TO THE CRIMEA AGAIN
(September 1855-July 1856)
I am ready to stand out the War with any man.--FLORENCE NIGHTINGALE
(Nov. 4, 1855).
On September 8, 1855, Sebastopol fell, after assaults, as every one
remembers, which had filled the British cemeteries and hospitals. Miss
Nightingale's time from this date to the end of the war was divided
between the Crimea and Scutari. On October 9, 1855, she left Scutari for
Balaclava, and she remained in the Crimea till the end of November, when
she hurried back to Scutari on hearing of a serious outbreak of cholera
in the Barrack Hospital at that place. On Good Friday, 1856 (March 21),
she again left Scutari for Balaclava, in consequence of an urgent appeal
from the hospitals of the Land Transport Corps, and she remained there
till the beginning of July. She left Scutari for England on July 28.
* * * * *
Miss Nightingale's work during her second and third visits to the Crimea
(of two months in 1855, and of three in 1856) was the most arduous, and
in some respects the most worrying, of all her labours in the East. The
distances between the several Crimean hospitals, enumerated in an
earlier chapter (p. 254), were great; how bad were the roads is known to
every one who has read anything about the Crimean War; and Miss
Nightingale experienced much of the rigour of a Crimean winter. "The
extraordinary exertions she imposed upon herself would have been
perfectly incredible," wrote M. Soyer, "if they had not been witnessed
by many. I can vouch for the fact, having frequently accompanied her to
the [Castle] Hospital as well as to the Monastery. The return from these
places at night was a very dangerous experience, as the road led across
a very uneven country. It was still more perilous when snow was upon the
ground. I have seen her stand for hours at the top of a bleak rocky
mountain near the Hospital, giving her instructions while the snow was
falling heavily." She had for some years been somewhat subject to
rheumatism, and in the Crimea she was at times tortured by sciatica. But
she was "acclimatised," she said, and was strong to endure. Sometimes
she spent long days in the saddle. At other times she drove in a rough
cart. Her first conveyance was a cart--drawn by a mule and driven, adds
the lively Soyer, by a donkey; and she suffered a nasty upset in it.
Colonel McMurdo, Commandant of the Land Transport Corps,[195] then
kindly gave her the best vehicle procurable. It has been dignified by
the name of "Miss Nightingale's Carriage," but was, in fact, a hooded
baggage-car without springs.[196] Some time later M. Soyer identified
the vehicle among other "Crimean effects" which were on sale at
Southampton. It was shown at the Victorian Era Exhibition forty years
later,[197] and is still preserved at Lea Hurst.
[195] Sir William Montagu Scott McMurdo (1819-94); K.C.B. 1881. Miss
Nightingale had a very high opinion of his services in the Crimea,
and Sidney Herbert appointed him Inspector-General of the
Volunteers (see Miss Nightingale's Letter on the Volunteers, 1861).
[196] A woodcut of it appeared in the _Illustrated London News_, August
30, 1856.
[197] See Vol. II. p. 409.
In this hooded vehicle, or on horseback, or if the roads were very bad
on foot, Miss Nightingale made her rounds in all weathers, her
headquarters being sometimes at the General and sometimes at the Castle
Hospital. She never presumed on her sex to save herself trouble or
fatigue at the expense of others. She was now without Mr. Bracebridge's
assistance, but she found that the absence of a civilian go-between was
no disadvantage. "A woman," she said, "obtains from military courtesy
(if she does not shock either their habits of business or their caste
prejudices) what a man who pitted the civilian against the military
effectually hindered." She superintended the nursing in all the
hospitals under her orders. Of the hospital huts on the Genoese Heights,
there is a vivid picture in Lady Hornby's _Travels_. "The first day of
our arrival," she wrote, May 1856, "we took a long ramble on the heights
of Balaclava, by the old Genoese castle. On one side is a solitary and
magnificent view of sea and cliffs; but pass a sharp and lofty turning,
and the crowded port beneath, and all the active military movements, are
instantly before your eyes. Higher up we came to Miss Nightingale's
hospital huts, built of long planks, and adorned with neatly bordering
flowers. The sea was glistening before us, and as we lingered to admire
the fine view, one of the nurses, a kind, motherly-looking woman, came
into the little porch, and invited us to enter and rest. A wooden stool
was kindly offered to us by another and younger Sister. On the large
deal table was a simple pot of wild flowers, so beautifully arranged,
they instantly struck my eye. How charming the little deal house
