Trafalgar was a victory that would change the course of the Napoleonic wars and lead to the British Navy ruling the waves for more than a century. In Christopher Lee's book he looks not only at this final and decisive battle but also at the three battles that preceded it. Through these battles he paints a picture of the personalities and the intrigues that were operating, and particularly of the creation of a national hero in Horatio Nelson and his intense rivalry with Napoleon, who is reputed to have kept a bust of Nelson on his desk. The battle itself was nearly two years in the making, with Nelson scouring the Atlantic for the French fleet. In Lee's book the reader is taken on that journey with Nelson and his men. This is the story of life ashore and at sea, in silken boudoirs and blood-slimed gun decks. It is the biggest story in Britain's maritime history.