ABSTRACT
Horatio Nelson was indeed blinded in the right eye by sand thrown up by shot in the siege of Calvi in Corsica, July 1794, when he was thirty-five years old; however, the eye was never removed. The cause of blindness has been attributed variously to rupture of the choroid, retinal detachment, or optic atrophy. In April 1797, thirty-eight-year-old Nelson, then a Rear Admiral, planned to seize treasure ships that he believed the Viceroy of Mexico had in sanctuary at Santa Cruz on Tenerife, one of the Canary Islands. Nelson, from his lodgings in Bond Street, went to the Church of St. George in Hanover Square, sending a note to the rector saying, ‘an officer desires to return thanks to Almighty God for his perfect recovery from a severe wound, and also for many mercies bestowed upon him’.