appeared to me, with its perfect cleanliness, its glorious view, and the
health, contentment, and usefulness of its inmates! How respectable
their few wants seemed; how suited their simple dress to the stern
realities, as well as to the charities of life, and how fearlessly they
reposed on the care and love of God in that lonely place, far away from
all their friends; how earnestly they admired and tended the few spring
flowers of a strange land,[198] these brave, quiet women, who had
witnessed and helped to relieve so much suffering! This was the
pleasantest visit I ever made. Miss Nightingale had been there but a few
days before, and this deal room and stool were hers."[199] Miss
Nightingale established reading-rooms, bored for water to improve the
supply near the hospitals, had the huts covered with felt for protection
against the winter, and brought her extra-diet kitchens, with M. Soyer's
good help, into full efficiency. In her absence the work had met with
many difficulties from the supineness or hostility of officials towards
what some regarded as her fads, and others as her interference. "In
April," she wrote to Mrs. Herbert from the Castle Hospital (Nov. 17,
1855), "I undertook this Hospital, and from that time to this we cooked
all the Extra Diet for 500 to 600 patients, and the _whole_ diet for all
the wounded officers by ourselves in a shed; and though I sent up a
French cook in July to whom I gave £100 a year, I could not get an Extra
Diet Kitchen built, promised me in May, till I came up this time to do
it myself in October. During the whole of this time, every egg, every
bit of butter, jelly, ale, and Eau de Cologne which the sick officers
have had has been provided out of Mrs. Samuel Smith's or my private
pocket. On Nov. 4 I opened my Extra Diet Kitchen."
[198] For another reference to the Crimean flowers, see below, p. 450.
[199] _Hornby_, pp. 306-7.
II
Miss Nightingale's work in the Crimea was attended by ceaseless worry.
She had to fight her way into full authority. She knew that she would
win, but her enemies were active, and were for the moment in possession
of the field. "There is not an official," she said, "who would not burn
me like Joan of Arc if he could, but they know that the War Office
cannot turn me out because the country is with me." She was beset with
jealousies in the Crimea, both in military and in medical quarters; and
to make matters worse, religious, and even racial animosities mixed
themselves up in the disputes. Lord Raglan, who believed in her and
always supported her, was now dead; and by some strange omission, the
instructions which had been sent to him from London at the time of her
original appointment were unknown to his successors in the command. The
words in the _published_ instructions--"in Turkey"--gave a sort of
technical excuse (as already mentioned) to jealous officials for
regarding Miss Nightingale as an interloper in the Crimea. The point,
however, had no substance; for there was a female nursing establishment
already in the Crimea, which had received no separate or independent
instructions, and which was yet supported by Government. By what
authority could it be there, except as delegated from the Lady
Superintendent in Chief? But the intrusion of Miss Nightingale was, I
suppose, resented by some military officers the more at Balaclava than
at Scutari, in proportion as the scene was nearer to the front; how
keen the resentment was, we have heard from Colonel Sterling. And as
Headquarters were unsympathetic also, Miss Nightingale had an uphill
task. "We get things done all the same," she wrote to Mrs. Herbert,
"only a little more slowly. When we have support at Headquarters matters
advance faster, that is all. The real grievance against us is that,
though subordinate to the Medical Chiefs in Office, we are superior to
them in influence and in the chance of being heard at home. It is an
anomaly, but so is war in England." There had been in England no due
provision for all the needs of the war. Miss Nightingale, seeing things
that needed to be done, preferred to get them done by anomalous means
rather than that by rule they should not be done at all.
That her analysis of the situation correctly explains the jealousy and
opposition of the Medical Chiefs in Office may be gathered from their
correspondence. The personal situation in the Crimea had not been eased
by the statements of Mr. Bracebridge, already mentioned (p. 213). On his
return home, he had not only extolled Miss Nightingale, but had made
severe strictures upon the whole medical service in the East. His
speech, delivered at a public meeting, was reported very fully in the
_Times_ (Oct. 16, 1855). Miss Nightingale was doubtless suspected of
complicity in this attack; but in fact she was innocent, and she was
quite as angry as were the doctors when she saw the report. Mr.
