Nelson's Clockwork Diamond
National Maritime Museum, London
The other day I revisited the National Maritime Museum to see, among other things, Admiral Lord Nelson's Trafalgar coat. I last saw it in 2010 and - unsurprisingly - they have changed the display quite significantly since then, so it was nice to get another look at it. The coat is now displayed with a large Union Jack behind it and info-panels describing Nelson’s decorations. These are as follows: the Order of the Bath, the Order of the Crescent (given by the Sultan of Turkey), the German Order of St Joachim and the Order of St Ferdinand and of Merit (given by Ferdinand IV of Naples).
What you don't get from looking at a photograph is the scale of the garment. I never realised how small in statue Nelson was - of course, people in the 18th century were smaller, generally, than we are today, but even so, I wasn't quite prepared for this neat, petite piece of clothing. You could see the hole from the bullet that killed Nelson in his left shoulder (a passing American thought it looked a superficial blow, but it wasn’t when you consider that it came from above and went downwards through Nelson's body). In another display you can see Nelson's Trafalgar stockings, still stained with blood (probably that of his secretary, John Scott, who was killed earlier in the battle). Rarely have I seen such an evocative piece of clothing, and the museum also had some excellent mourning artefacts on display related to Nelson's death.
There’s also another piece of clothing on display which belonged to Nelson: his dress uniform, which was worn on formal occasions. You can see how the undress coat he was wearing at Trafalgar differs from the one above, with its stiff collar. He is wearing a similarly formal coat in the famous portrait by Lemuel Francis Abbott (below), which can also be seen at the National Maritime Museum. Again, he has his decorations pinned to the coat and also some family portraits at his neck - he lost his right arm in 1797, hence the sleeve pinned to his breast. But take a look at his hat and the diamond jewel on the front of it.
This is a a military decoration of the Ottomon Empire known as a chelengk (or çelenk). It was awarded to Nelson by Sultan Selim III of Turkey in honour of the Battle of the Nile in 1798 and was intended to be pinned to a turban. It has thirteen diamond rays to represent the French ships captured or destroyed at the action. Nelson was the first non-Muslim to receive one and he wore it - by special permission - on his Naval bicorne hat (apparently the central jewel had a clockwork mechanism and Nelson could make it spin around, which must have looked hilarious!)
Nelson’s chelengk used to be on display in the Painted Hall at Greenwich, where his body lay in state after his death at Trafalgar, but was moved to the National Maritime Museum on its opening in 1937, where it was a key attraction. However, you will look in vain for it today. That’s because it was stolen is 1958 by someone who used a folding ladder to break in through a window. It has never been recovered, but we do know what it looked like because the Vice-Admiral had it sketched so it could be added to his coat of arms (below). The College of Arms - having recently rediscovered the drawing in its archive - assisted with the making of a replica, which was unveiled in a special exhibition at the National Maritime Museum on October 21st 2017: ‘Trafalgar Day’.
If you want to know more about the chelengk, the historian Martyn Downer has written a book called ‘Nelson’s Lost Jewel’, and there’s a video about the replica, courtesy of the Phillip Mould Gallery in London. Another replica, which appeared in the film 'Bequest to the Nation', is catalogued online here.