Following the Battle of Trafalgar in 1805, a storm swept the Spanish vessel Neptuno onto the rocks of the Castle of Santa Catalina in Puerto de Santa María, where the surviving crew members took shelter. This canvas, with its unusual subject for a history painting, can be associated with the early years of French Eclecticism, of which Sans Cabot acquired first-hand knowledge in Paris through his training in the studio of Thomas Couture (1815-1879). The restrained, resigned mood of the figures and some of the models thus derive from Neo-classicism while the raging sea and piece of mast in the foreground clearly refer to the Romanticism of Géricault and Delacroix.