The Nelson Connection
Buckler’s Hard developed as a thriving shipbuilding village where warships for Nelson’s Navy were built, three of which took part in the Battle of Trafalgar. See models of these ships including HMS Euryalus on which the dispatch was written containing the news of the great victory and of Nelson’s death. View Nelson memorabilia including his baby clothes, made for him by the citizens of his birthplace, Burnham Thorpe, in Norfolk.
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SS Persia Story
A new exhibition for 2008 tells the remarkable story of the P & O liner, SS Persia, its links with Rolls Royce and the Montagu family and its sinking by a German U-Boat during WWI. Following the world’s deepest salvage operation of its type, several of the ship’s artefacts, entombed for nearly one hundred years, are on display for the first time, including the door to the Bullion Room, behind which the salvage team had hoped to find the fortune in gold and jewels that the ship was believed to be carrying on its fateful final voyage.
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Historic Cottage Displays
Visit the historic cottage displays to see how the village would have looked in the early 1800s and how inhabitants lived and worked. Compare the difference between the cramped home of a Labourer’s family with the more spacious home of a shipwright craftman. Listen to the local gossip of the 1790s in The New Inn, the centre of village life, which served as a meeting place, committee room, offices and entertainment area.
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The war effort
In more recent times, the village played a significant role in the D-Day landings. Learn about the activity on the river during the years of WWII, the building of segments of the Mulberry Harbour, which were towed across to the Normandy coast in preparation for D-Day, and the many hundreds of landing craft that sailed from the Beaulieu River to support the Normandy landings. A film presentation tells the story of Buckler’s Hard at war.
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