ModelMonkey wrote:
Really interesting discussion regarding how a ship might be affected by the loss of shot, powder, masts, timber and rigging, while possibly gaining water weight over the course of a battle. Enjoying this thread immensely.
Well, in that case, here we have some more research
:
I found these ‘4 views of the Redoutable at Trafalgar’ on an art auction website:
The provenance was indicated as ‘Lucas, through family descend’ and it was dated 1806. They are credited to louis-Philippe Crépin (
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Louis-Philippe_Crépin).
I also found 3 illustrations in a very similar, yet slightly different style online.
And I also found 4 similar illustrations from a British newspaper.
These state that an original set of illustrations was made by an officer of the Redoutable for captain Lucas. They were passed on to his granddaughter. She allowed copies to be made for the Musée de la Marine at the Louvre. Of these copies, another set of copies was made for the newspaper.
So, there are 3 series:
A: the originals: I believe these to be the image above. I cut them out below to show them at higher resolution, marked with ‘A’. The attribution to Crépin doesn’t fit with ‘an officer of the Redoutable’, but one of both sources can easily be mistaken.
B: a set of copies in the Musée the la Marine. I have no way to be sure, but I believe these to be the files I marked with ‘B’ below. I found only 3, so one must be still out there.
C: a set of copies of those copies in the newspaper. These are quite obvious. I marked them with ‘C’ below.
I tried to order the illustrations of each set chronologically (from 1 to 4) and correlate the three sets:
1: Victory approaching the combined line, being fired on by the Bucentaure and Redoutable:
2: Victory and Redoutable early in the battle, before the arrival of Téméraire (approaching at the left):
3: The height of the battle for Redoutable: figting both Victory and Téméraire, while the Tonnant is raking her stern:
4: The redoutable after the battle, towed by the Swiftsure and about to founder:
Some observations and musings:
The copies of the Musée the la Marine and the newspaper are very similar in composition and content. But they differ quite significantly from the originals. That may not be surprising, as who knows under what conditions and with what intent the copies for the museum were made…
I have tried to correlate each set as good as I can, but because of these differences I cannot be 100% sure. It would help to find the missing illustration of the copies in the museum. Also, any input on my (uncertain!) attempt at correlation, or any info on these illustrations, is very welcome!
In any case, I think we can only use the original set as a sound historical source. But then again, we also have to treat that one as a historical source and take the ability and intent of the original maker into account.
And that brings us to the first illustration (Victory closing in on Bucentaure and Redoutable), as the original differs significantly from the copies.
On the original we don’t see any royals. Not even any topgallant sails, as her main topgallant mast and fore topmast are gone. This doesn’t show she had no royals set during the approach as all topgallant masts are gone in this illustration. But it does show that we cannot trust the copies who do show royals, but based on what?
The original does fit better with Lucas’ report than the copies, as the report states that the main topgallant mast was gone by the time Victory broke the line. Also, het fore topsail is shown shot down as described in the report.
British sources on Vic’s damage do not indicate that her fore topmast was destroyed, but the illustration could have made a free interpretation from Lucas’ report (which only talks about the fore topsail and its yard, not topmast, while it does mention the main topmast going down).
Anyway, my overall feel is that the original series does follow the report of Lucas’ pretty closely. That makes it into a very interesting visual source. We can hope that they don’t contain mayor mistakes, especially to the appearance of Redoutable as the ‘client’ (and maybe the maker?) would have known that ship intimately.
But then again, we can also expect some mistakes. The most obvious one seems to be the stern configuration of Victory with open galleries.
But during Trafalgar, Victory’s stern was never visible directly from Redoutable: Redoutable’s poop deck was alongside Victory’s quarter deck during their engagement. Only after Victory broke loose later during the battle, Redoutable’s crew, or what was left of it, had a chance to see her stern. But I can imagine that they had much more serious matters on their mind at that time…
So it may not be surprising that the illustrator ‘filled in the blanks’ with a rather ‘standard’ British first rate stern?
It is also striking to me how the general view of both ships looks a lot like in the painting "Le Redoutable à la bataille de Trafalgar" by louis-Philippe Crépin, dated 1807 (
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File ... g_9431.jpg ):
The wrong stern on Victory, the position of her fallen mizzen mast and ensign, mainsail not yet clewed (while it is on timeframe ‘2’ in the illustrations), stun’sail configuration, fore topmast down and sail hanging over the fighting top and lower yard, main topgallant gone, …
Redoutable is of course missing more of her masts and rigging as the moment portrayed here is later in the battle than in the first illustration, but her general position and appearance is very similar too.
If this is indeed Crépin using one of his illustrations to develop the composition of a painting later on, but from a different moment in the battle, this gives a most interesting glimpse in his artistic process!
It doesn’t necessarily prove that he is the author of the original illustrations (he could have been showed or even lend them by Lucas), but it does become a little more likely. The high quality of the illustrations also leads me to believe that they were not just made by an officer of the Redoutable, but by a trained artist.
Sorry for the long post, and without any plastic in it!
Anyway, I’m very interested in any ideas or observations anyone can make on these!
Cheers,
Marijn