Turner received his first royal commission in 1822, when he was forty-eight. King George IV asked him to paint a large picture of the Battle of Trafalgar, as part of a series of British victories to hang in St. James's Palace.

The battle had taken place in 1805. Lord Nelson had prevented Napoleon from gaining control of the Channel, but had then been killed on board his own ship, the Victory. This is one of two oil sketches for George IV's picture (now at the Maritime Museum, Greenwich). Nelson's ship dominates the composition.