Florence Nightingale, “The Lady with the Lamp”, (May 12, 1820 – August 13, 1910) was a British nurse, statistician, social reformer, and founder of modern nursing.
He was a pioneering figure who changed nursing in the 19th and 20th centuries from an unskilled profession to a highly qualified and respected medical profession.
She became famous for her nursing work during the Crimean War (1854-56) and an icon of the Victorian era such as “The Lady with the Lamp” or simply “the Crimean Angel”, who performed her night rounds of wounded and dying soldiers.
Birth
Florence Nightingale was born in Florence, Tuscany, Italy, on May 12, 1820 into a wealthy upper-class British family and was named after the city of her birth where the Renaissance began around the years 1350 to 1400 by her writers, painters and architects. and philosophers.
Florence’s older sister, Frances Parthenope, was also named after her birthplace in Parthenope, a Greek settlement now part of the city of Naples.
Parthenope, in southern Italy, was colonized by the ancient Greeks as part of their colonization, in the 8th and 7th centuries BC. C.
Education
The family moved back to England in 1821, and Florence was raised in the family homes in Embley, Hampshire and Lea Hurst, Derbyshire.
Victorian England (1820 to 1914), was characterized by the status of Great Britain as the most powerful nation in the world where the first Industrial Revolution (1760-1840) and Charles Dickens (1812-1870) began.
Florence received a classical education in history, philosophy, and literature, including studies in mathematics, German, French, Italian, Greek, and Latin.
Never satisfied with the traditional feminine skills of home management, she preferred to read the great philosophers and engage in political and social debates with her father.
Divine call
Florence Nightingale never married because in 1837 she concluded that nursing was her God-given vocation, where she could serve both God and humanity.
But, during the Victorian era, a young woman of her social stature was expected to marry to secure her position in the class and become a wife and mother, not a job that the upper social classes considered a menial job.
The politician and poet Richard Monckton Milnes pursued his goal, after a nine-year courtship she rejected him, convinced that marriage would interfere with her divine nursing vocation.
Her parents and sister were unhappy and eventually allowed Florence to pursue her ambition.
Her father gave her an annual income of £ 500 (roughly £ 40,000 / US $ 65,000 in current terms), allowing her to live comfortably and pursue her nursing career.
Nursery career
Florence enrolled in the Institution of Protestant Deaconesses at Kaiserswerth in Germany for training in 1850 and again in 1851, where she learned basic nursing skills, the importance of patient observation, and the value of good hospital organization.
In 1853, she became superintendent of the Institution for Sick Ladies (governesses) in Distressed Circumstances, London, and later became superintendent of nurses at King’s College Hospital.
Crimean War
The Crimean War (1853 – 56) was a major European military conflict of the 19th century that saw an alliance of the Ottoman Empire, France, Great Britain, and Sardinia against Tsarist Russia.
Most of the conflict occurred in the Crimean peninsula, an important military position for the Russians, because their naval fleet could access the Mediterranean Sea from the region.
The immediate cause involved disputes over the Orthodox holy places in Jerusalem and the rights of the Orthodox Christian minorities in the Holy Land, which were under the occupation of the Ottoman Empire.
Nicholas I issued an ultimatum for the Orthodox subjects and the rights of the Eastern Orthodox Church of the collapsed Ottoman Empire to be placed under his protection.
The French Emperor Napoleon III refused, he was promoting Catholic interests.
Great Britain tried to mediate and arranged a compromise to which Nicholas I. agreed.
When the Ottomans demanded changes, Nicholas I refused.
Having obtained promises of support from France and Great Britain, the Ottoman Turkish Empire declared war on Russia in October 1853.
Charge of the Light Brigade
The Charge of the Light Brigade that took place during the Battle of Balaklava on October 25, 1854 of the Crimean War, was part of the Siege of Sevastopol, Russia’s main naval base in the Black Sea.
The Light Brigade was the British light cavalry force with fast horses and soldiers armed with spears and sabers.
