a tie with the flags representing the famous quote when he visited naval vessels . The phrase is said by a character on a raft in " Jaws 2 " pretending that he is a British naval commander just before the shark attacks . In the 1980s sitcom " Blackadder the Third " , the show ' s antihero , Mr . E . Blackadder , mocks Nelson ' s famous signal . In the episode " Ink and Incapability " , he announces that Nelson used a similar signal at the Battle of the Nile : " England knows Lady Hamilton is a virgin . Poke my eye out and cut off my arm if I ' m wrong . " This is a reference to Nelson losing an eye in battle in 1794 and an arm in 1797 . Today " England expects . . . " is often adapted for use in the media , especially in relation to the expectations for the victory of English sporting teams . Such is the sentence ' s connotation with sport that a recent book on the history of the England national football team by James Corbett was entitled " England Expects " . A BBC Scotland television drama also bears its name .