The Battle of Trafalgar (21 October 1805) was a naval engagement fought by the British Royal Navy against the combined fleets of theFrench and Spanish Navies, during the War of the Third Coalition (August–December 1805) of the Napoleonic Wars (1796–1815).
Vice Admiral Horatio Lord Nelson, byLemuel Francis Abbott
Vice Admiral Cuthbert Collingwood
Pierre-Charles Villeneuve, the French Admiral
Federico Gravina, the Spanish Admiral
Twenty-seven British ships of the line led by Admiral Lord Nelson aboard HMS Victorydefeated thirty-three French and Spanish ships of the line under the French Admiral Villeneuve in the Atlantic Ocean off the southwest coast of Spain, just west of Cape Trafalgar, near the town of Los Caños de Meca. The Franco-Spanish fleet lost twenty-two ships, without a single British vessel being lost. It was the most decisive naval battle of the war.