"James Sharman.  He was with Lord Nelson at Trafalgar.  It was he who helped to carry the admiral from the upper deck to the cockpit.  He came home in the Victory, and afterwards joined several other ships, until he bore up for Greenwich Hospital; but not liking to be shut up there, Sir Thomas Hardy--who, you mind, was Lord Nelson's flag-captain--got him appointed to look after this column; and a good berth it is.  He entered the navy as far back as 1799, and was afloat wellnigh twenty years.  He came here, as near as I can remember, in 1819.  He was as brave a seaman as ever stepped.  I mind hearing of a gallant act of his, after he had been here about ten years.  It was at the end of November; and the day was fast closing in, when the Hammond, a brig bound from Newcastle to London, drove on shore during a heavy gale, just a little way to the south of where we are standing.  As she was heavily laden, and the water is shallow thereabout, she grounded more than a hundred fathoms from the beach.  In a short time the wreck parted, and both her masts fell, carrying away, as was supposed, the whole of the crew.  A short time after dark, however, one of the preventive men, named Smith, brought word to Sharman that he heard groans upon the wreck.