2-970-090 - /Heritage Images

The Great Naval Review: sketch on Fort Monckton, 1856. Crowds watching a display by the Royal Navy off the Hampshire coast. 'As the Royal yacht steamed past the walls, the Saluting Battery fired in her honour, and then the people in the embrasures of the forts, on the slopes of the esplanade from Portsmouth to Southsea, from Blockhouse Fort to Monckton, crowded together to watch her. The approach to the Spit Buoy was marked by breathless expectation shown in every face turned anxiously towards the fast-sailing yacht and her attendant steamers...The Queen's yacht, emerging from the surrounding smoke, proceeded rapidly past Fort Monckton, meeting everywhere the same enthusiastic reception, and, having rounded into a position to return down the centre line, entered the squadron of gun-boats...and majestically proceeded on her way'. From "Illustrated London News", 1856.