Horatia Nelson

Horatia Nelson, christened as Horatia Nelson Thompson (29 January 1801 – 6 March 1881), was the illegitimate daughter of Emma, Lady Hamilton, and Horatio Nelson, 1st Viscount Nelson. Life Early years Born in a house rented by Sir William Hamilton (Emma's husband) at 23 Piccadilly in London, as Nelson was at anchor in Torbay preparing to sail to the Battle of Copenhagen (news reached him before he set sail), she was given to a wet nurse called Mrs. Gibson, who was informed that the child, about a week old, was born six weeks earlier, at a time when Emma was in Vienna. Once Emma's husband had died on 6 April 1803, and 5 days before Nelson had to board on 18 May that year, Horatia was christened, aged two, at St Marylebone Parish Church as Horatia Nelson Thompson, with Emma and Horatio as the 'godparents' and a cover-story naming her as the daughter of Vice-Admiral Charles Thompson of Portsmouth Dockyard (with his agreement). Her date of birth on the baptismal record was given as 29 October 1801 according to the record transcripts, but Kate Williams cites the year as 1800 (referring to a letter from Mrs Gibson to Emma), to further the pretence that the child had been born an orphan in Naples. A letter from Nelson to Lady Hamilton dated July 1801 was discovered in 2021 at the National Maritime Museum. In it, Nelson recommends that the baby, then 6 months old, be vaccinated with Edward Jenner's new vaccine against smallpox. Later on, her natural parents adopted her as an orphan.