London, Aug. 12 (Reuters): Two men who shaped the world as adversaries but never met will share a stage in London next year as Britain and France celebrate the 200th anniversary of the Battle of Trafalgar.

British Admiral Horatio Nelson and his enemy French Emperor Napoleon Bonaparte were both national heroes in their own lifetimes and both received state funerals when they died. But they had rather more than that in common.

?These were both charismatic leaders ? shunned by their peers but adored by their men. They both came from lowly origins and ended as heroes,? said Colin White, curator of a special exhibition to be staged in 2005 at the National Maritime Museum.

Nelson?s flagrant love affair with the married Emma Hamilton ? who bore him a daughter in 1801, two years before the death of her husband ? shocked English society. But as news of his death at the age of 47 ? shot through the spine on the deck of HMS Victory by a French sniper ? spread after the battle, eyewitness accounts report hardened sailors weeping openly.

Napoleon and Nelson were also snappy dressers ? a fact historians say may have cost the latter his life as he stood on the deck of Victory in his conspicuous dress uniform.