Auction Catalogue
Create new listRailways, An important item of railwayana named to Sir William Beattie, the surgeon who attended the fatally injured Lord Nelson on board HMS Victory at the Battle of Trafalgar, 21 October 1805:
London & Greenwich Railway (Incorporated 1833), a silver Director’s Ticket by Rowe & Kentish, train steaming right on viaduct, trees and farmland in foreground, rev. named (Sir Wm. Beattie, M.D., F.R.S.), 39mm (Moyaux –; D & W 329/39; Swan 1). Very fine and toned, very rare and of particular historical significance (£800-1,000)
Sir William Beattie, MD, FRS (1773-1842), b. Londonderry, entered the Royal Navy in 1793 and saw much service in it in various parts of the world. He was the surgeon on board HMS Victory at the battle of Trafalgar and attended Lord Nelson immediately after he received his mortal wound; he published his Authentic Narrative of the Death of Lord Nelson… in 1807. On retirement from the Navy he entered general practice in Aberdeen before obtaining his MD from the University of St Andrews in October 1817, being made licentiate of the College of Physicians two months later and elected a fellow of the Royal Society in April 1818. In 1822 he was appointed physician to Greenwich Hospital, an office he retained until retirement in 1839. He was knighted by William IV in May 1831.
The musket ball that killed Nelson, together with a portion of gold lace and part of the epaulet from Nelson’s coat which were firmly attached to it, was retained by Thomas Hardy and presented to Beattie who kept it in a crystal case. By 1851 the ball was in the possession of the Prince Consort and it is now in the Royal Collection at Windsor
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