2-791-544 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

Launch of the "Boscawen" at Woolwich, 1844. Crowds cheer as the warship HMS Boscawen is launched on the River Thames in London: '...ranges of seats, rising gradually in the form of an amphitheatre, had been erected around the ship, and those set apart for the public functionaries and their friends were decorated with flags of all nations, and when filled with elegantly dressed females and officers in naval and military uniforms, had an extremely brilliant effect'. From "Illustrated London News", 1844, Vol I.