Bracebridge was her friend, but truth and expediency were greater
friends; and she proceeded to give Mr. Bracebridge a trenchant piece of
her mind (Nov. 4). She objected to his speech: "_First_, because it is
not our business, and I have expressly denied being a medical officer,
and rejected all applications both of medical men and quacks to have
their systems examined[200]; _secondly_, because it justifies all the
attacks made against us for unwarrantable interference and criticism;
and, _thirdly_, because I believe it to be utterly unfair." And she
proceeded in much detail to defend the doctors against Mr. Bracebridge's
aspersions. His indiscretion doubtless raised prejudice in medical
quarters against Miss Nightingale; but there were other and deeper
causes at work. Dr. Hall, the Principal Medical Officer in the Crimea,
was, in some sort, the person most responsible, individually, for the
state of things which had stirred so much outcry in England; and Mr.
Sidney Herbert at a very early stage had put his finger on Dr. Hall's
touchy spot. "I cannot help feeling," he had written to Lord Raglan in
December 1854, "that Dr. Hall resents offers of assistance as being
slurs on his preparations."[201] Dr. Hall wrote fiercely about "a system
of detraction against our establishments kept up by interested parties
under the garb of philanthropy." Some became detractors, he went on, "to
make their mission of importance, and they wish the world to believe
that all the ameliorations in our institutions are entirely owing to
their own exertions or those of a few nurses; and I am sorry to say some
of our own department have pandered to this, and have been rewarded for
it." Miss Nightingale's remark upon this tirade was characteristic: "One
is tempted to ask, have no others been rewarded who have nothing to show
for the result of this same boasted hospital system, but the wreck of an
Army, which they did not advise even the most ordinary precautions (as
to diet and clothing) to prevent, and the graves at Scutari."[202] To
me, after much reading of the documents, it seems that Dr. Hall was the
victim of a false position. He had been appointed Medical
Inspector-General in the Crimea when he was still in India, and he did
not arrive on the scene in time to think out the preparations properly.
Miss Nightingale never allowed personal feeling to affect the
impartiality of her judgments. Dr. Hall disputed her authority and
resented her interference. She fought him, and in the end she beat him;
but there are passages in her letters which bear testimony to his good
services and high capacity in many respects. Nor were their personal
relations unfriendly; but she saw in him throughout an antagonist
influence. The Deputy Purveyor-in-Chief, Mr. David Fitz-Gerald, regarded
her coming to the Crimea with equal, or greater, suspicion and dislike,
and he sent home to the War Office a Confidential Report, criticizing
the female nursing establishment, and making out an argumentative case
against the desirability of sanctioning Miss Nightingale's claim to be
the Lady Superior of the Crimean nurses. Miss Nightingale had been shown
these reports by a friend, and she was angry at what she considered a
campaign of secret hostility against her.
[200] There are applications of the kind among Miss Nightingale's
papers.
[201] _Stanmore_, vol. i. p. 369.
[202] _Notes_, vol. i. sec. i. pp. xxiv.-v. In a private letter
Miss Nightingale's irony was more bitter. "K.C.B." meant, she
supposed, Knight of the Crimean Burial-grounds."
To add to the mischief, the professional difficulty (as I may call it)
became entangled with the religious difficulty. Some of the nuns who had
previously been assigned to the hospitals at Koulali, proceeded in
October 1855, at Dr. Hall's instance, to the General Hospital at
Balaclava. This was naturally regarded by Miss Nightingale as an act of
usurpation upon her authority; it gave an undue proportion of Roman
Catholics to a particular hospital; and, moreover, she did not consider
these particular ladies, or their Reverend Mother, Mrs. Bridgeman,
wholly efficient. They were most devoted and self-sacrificing, and their
spiritual ministrations were admirable, but as nurses and administrators
she thought less highly of them. Mr. Fitz-Gerald, on the other hand, was
strongly prepossessed, as independent observers thought, in their
favour. As ill-luck would have it, these ladies were for the most part
Irish, and the matter was made to assume the aspect of a
racial-religious feud. People who could not understand Miss
Nightingale's single-minded devotion to efficient and business-like
administration supposed that she was actuated by prejudice. Dr. Hall was
not moved by any such suspicion; but the ladies, whom Miss Nightingale
regarded as not among the more efficient of her staff of nurses, were
his nominees, and he strongly backed them. There was a somewhat similar
dispute about another transference of nurses in the Crimea made without
Miss Nightingale's sanction; and some of the women, taking their cue
from their superiors, were inclined to question and flout her authority.
"I don't know what she wants here," said one, when the Lady
Superintendent appeared on the scene.[203]
[203] _The Autobiography of a Balaclava Nurse_, vol. ii. p. 163.
III
All this controversy raised Miss Nightingale's vexation to white heat.
