The Battle of the Nile (Aboukir Bay), 1798. Napoleon Loses Mediterranean Dominance, French Marooned in Egypt, Britain Controls Med Trade Routes.

The British struck a devastating blow to Napoleon’s plans, trapping his army in the sands of Egypt and extinguishing his hopes of commanding the Red Sea. With ruthless precision, they seized Malta, the strategic linchpin of the Mediterranean—a fortress they would hold, unyielding, until the final fires of World War II burned out.

Aboukir Bay. August 1, 1798.
French Forces: 13 Ships of the Line and Four Frigates.
British Forces: Fourteen Ships of the Line.

Additional Reading and Episode Research:

• Howarth, David. Lord Nelson, the Immortal Memory.
• Lloyd, Christopher. The Nile Campaign: Nelson and Napoleon in Egypt.
• Warner, Oliver. Great Sea Battles.
• Bennet, Geoffrey. Nelson the Commander.

Other Battles Mentioned:

• Plassey
• Trafalgar

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Transcript

Welcome to History's Greatest Battles, Season 01, Episode 73: The Battle of the Nile, also known as Aboukir Bay, the first of August, 1798.

French Forces: 13 ships of the line and four frigates.
British Forces: 14 ships of the line. 

The British struck a devastating blow to Napoleon’s plans, trapping his army in the sands of Egypt and extinguishing his hopes of commanding the Red Sea. With ruthless precision, they seized Malta, the strategic linchpin of the Mediterranean—a fortress they would hold, unyielding, until the final fires of World War II burned out.

By 1798, Napoleon Bonaparte had risen to claim his place as France’s most triumphant general, his recent conquests delivering Italy into the Republic’s grasp. Naturally, it was he whom the Directory—the ruling council of France—chose to lead a daring new campaign to the East, one that promised both glory and unimaginable risk.

Ever since the British East India Company’s decisive victory at Plassey in 1757, where they crushed a prince backed by French arms, France’s influence in India had withered with alarming speed. By 1796, they’d been expelled from their final stronghold at Pondicherry, leaving the subcontinent firmly under Britain’s relentless grip. But Napoleon saw a bold counterstroke: if Egypt fell into French hands, the Republic would hold the eastern Mediterranean and the Red Sea, placing themselves within reach of India once more and poised to strike at British trade in the Indian Ocean. This was the core of Napoleon’s clandestine mission in 1798.

Only France’s highest-ranking officials knew the details, and in secrecy, Napoleon oversaw the amassing of ships in the southern French ports, readying the expedition for its unknown destination. The British, meanwhile, sensed that something vast was stirring, but they were left guessing at the target—was it Malta, the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, Turkey, or Egypt itself? Perhaps Napoleon would instead strike west, rattling British control in the Caribbean, in Ireland, or even daring to touch English shores. In London, the government issued orders with urgency: British ships stationed near Cadiz in Spain were to head for Toulon and Marseilles, ready to shadow the French fleet the moment it left port.

Commanding the fleet off Cadiz was Earl St. Vincent, who entrusted this mission to none other than Rear Admiral Horatio Nelson, his most gifted and daring young commander. Nelson had earned his reputation by taking risks that others would deem reckless, yet reaping rewards from every dangerous wager. St. Vincent knew this well and dispatched Nelson with four warships, sending him through the Straits of Gibraltar toward Toulon. A fierce storm lashed Nelson’s flagship, Vanguard, as he neared the southern French coast, leaving the vessel battered and in dire need of repair. Worse yet, while Nelson struggled to repair his ship, the French fleet slipped by unnoticed. Days ticked by before Nelson could rejoin the hunt, bolstered only when a promised squadron, fresh from the Atlantic, arrived to strengthen his hand.

The fact that the incoming British squadron had encountered no French ships en route made one thing clear—the French had veered eastward. Nelson immediately took to the chase, steering first for Naples, Italy’s busiest port, hoping for news. But by the time he arrived, he discovered he was already behind; Napoleon had stormed Malta, wresting it from the once-formidable knights of the Order of St. John, whose strength was now a relic of centuries past. Napoleon had quickly garrisoned the island, pocketing the knights’ considerable treasure before pushing on. Nelson gathered his captains, and together they decided Egypt would be their next destination.

Arriving off Alexandria on June 28, they found only quiet waters, with no trace of French activity in sight. Unbeknownst to them, they had passed dangerously close to the French fleet in the dead of night just three days earlier. Wasting no time, Nelson turned north toward Turkey, while the French fleet quietly slipped into Alexandria’s harbor, barely an hour after he had vanished over the horizon. With speed and precision, Napoleon landed 30,000 troops from 400 transports, then directed his escorting warships—either to seek safety at the French-held island of Corfu or to remain in Egyptian waters, bracing for Nelson’s inevitable return.

Admiral François-Paul Brueys chose to stay, positioning his thirteen ships of the line alongside four frigates in Aboukir Bay, a natural bulwark some fifteen miles from Alexandria. Aboukir Bay’s wide, shallow waters became Brueys’ fortress. He anchored his fleet as close to shore as he dared, each vessel secured in five fathoms of water, stretching them in a line from the shallow coastal waters in the southeast to the deeper approach near Aboukir Island in the northwest. Anchored bow to stern, Brueys’ line presented any would-be attacker with a daunting gauntlet of fourteen broadsides. The frigates nestled between his line and the shore, making his formation all but impossible to outflank. Confident in the strength of his defensive line, Brueys sent men ashore to dig wells and replenish their dwindling water stores.

