1949: Unable to resist the irony, Britain defeats Napoleon one more time

The last remnant of Napoleon’s navy gets scuttled after being put to a century and a half of hard labor.

The Battle of Trafalgar is generally considered settled history: a decisive British victory over Napoleon’s fleet. But in 1949, the Royal Navy found one last loose end in HMS Implacable, a rebadged, captured French warship that had survived for nearly a century and a half.

Nelson’s flagship, the HMS Victory, is a national icon. The Victory gets preservation, reverence, and schoolchildren. The last remnant of Napoleon’s navy gets scuttled after being put to a century and a half of hard labor. Some knives turn slowly.