22 October 2025
HMS Victory is the oldest commissioned warship in the world and is the Flagship of the Head of the Naval Service, First Sea Lord, General Sir Gwyn Jenkins.
Trafalgar Day is the most important day in Victory’s calendar and Tuesday 21st October saw a ceremony held onboard Victory, marking the 220th anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar, a battle which changed the course of our history as a nation, and which sealed British dominion of the seas for a hundred years.
The day started with the daily naval ceremony of ‘Colours’, as the White Ensign of the Royal Navy and the Union Jack are hauled up, followed shortly afterwards by the flag sequence indicating Nelson’s famous message to the Fleet that “England expects that every man will do his duty”.
Nelson’s tactical genius in splitting the line of enemy ships had already set the pre-conditions for victory, when only an hour into the Battle, Nelson was hit by a French sharpshooters’ musket ball as he paced Victory’s quarterdeck, directing the battle. He fell, fatally wounded, on a spot marked by a lovingly polished brass plaque, which now forms the centrepiece of the Trafalgar Day Ceremony and is the where the Royal Navy’s Second Sea Lord Vice Admiral Paul Beattie will lay a wreath of Remembrance in the ceremony led by the Chaplain of the Fleet, the Reverand Doctor Mark Davidson KHC.