LARGE PORCELAIN BOWL.
Painted in colours and richly gilded. Dated 2 April 1801.
With inscription in memory of the brave Danes who fell at the Battle of Copenhagen
(At Dansk Folke Museum, Copenhagen.)
Writing to the Times in 1801, an officer present at the engagement says: "The enemy made a very obstinate resistance and fought like brave men. Most of our ships are very much cut up … and the vessels which have been captured are perfect sieves, there being hardly a single plank in any one of them but has at least ten shot-holes in it. In fact, it was the most dreadfully fought action that ever took place in the annals of history." Of the shattered prizes, only one Danish vessel was fit to be repaired and taken to Portsmouth.
It was at this battle, as every schoolboy knows, that Nelson disregarded Admiral Parker's signal, "I have only one eye," he said, turning to his captain, "and may be allowed to be blind on occasion." Placing the spy-glass to his blind eye he said, "Upon my word, I do not see any signal."
A young Danish officer, a lad of seventeen, Villemoes, commanding a floating battery with twenty-four men, stuck to his post till only four of his men remained. Nelson, after the battle, begged the Crown Prince to introduce the young officer to him. The brave deeds of two great fighting races stand out on that day of awful carnage. Captain Larssen, after the battle, when he appeared in the streets of Copenhagen, was the object of universal homage as the hero of Bloody Maundy Thursday. When he passed Amagertorv, the fishwives would rise and make him a deep curtsy. Yet he passed his days in straitened circumstances and died well-nigh forgotten. No statue commemorates his memory.
But there is a ceramic record of that day of great battle. We illustrate a Copenhagen porcelain bowl, with painted scene, showing the Dannebrog flying and the sea-fight in progress. It was given, painted in colours, to the officers, and uncoloured to the sous-officiers who fought on the 2nd of April 1801. There is one at the Dansk Folke Museum and another at Rosenborg Castle, and the few other bowls in private hands are highly treasured as heirlooms. It is inscribed on a panel:—
Tilegnet
O. Fischer
og alle brave Danske.
Kiöbenhavn 2 April 1801,
af
Roepstorff.