By the summer of 1798, Britain and France were locked in an epic struggle which would persist for two decades and would eventually decide the fate of Europe. Ignited by the revolutionary upheavals that rocked France during the 1790s, the conflict had been joined by the Continent’s major powers, including Austria, Prussia and the Netherlands.
Despite having a huge military advantage, the Allies were divided and had differing objectives. By 1797, only Britain remained at war with the French Republic.
During this period, the Royal Navy, under Rear Admiral Horatio Nelson, crushed General Napoleon Bonaparte’s ambition to undermine the British Empire in a bloody naval action in Aboukir Bay, Egypt. When news reached Malta, it led to a turbulent period of unrest.
The victory at the Battle of the Nile, together with his passionate yet scandalous extra-marital affair with Lady Emma Hamilton in Naples, made Nelson a very popular figure. This combination of events, mixed with local, foreign and love affairs, caused Britannia’s ‘God of War’ to postpone his intended trip to Malta. The bed shared by Lady Hamilton and Lord Nelson in Naples provides an excellent highlight of the turbulent two-year period, during which Malta changed hands three times, from the Order of St John, to the French, to the British.