On January 7, 1856, she wrote an official letter to the War Office,
complaining of the encroachment on her department by the Medical
Officer. In semi-private letters to Mr. Sidney Herbert (Feb. 20, 21,
1856) she formulated her grievances. Dr. Hall was "attempting to root
her out of the Crimea." Other officials were traducing her behind her
back. The War Office was not adequately supporting her. "It is profuse,"
she said, "in tinsel and empty praise which I do not want, and does not
give me the real business-like efficient standing which I do want." She
begged Mr. Herbert to move in the House of Commons for the production of
correspondence, so that the public might be able to judge between her
and those who were traducing her, and striving to thwart her work. Mr.
Herbert, in a reply[204] marked alike by good sense and good feeling,
ventured "to criticize and to scold" his friend. "You have been
overdone," he said, "with your long, anxious, harassing work. You see
jealousies and meannesses all round you. You hear of one-sided, unfair,
and unjust reports made of your proceedings and of those under you. But
you over-rate their importance, you attribute too much motive to them,
and you write upon them with an irritation and vehemence which detracts
very much from the weight which would attach to what you say." There are
letters to show that this was the opinion also of the more sagacious
among Miss Nightingale's nearest friends. To move for papers would, Mr.
Herbert added, be very injudicious. There was no public attack, and the
publication of papers would call needless attention to disputes. The
answers to her critics, which she had sent home, appeared to Mr. Herbert
to be complete, and he understood that the War Office so considered
them. Moreover the Secretary of State was about to issue orders which
would clear up Miss Nightingale's position once and for all. And her own
letters, though conclusive as to the facts, had in their tone done
herself "less than justice."
[204] Printed _in extenso_ in _Stanmore_, vol. i. pp. 416-420.
All this was excellent advice, and Miss Nightingale took it in good
part, but not, in a phrase now sanctioned in high politics, "lying
down." She replied at great length and with full vigour. The gist of her
letter was that it was easy to be calm and "statesmanlike" at a
distance, but difficult not to be angry and downright when you were on
the spot finding your work for the sick and wounded hampered at every
turn. She had been criticized, among other things, for interference in
the Purveyor's sphere. Her reply to Mr. Herbert on this point is
decidedly effective, and incidentally throws light on the hardness of
her life in the Crimea. Happily, she said, she had brought with her
adequate supplies for herself and her staff. If she had not, they would
have been in danger of starvation:--
(_Miss Nightingale to Sidney Herbert._) CRIMEA, _April_ 4 [1856]. I
arrived here March 24 with Nurses for the two Land Transport
Hospitals required by Dr. Hall in writing on March 10.[205] We have
now been ten days without rations. Lord Cardigan was surprised to
find his horses die at the end of a fortnight because they were
without rations, and said that they "chose" to do it, obstinate
brutes! The Inspector-General and Purveyors wish to see whether
women can live as long as horses without rations. I thank God my
charge has felt neither cold nor hunger (and is in efficient
working order, having cooked and administered in both Hospitals the
whole of the extras for 260 bad cases ever since the first day of
their arrival). I have, however, felt both. I do not wish to make a
martyr of myself; within sight of the graves of the Crimean Army of
last winter (too soon forgotten in England), it would be difficult
to do so. I am glad to have had the experience. For cold and hunger
wonderfully sharpen the wits.... During these ten days I have fed
and warmed these women at my own private expense by my own private
exertions. I have never been off my horse till 9 or 10 at night,
except when it was too dark to walk home over these crags even with
a lantern, when I have gone on foot. During the greater part of the
day I have been without food necessarily, except a little brandy
and water (you see I am taking to drinking like my comrades of the
Army). But the object of my coming has been attained, and my women
have neither starved nor suffered.
[205] The letter is printed in _Hall_, p. 451.
The memory of the petty persecution to which she was subjected by
hostile and jealous officials in the Crimea never faded from Miss
Nightingale's mind. A reference to it will be found in a much later
chapter,[206] and she often mentioned it in her notes and letters. But,
though she fought the officials hard, she never showed temper in public,
and she did not allow either the obstruction itself or her vexation at
it to impede her work. She had come to the Crimea prepared, and her
private stores sufficed to feed her staff till official obstruction was
removed; whilst as for her vexation, she was careful not to show it lest
her work should suffer.
[206] Vol. II. p. 195.
Meanwhile a dispatch was already on its way from the War Department,
which gave to Miss Nightingale the full support for which she had asked.