Nelson scoured the southern Turkish coast in vain until fate finally offered a lead: a captured French merchant ship whose crew unwittingly revealed the enemy’s position. Seizing the opportunity, Nelson turned south and made for Alexandria, arriving there at dawn on August 1. The harbor lay quiet, empty of French sails. Undeterred, Nelson dispatched two ships to scout the area as he continued eastward, reducing his force from fourteen ships but determined to corner his elusive prey. For weeks, Nelson had drilled his captains in every likely formation they might encounter, preparing them for any twist in the hunt. With each man briefed and battle plans honed, his captains held Nelson’s full trust and knew his intentions without question.

True to his fearless reputation, Nelson advanced with a steady northwesterly wind, his ships strung in a disciplined line-astern formation. Spotting the French fleet anchored rigidly along the shore, he saw his chance—he would strike them in segments, shattering their static line piece by piece. With this approach, Nelson could position his ships to overpower isolated sections of the French fleet, leaving the rest of Brueys’ vessels stranded—out of range and helplessly facing away from the assault. Nelson commanded his fleet to fall upon the French ships anchored at the front and center, leaving the distant vessels at the southeast for the final blow. The British opened fire at precisely 6:28 p.m., with daylight slipping swiftly into night.

One by one, each British ship rounded the shoals, bearing down on the enemy’s line with lethal proximity. Nelson’s captains anchored within yards of the French ships and commenced firing at point-blank range. Here, British gunnery proved its worth. English crews, practiced and unflinching, fired with merciless speed, loading and discharging twice as swiftly as the French and with unmatched precision. The first to break Brueys’ illusion of security were the Goliath and Zealous. They swept in to reveal his miscalculation: his fleet was anchored about 150 yards apart, and his vanguard sat further from the shoals than he’d anticipated. With the gap wide open, the British slipped around the bow of the French lead ship, Guerrier, maneuvering deftly to take its landward side, where French guns lay unmanned.

In that instant, a second flaw in Brueys’ defenses became glaringly evident. The speed and secrecy of Napoleon’s expedition had forced Brueys to sail with a skeleton crew, dangerously under-staffed. To make matters worse, scores of Brueys’ sailors were still ashore, tasked with digging wells, and hadn’t the chance to return before Nelson’s onslaught. Only the seaward guns were manned, leaving Goliath and Zealous free to pummel Guerrier and the second ship, Conquérant, without facing a single retaliatory shot. The French guns fired desperately at the advancing British line, but with Nelson’s ships advancing in column, each vessel appeared alone, reducing the effectiveness of French fire. The British then anchored within musket shot—often as close as 100 yards—and unleashed their superior gunnery.

By concentrating his assault on the front half of Brueys’ line, Nelson aligned his thirteen ships against only six of the French. Darkness quickly descended, but the flames leaping from French ships illuminated the waters, casting a ghastly glow that lit Nelson’s targets—only the thickening smoke veiled them from sight. In barely an hour, the vanguard of the French fleet was shattered—sinking or raising the white flag. Nelson’s ships pressed forward, turning their wrath upon the French center. The final British ship, Bellerophon, entered the fray with its sights set on L'Orient, the French flagship, a colossal vessel bristling with 120 guns.

Brueys’ crew sprang to life, their cannons tearing into Bellerophon, which quickly took heavy damage and was forced to withdraw, its masts shattered. Yet not before landing a series of brutal blows on L'Orient, deepening Brueys’ mounting misfortune. During their idle weeks in Aboukir Bay, Brueys had his flagship re-painted, and cans of paint and thinner now littered the deck. As British fire raked L'Orient, these volatile supplies ignited, setting the ship ablaze. As Bellerophon staggered away, Brueys scrambled to control the flames, deploying men to douse the blaze. They had scarcely begun when the rest of the British fleet moved within range, sealing L'Orient’s fate. The two scouting ships Nelson had sent to Alexandria rejoined just in time. Alexander and Swiftsure bore down on the inferno that was L'Orient, with Alexander slipping between L'Orient and Tonnant, unleashing broadsides from the unguarded landward side while Swiftsure did the same from seaward.

Two additional British ships arrived to add their fire, tearing into L'Orient’s hull. Despite its powerful guns damaging Swiftsure, the flames consuming L'Orient spread beyond control; the flagship’s end was inevitable. Brueys met his fate on the deck, a cannonball shattering his left leg. By 9:15 p.m., L'Orient’s crew began abandoning the vessel, its doom written in the roaring blaze. At precisely 9:30, fire reached L'Orient’s powder magazine. The ensuing explosion tore through the night, a deafening roar heard fifty miles distant. Flaming debris rained down on nearby ships, and the shockwave was so fierce that it stilled every cannon in the bay.

The British obliteration of Napoleon’s fleet left his army stranded in Egypt, shattering his ambitions to project French power over the Red Sea. The British further cemented their dominance by seizing Malta—a critical port and supply base they would hold until the close of World War II.