Napoleonic Prisoner of War Bone Model of a 78 Gun Ship

Period: 1700-1900

Origin: Anglo French

Medium: Bone, horse hair, metal pins

Literature: One can only be filled with wonder and amazement at the skill, patience, ingenuity and fortitude displayed by the unknown French seamen of the Napoleonic era who produced these accomplished works of art in the most sordid and terrible conditions of the prison ‘hulks’ with primitive tools and equipment.
Stripped of all masts, rigging, sails, decorations and embellishments these ‘hulks’ were moored in estuaries and harbours around the coast of Britain. Some were moored off Plymouth housing the captured Napoleonic prisoners of war and it is possible that this model was purchased by a member of the Younge family at that time as a memento or souvenir of the Napoleonic period.