The dispatch was not settled, however, without a stiff fight against it
by subordinates at the War Office, who sided with Sir John Hall and Mr.
Fitz-Gerald. The curious in such matters may consult the minutes and
counter-minutes upon Miss Nightingale's letter of protest preserved in
the archives of the War Office. Lord Panmure, however, took her view.
Even when the lines of the dispatch were settled in accordance with his
instructions, protests were still made against a policy which, in
supporting Miss Nightingale, would censure Dr. Hall, but the Minister
was not moved. He had already, on November 5, 1855, written to Miss
Nightingale herself, stating that Mrs. Bridgeman was not justified in
acting as she had done.[207] He now, on February 25, 1856, wrote to the
Commander of the Forces directing that Dr. Hall's attention should be
called to the irregularity of his proceeding in introducing nurses into
a Hospital without previous communication with Miss Nightingale, and
that the following statement should be issued:--
The Secretary of State for War has addressed the following dispatch
to the Commander of the Forces, with a desire that it should be
promulgated in General Orders: "It appears to me that the Medical
Authorities of the Army do not correctly comprehend Miss
Nightingale's position as it has been officially recognized by me.
I therefore think it right to state to you briefly for their
guidance, as well as for the information of the Army, what the
position of that excellent lady is. Miss Nightingale is recognized
by Her Majesty's Government as the General Superintendent of the
Female Nursing Establishment of the military hospitals of the Army.
No lady, or sister, or nurse is to be transferred from one hospital
to another, or introduced into any hospital, without consultation
with her. Her instructions, however, require to have the approval
of the Principal Medical Officer in the exercise of the
responsibility thus vested in her. The Principal Medical Officer
will communicate with Miss Nightingale upon all subjects connected
with the Female Nursing Establishment, and will give his directions
through that lady."[208]
[207] See _Hall_, p. 438.
[208] _Hall_, p. 450. The text of the General Order as issued on
March 16 was printed in the _Times_ of April 1, 1856.
Miss Nightingale's strong feeling in this matter was not caused, as a
hasty, prejudiced, or uncharitable judgment might suggest, by wounded
_amour propre_. It was based on the conviction which experience had
given her, that only by the strictest discipline exercised through
properly constituted authority, could the experiment of female nursing
in military hospitals be made successful. In the Confidential Reports
which were sent to the War Office criticizing the experiment, advantage
was taken of mistakes and misdeeds which Miss Nightingale felt that she
might have prevented had she been armed earlier with explicit and
plenary authority.[209]
[209] See on this subject her Report to the Secretary of State,
_Subsidiary Notes_, pp. 1, 2.
Armed with this full authority, Miss Nightingale proceeded to make such
transferences among the nurses as she deemed necessary in the cause of
efficiency. She had no desire to remove Mrs. Bridgeman and the nuns; she
was anxious only to make some reforms in their administration, as she
would now have express authority to do; and she begged Mrs. Bridgeman to
remain. Sir John Hall and the Deputy Purveyor-in-Chief, smarting under
the War Office's edict, seem to have laid their heads together, and
advised Mrs. Bridgeman to resign.[210] "It must rest with you to
decide," wrote Sir John, "whether you wish to remain subservient to the
control of Miss Nightingale or not." She and her Sisterhood, resigning
forthwith (March 28), returned to England, and Miss Nightingale filled
their places by others of the staff. In her retrospect of the whole
campaign, she regarded the spring of 1856 in the Crimea as one of the
three periods when her nurses gave the greatest proof of their
utility.[211] There was then great sickness among the Land Transport
Corps. The other two periods were on the arrival of the wounded from
Inkerman at Scutari (p. 181), and "during the heavy summer work of
nursing the wounded at Balaclava in 1855." There is, I think, no
memorial of Miss Nightingale in the Crimea. But on the heights above
Balaclava, visible from a great distance at sea, is a tall marble cross,
erected to the memory of the heroic dead, "and to those Sisters of
Charity who had fallen in their service." The words engraved upon it
are, "Lord, have mercy upon us."[212]
[210] See the letters printed in _Hall_, p. 457.
[211] _Notes_, p. 158.
[212] It has often been stated that the cross was erected by
Miss Nightingale, but this is not the case. The inscription was
suggested by Mrs. Shaw Stewart. In 1863 a Maternity Charity was
established at Constantinople "in honour of Florence Nightingale."
