This street was named in honour of Horatio Nelson who "is generally regarded as the greatest officer in the history of the Royal Navy. His reputation is based on a series of remarkable victories, culminating in the Battle of Trafalgar [21 October 1805] where he was killed in his moment of triumph" (Royal Navy website).
The British victory over the French at the Battle of Trafalgar (1805) was commemorated in Trafalgar Street (1812, IHTA xii, 19), a side-street of Nelson Street. A similar origin accounts for Nile Street, which commemorates the Battle of the Nile of 1798, at which Nelson also led the British Navy. Officially Nile Street no longer exists but the street sign is still on display at a car park off York Street.
Nelson Street is first mentioned on Mason's town plan in 1815 (IHTA). The northern half consists of two parallel parts: the slip-road off the M2, which continues onto the Westlink; and, beside it, the original line of the street connecting the docks area with Great Patrick Street in the city centre.
Nelson Street was a renaming of Point Street, or Point Loning, as it appeared on James Williamson’s town plan of 1791. The landscape along the shores of Belfast Lough was very different in the 18th century. On Williamson’s map Point Loning is shown leading north from the town into the Point Fields, stopping short of a coastal headland called the Point. Since then, a great deal of land has been reclaimed and the Point would no longer be on the shore but in the heart of Sailortown.