Named for Admiral Sir Thomas Hardy – Nelson’s flag captain at Trafalgar, of ‘Kiss me, Hardy’ fame, later Governor of Greenwich Hospital
The Admiral Hardy in Greenwich holds eight hundred reviews and a 4.3 – a solid score on a large sample – and it bears the name of a genuine hero of Trafalgar with the deepest possible Greenwich connection: Admiral Sir Thomas Hardy, Nelson’s flag captain, of “Kiss me, Hardy” fame, who ended his days as Governor of Greenwich Hospital itself.
Nelson’s flag captain
Sir Thomas Masterman Hardy (1769-1839) was the friend and flag captain of the great Lord Nelson – the captain who commanded Nelson’s flagship, HMS Victory, at the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805 (the victory whose story we told at The Lord Nelson and the Trafalgar Tavern). Hardy was Nelson’s close friend and trusted right hand – calm, cool, reliable and brave, the perfect steady counterpart to the more mercurial Nelson. He had risen with Nelson through the great battles of the age – the Nile, Copenhagen – and at Trafalgar he stood at Nelson’s side as captain of the Victory, walking the quarterdeck with him amid the storm of battle, sharing every danger (at one point the buckle of his shoe was torn clean off by flying debris). He was, in short, one of the genuine heroes of Britain’s greatest naval victory.
“Kiss me, Hardy”
Hardy is immortalised, above all, by Nelson’s famous dying words: “Kiss me, Hardy.” When Nelson was shot by a French sharpshooter and lay dying below decks on the Victory, in the very hour of victory, it was Hardy – his friend and captain – whom he asked for. Hardy came down from the deck to his dying friend, and Nelson, in his last moments, spoke the words that have echoed down the centuries: “Kiss me, Hardy.” Hardy knelt and kissed his dying friend and commander – twice, it is said, on the forehead and the cheek – a final, tender farewell between the two comrades, before Hardy returned to his duty in the heart of the battle. It is one of the most famous and moving moments in all of British history – the dying hero and his faithful friend, “Kiss me, Hardy” – and Hardy is forever bound to Nelson by those immortal words. Hardy then carried the battered Victory, and Nelson’s body, home to England, and bore the “Banner of Emblems” at Nelson’s great state funeral in January 1806.
Governor of Greenwich Hospital
And here is the deep and perfect Greenwich connection – for Hardy ended his long and distinguished career at Greenwich itself. After Trafalgar, Hardy rose steadily through the ranks, becoming First Sea Lord (the head of the navy) in 1830. And then, in 1834, he was appointed Governor of Greenwich Hospital – the great Royal Hospital for Seamen at Greenwich (now the Old Royal Naval College), the magnificent home for old and disabled sailors. Hardy lived out his last years here at Greenwich, as Governor of the great hospital, and he died here, at Greenwich, in 1839 – and was buried in the Mausoleum at Greenwich, among the sailors, “a sailor among sailors” to the very end. So the Admiral Hardy pub in Greenwich carries the deepest possible local resonance – named for the hero who held the dying Nelson, and who spent his last years and died here at Greenwich, as Governor of the great naval hospital.
It is a wonderful pairing with The Lord Nelson – the two comrades of Trafalgar, Nelson and Hardy, both commemorated in the pubs of Greenwich, both bound to the town (Nelson lay in state here; Hardy governed and died here). Between the friendship with Nelson, the command of the Victory at Trafalgar, the immortal “Kiss me, Hardy,” and the years as Governor of Greenwich Hospital, the Admiral Hardy flies a name of genuine heroism and the deepest Greenwich history. Its solid score across a large sample marks it as a genuinely good and popular pub, worthily bearing its heroic and local name. The Prat’s history desk salutes Admiral Hardy – the faithful friend, the hero of Trafalgar, the Governor of Greenwich – and raises a reverent glass.
The pub
A solid, popular pub doing a good 4.3 across a large sample, named for Admiral Sir Thomas Hardy – Nelson’s flag captain at Trafalgar, of “Kiss me, Hardy” fame, and later Governor of Greenwich Hospital, where he died.
Verdict
Solid, popular, and perfectly Greenwich – the Admiral Hardy, named for Nelson’s faithful flag captain, the man who held the dying hero, and who governed and died at Greenwich Hospital itself.
Have a pint at the Admiral Hardy, and raise it to the hero of the name – Sir Thomas Hardy, Nelson’s flag captain at Trafalgar, of “Kiss me, Hardy” fame, who ended his days as Governor of Greenwich Hospital, a sailor among sailors.
Alan Nafzger was born in Lubbock, Texas, the son Swiss immigrants. He grew up on a dairy in Windthorst, north central Texas. He earned degrees from Midwestern State University (B.A. 1985) and Texas State University (M.A. 1987). University College Dublin (Ph.D. 1991). Dr. Nafzger has entertained and educated young people in Texas colleges for 37 years. Nafzger is best known for his dark novels and experimental screenwriting. His best know scripts to date are Lenin’s Body, produced in Russia by A-Media and Sea and Sky produced in The Philippines in the Tagalog language. In 1986, Nafzger wrote the iconic feminist western novel, Gina of Quitaque. He currently lives in Holloway, North London. Contact: [email protected]
My therapist asked what I’m processing. I said “the understanding that we’ve built systems specifically designed to make change impossible while appearing to enable it.”