Horatia was Lord Nelson's only child, although there is an unsubstantiated story that she had a twin who was taken away at birth. She was born to Emma Hamilton at Sir William Hamilton's London house, 23 Piccadilly, while Nelson was preparing to set sail for the Battle of Copenhagen. The news was brought to him while he was at anchor in Torbay in Devon. For the first few years of her life, she was known as Horatia Thompson because, in order to protect Nelson from the scandal of having fathered a child out of wedlock, Admiral Thompson of Portsmouth Dockyard agreed to pretend to be the father. However, in his will, Nelson wrote : "I leave to the beneficience of my country my adopted (sic) daughter Horatia Nelson Thompson, and I desire that she will in future use the name of Nelson only." He died at Trafalgar when Horatia was four, and left her £200 a year. Unfortunately, Lady Hamilton fell into debt and the girl had to spend ten months in a prison cell with her mother before they flew to Calais to escape the creditors. Emma died in 1815 and Horatia was brought back to England disguised as a boy ; as, if her identity had become known, she would have been liable to arrest for the debts her mother had incurred in France. Horatia spent her next seven years in Slaugham in Sussex with Nelson's sister, Mrs. Catherine Matcham. On the 19th. February 1822, she married the Reverend Philip Ward, and they had nine children, of whom two are buried in this grave. Her youngest son died of a liver complaint on his return from India, and her eldest daughter was knocked down by a horse which bolted from the yard of the Queen's Head Inn in Pinner High Street, and was carried into a nearby draper's shop, where she died. Horatia survived her husband (who is, presumably, buried in Tenterden) by twenty years, and died at Beaufort Villa, Woodridings, Pinner, half a mile North of the cemetery. In memory of Lieut. Philip Ward, 25th. Bengal Native Infantry, who died 12th. September 1865, aged 33, youngest son of the late Revd. Philip Ward, Vicar, Tenterden, Kent. Also in memory of Eleanor Philippa Ward, Spinster, eldest daughter of the above-named Revd. Philip Ward, who was accidentally killed 6th. August 1872, aged 48. Here also rests Horatia Nelson Ward, who died March 6th. 1881, aged 80, the beloved daughter of Vice Admiral Lord Nelson and widow of the above-named Revd. Philip Ward." (bio by: Iain MacFarlaine)

Horatia married the Rev. Philip Ward, and lived until 1881. She had ten children: Horatio Nelson (born 8 December 1822); Eleanor Phillipa (born April 1824); Marmaduke Philip Smyth (born 27 May 1825); John James Stephen (13 February 1827–1829); Nelson (born 8 May 1828); William George (born 8 April 1830); Edmund Nelson (1831); Horatia Nelson (born 24 November 1833), Philip (born May 1834) and Caroline (born January 1836).