Through misinterpreted orders, the 670-horse Light Brigade launched a headlong charge into a treeless valley against heavily defended Russian troops.
Of the 670 soldiers in the Light Brigade, about 110 were killed, 160 were injured, and approximately 375 horses were lost.
The legend of that one-quarter mile long load was made famous by Alfred, Lord Tennyson in his 1855 poem to honor his bravery and sacrifice.
The poem’s theme highlighted his gallant patriotism: “Honor the charge they made! Honor the Light Brigade, Noble six hundred!”
Conditions during the Crimean War
The loss of life in the war was staggering, with many more soldiers dying from disease than injury.
Of the 1,650,000 Allied and Russian soldiers who participated in the war, 900,000 died of diseases such as typhus, typhoid, cholera and dysentery caused by the dire conditions.
The British base and army hospitals were mainly established in Scutari across the Bosphorus from Constantinople (Istanbul), Turkey.
On October 21, 1854, Florence Nightingale led a team of 38 volunteer nurses that she trained, including her aunt Mai Smith and 15 Catholic nuns, to Selimiye Barrack Hospital in Scutari, where they arrived on November 5.
The first modern war correspondent, British journalist William Howard Russell, reported in the London Times that soldiers were being treated by an incompetent and ineffective medical establishment and that the most basic supplies were not available.
The British public protested and demanded that the situation be improved.
Florence Nightingale described the conditions as the “Kingdom of Hell”.
He found filthy conditions, overcrowding, overworked medical staff, no equipment to process food for patients, faulty sewers, and lack of ventilation.
He immediately worked to improve sanitation, nutrition, and activity for patients and set standards of care.
She obtained supplies and equipment with funds provided by the London Times and enlisted the soldiers’ wives to help her do the laundry and clean the wards, while the nurses provided her basic care.
Attention was also paid to psychological needs, as well as educational and recreational activities.
Their efforts reduced the death rate by two-thirds with the introduction of such measures.
Throughout these difficult times, he kept meticulous records of the number of deaths and the causes of deaths, so that upon his return to Britain he could justify the need to improve conditions in the hospitals.
The woman with the lamp
Florence Nightingale’s wandering through the wards at night, providing support to patients, earned her the title “The Lady with the Lamp.”
The Times reported : “She is a” ministering angel “without any exaggeration in these hospitals, and as her slender figure slides silently down every corridor, the face of each poor man softens with gratitude at the sight of her. And silence and darkness have settled over those kilometers of prostrate sick, you can see her alone, with a lamp in her hand, making her solitary rounds. “
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s 1857 poem, “Saint Philomena,” further popularized his outstanding efforts:
It! in that house of misery
A lady with a lamp I see
Pass through the glowing gloom
And flit from room to room.
In May 1855, he became ill with “Crimean fever” (brucellosis), which he probably contracted from drinking contaminated milk.
The lingering effects of the disease were to last for 25 years, and she was often left in bed due to severe chronic pain.
Post Crimea
Russia sought peace in January 1856 with the loss of 500,000 soldiers, mainly due to disease, malnutrition, and exposure.
On March 30, 1856, the Treaty of Paris ended the Crimean War.
Florence Nightingale returned home to Derbyshire on August 7, 1856 as a reluctant heroine.
Professional Nursing Foundation
Florence Nightingale laid the foundation for professional nursing with the establishment of her nursing school at London’s St Thomas’ Hospital (now part of King’s College) in 1860.
The Nightingale Pledge made by the new nurses and the Florence Nightingale Medal, the highest international distinction a nurse can achieve, were named in her honor.
The annual International Nurses Day is celebrated on her birthday.
She was also honored with the title of Lady of Grace of the Order of Saint John of Jerusalem.
She also became the first woman to receive the Order of Merit.
Upon her death in 1910, she was honored with a memorial service at St. Paul’s Cathedral, London and was interred in the family plot at St. Margaret’s Church, East Wellow, Hampshire.
