The Fighting Temeraire, tugged to her last berth to be broken up
The Fighting Temeraire
J. M. W. Turner · 1839
01
London. 1839. The Royal Academy.
An old warship goes up the Thames.
To be broken up.
02
She is the Temeraire.
Trafalgar, 1805. She defended Nelson's flagship.
By 1838 the Navy has sold her.
03
A small black tug drags her.
Steam, pulling sail.
04
Look up. Three tall masts.
Sails furled. Still half rigged.
The Navy had stripped her masts. Turner painted them back.
05
Turner probably never saw the tow.
He built it from reports.
Then he set the sun down behind it.
The whole river.
Uncropped.
“The flag which braved the battle and the breeze, / No longer owns her.”
His darling
Turner never sold it. He called it his darling.
He died in 1851. He left it to the nation.
2005: a BBC Radio 4 poll names it
Britain's greatest painting.
Since 2020 it has been on the £20 note.
J. M. W. Turner
British · Romanticism · 1775 to 1851
Sources · 5