Things just got worse and worse for the Austrians after the Battle of Marengo, until they were defeated again by the French, and much closer to home, at Hohenlinden in Bavaria. They made peace with France, as did Russia, leaving Britain as the only major power still in the Second Coalition, which was now all but dead. Britain did win a couple more victories, notably in Malta and then, with the Turks, over the isolated remnants of the French Army of Egypt. Most spectacularly, it won the great naval Battle of Copenhagen, where Nelson won undying fame for his laconic comment “I see no signal”, though the truth was slightly less creditable to him, and a lot more creditable to his commander than the legend allows.

News of that victory would have been balm to William Pitt the Younger’s soul. But, oddly, he was no longer Prime Minister to receive it. After seventeen years, he’d gone two weeks earlier.

Illustration: The British fleet off Kronborg Castle, Elsinore, 28 March 1801 [before the Battle of Copenhagen], by Nicholas Pocock, 1810. © National Maritime Museum, Greenwich, London.

Music: Bach Partita #2c by J Bu licensed under an Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives (aka Music Sharing) 3.0 International License