The MOD Art Collection includes many paintings showing battle scenes, particularly naval battles. Battle scenes were potentially lucrative for artists, particularly in the late eighteenth and the nineteeth centuries as engravings found a ready and apparantly unquenchable market. The paintings themselves were avidly commisioned and collected. - Trafalgar.
- John Christian Schetky
- The Battle of Trafalgar, in 1805, was the deciding event in the Napoleonic Naval wars, and is probably the most depicted battle in British history. The MOD Art Collection includes three significant versions; this one is probably the best.
- Battle of Jutland from the Air, 1916.
- Norman Howard
- This naval battle, which has attracted a huge amount of academic interest in recent years, established the strategic control of the North Sea by the British Fleet. This painting is particularly interesting in that it is believed to be one of the first aerial views of a battle.
- Fleet at Sea, 1688.
- Willem van der Velde the Younger
- The painting, which is signed and dated, came into the ownership of the Admiralty from the collection of Sir Phillip Stevens, Admiralty Secretary from 1763 to 1795. It hangs in the Admiralty Board Room.
- Naval Gun at Ladysmith, 1900.
- HC Seppings Wright
- Ladysmith was subjected to a four-month siege during the second Boer War, and was relieved in February 1900 by Lord Roberts.
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