Discover the story of this Union Jack which survived Nelson’s victory in the Battle of Trafalgar. One of just three British flags that survived in Nelson's victory against the French and Spanish fleets, this Union Jack was flown by HMS Spartiate.
On 21 October 1805, the fate of Europe hung in the balance, as the British navy, under the command of Vice-Admiral Lord Horatio Nelson, clashed with combined French and Spanish forces in the Atlantic, off Cape Trafalgar, southwest Spain.
The British were vastly outnumbered: the enemy fleet had six more ships, carrying an extra 484 guns, and almost 30,000 men to fight a force of 18,000. But thanks to Nelson’s unorthodox tactics, he achieved one of the most spectacular and consequential naval victories in history. During the fight he lost his life, but set the scene for more than a century of British dominance of the seas.
In The Exceptional Sale on 1 July 2025, Christie’s will offer one of just three British flags known to have survived the Battle of Trafalgar. The flag was flown by HMS Spartiate, then presented to the ship’s lieutenant, and its surface is blistered by gunfire and embedded with splinters of wood and cannonball shrapnel.
Thomas, we are stood here before this incredible object
and the first thing I'm struck by is the sheer size.
You're enveloped in the colours of the instantly recognisable Union Jack
but it's not any old Union Jack.
Tell me a bit about this plane.
So this is the Union Jack that was flying from HMS Barsyut,
which is a ship in Nelson's fleet at the Battle of Trafalgar on the 21st of October, 1805.
Where would it have been positioned on the ship?
It would have been hanging from probably the Fort Topsail Yard.
Nelson was a very practical man.
He was very concerned about the importance of distinguishing friend from foe in the battle.
And so 11 days before the Battle of Trafalgar,
he issued an order that every ship had to have a Union Jack from the Fort Topsail Yard.
So it's a kind of classic inspiration of Nelson.
What tactics did Nelson deploy at Trafalgar?
It was a revolutionary approach.
Traditional fleet tactics had two fleets sailing in parallel, exchanging broadsides.
Nelson wanted a much more destructive, decisive battle.
And so he completely turned traditional tactics on their head.
The Franco-Spanish fleet was in line.
Nelson organised his fleet in two columns,
which approached the Franco-Spanish fleet at right angles.
The idea was to break it into three pieces and defeat the parts of the fleet individually.
This is the classic Nelson move.
He called it the Nelson Touch at the Battle of Trafalgar.
So Barsyut was one of the slowest sailors in the fleet
and naturally, in Nelson's tactics, that would have placed it at the back of Nelson's column.
So Barsyut would have been following this column of ships,
seeing the victory right in the distance.
The other thing you can pick up on immediately as well are these holes.
They look as though they are shrapnel holes or musket holes or even cannon holes.
The flag was analysed by the owners over the last 16 years
and small fragments of lead have been found,
small fragments of wood, which are consistent with battle damage.
This one does look very much like a cannonball footprint, as you might put it.
Barsyut was one of the slowest sailors in the British fleet
and so the French fleet had as much time as they wanted, essentially, to pepper the ship.
And so it makes complete sense that you would see
this kind of peppering of damage throughout the flag.
It would have been sailing towards the French fleet pretty much all day.
The first British ship engages around midday.
The Sparsyut probably only engaged about two, two and a half hours after,
which meant that it was putting up with this hail of cannon fire,
gosh, for an additional two hours and the courage involved in that was extraordinary.
Tell me a bit about the history of HMS Sparsyut then,
because I believe it would have been a ship well known to the French forces.
It was actually a French ship originally.
The Sparsyut was captured by the British at the Battle of the Nile,
which was the first kind of great signature victory of Nelson
and was then turned into a British ship.
Nelson received a significant injury to his forehead at the Battle of the Nile
and it was said that that was from a shot from the Sparsyut.
What was life like on board?
Well, it wouldn't have been a picnic.
I mean, everyone knows about the traditions of flogging, the harsh naval discipline,
but they were very well fed.
They'd be described as the healthiest Britons on the planet at the period.
They were consuming about 4,000 calories a day.
They were also very well supplied with booze.
The rum ration was half a pint of rum at 57% alcohol per man per day.
So they would have been quite cheerful.
I think that was considered part of making sure they felt looked after.
Then crucially, the difference in discipline and the difference in morale
is considered to be one of the key factors
in the inevitability of the British victory at Trafalgar.
We of course are all aware of Nelson's great victory,
but it came at huge personal cost.
Nelson was actually shot by a musketeer.
The bullet lodged in his spine.
He was carried below decks and after hours of agonizing suffering, he died.
The thing really that crystallizes the Battle of Trafalgar
in its extraordinary place in British history,
it's not only the supreme victory, but the supreme sacrifice of Nelson.
It's a really powerful and moving object,
so redolent of that chapter in British naval history.
It's the first time I've seen it this close and just the scale of it
and that extraordinary kind of charisma it has as a historical object.
It's just incredible to think it was there.
