1797 Battle of St. Vincent:

On February 14, the Spanish fleet sailed from Cartagena to Cadiz, where they wanted to meet the rest of the fleet. The British frigates discovered the movement of the Spanish and soon Sir John made his fleet clear for battle. The 15 English ships of the line with the flagship Victory were the enemies of the 27 Spanish ships of the line, but the Spanish fleet was divided into two parts and the British were between them. As Nelson knew that the battle line of the Spanish would cause defeat so he ordered Captain Miller to leave the English line. The Captain sailed into the Spanish line and was soon under the fire of five Spanish ships. Some other captains followed Nelson's example and attacked the Spanish line. Nelson commanded his ship against a Spanish ship of the line with 80 guns and led the boarding party himself. After he had conquered the 80 gun ship "Nicolas" he conquered the 114 gun ship "San Josef" with the "Nicolas", and again he led the boarding party. The other part of the Spanish fleet escaped, because they were afraid that what had happened to the other part of their fleet would happen to them as well.

All in all, the battle was a great victory, and the British called this fight: The Battle of St. Vincent. After the battle, the complete fleet called Nelson's conquest of the San Josef: Nelson's Patent Bridge for Boarding First-Rates. Nelson learned that he had been promoted to a Rear-Admiral before the battle, and he also became a Knight of the Bath with the title 'Sir'. In the next months, Rear-admiral Nelson led the evacuation of Elba and became commander of a ship of the line, which took part in the great mutinies of the fleet. Nelson impressed the crew of this ship, because he bought clothes and food for them. In addition, he had a strong personality and spoke with seamen without arrogance and artificiality. Nelson knew what seaman needed, because when he had been a little boy, he had sailed on ships as a normal seaman.