Miss Nightingale was much exhausted by her labours in the Crimea, and, a
few weeks before she left it for the last time, she wrote some
testamentary dispositions which, in the event of her death, were to be
handed to General Storks, in command at Scutari: "As you," she wrote to
him (Balaclava, May 3, 1856), "are of all those in office, whether at
home or abroad, the officer who has given the most steady and consistent
support to the work entrusted to me by Her Majesty's Government, I
venture to appeal to you to continue that support after my death, and to
carry out as far as possible my last requests." She expressed an
"earnest desire" that Mrs. Shaw Stewart should be appointed to succeed
her. She left messages of commendation and pecuniary gifts to the
Reverend Mother of the Bermondsey Nuns, Sister Bertha Turnbull, and Mrs.
Roberts: "To the Queen I beg humbly to restore the 'Order' with which
Her Majesty was pleased to decorate me. If she sees fit to return it to
my family, it will be prized the more by them. I cannot express the
support which the approbation of my Sovereign has been to me in all my
trials. But I would assure Her that neither by word or thought or deed
have I ever for one moment been unworthy of Her service or of the
charge entrusted to me by Her. I would wish the Commander of the Forces
in the East, in restoring to Her this jewel, to assure Her of this."
There were other requests, but her last thought was of the Army: "I
would wish that I could have done something more to prove to the noble
Army, whom I have so cared for, my respect and esteem. If the Commander
of the Forces would put into General Orders a message of farewell from
me, of remembrance of the time when we lived and suffered and worked
together, I should be grateful to him." She was to be spared to render
services to the British Army greater than any she had been able to
render in the Crimea.
IV
At Scutari, during the last months of Miss Nightingale's sojourn (Nov.
1855--March 1856, and July 1856), her work was as continuous as in the
Crimea. Her companions, Mr. and Mrs. Bracebridge, had returned to
England in August 1855, and their place was taken by Mrs. Samuel Smith.
From her letters we get a glimpse of Florence's daily toil at Scutari.
"Mine," wrote the aunt (Dec. 31, 1855), "is mere copying; hers is
perplexing brain-work. I go to bed at 11; she habitually writes till 1
or 2, sometimes till 3 or 4; has in the last pressure given up 3 whole
nights to it. We seldom get through even our little dinner (after it has
been put off one, two, or three hours on account of her visitors),
without her being called away from it. I never saw a greater picture of
exhaustion than Flo last night at ten (Jan. 7). 'Oh, do go to bed,' I
said. 'How can I; I have all those letters to write,' pointing to the
divan covered with papers. 'Write them to-morrow.' 'To-morrow will bring
its own work.' And she sat up the greater part of the night." But with
all this pressure, there was no flurry. "Such questions as food, rest,
temperature," wrote her aunt in another letter (Jan. 25, 1856), "never
interfere with her during her work; I suppose she has gained some
advantage over other people in her entire absence of thought about these
things; that is, her mind overtasked with great things has not these
little questions to entertain. She is extremely quick and clear too, as
you know, in her work. This I suppose has increased upon her, and she
can turn from one thing or one person to another, when in the midst of
business, in a most extraordinary manner. She has attained a most
wonderful calm and presence of mind. She is, I think, often deeply
impressed, and depressed, though she does not show it outwardly, but no
irritation of temper, no hurry or confusion of manner, ever appears for
a moment." Mrs. Smith's work was not only copying. Mrs. Bracebridge had
called herself "Boots," because she did all Florence's odd jobs, and to
this part Mrs. Smith had succeeded. "Aunt Mai," who had helped so
greatly in Florence's struggle for independence, must have felt rewarded
for her self-sacrifice in leaving husband, home, and children, by being
able to stand at her niece's side through some part of the life of
action.
For Christmas Day (1855) Miss Nightingale accepted an invitation to the
British Embassy, and another guest has drawn a picture of her on this
occasion:--
By the side of the Ambassadress was a tall, fashionable, haughty
beauty. But the next instant my eye wandered to a lady modestly
standing on the other side of Lady Stratford. At first I thought
she was a nun, from her black dress and close cap. She was not
introduced, and yet Edmund and I looked at each other at the same
moment to whisper _Miss Nightingale_. Yes, it was Florence
Nightingale, greatest of all now in name and honour among women. I
assure you that I was glad not to be obliged to speak just then,
for I felt quite dumb as I looked at her wasted figure and the
short brown hair combed over her forehead like a child's, cut so
when her life was despaired of from a fever but a short time ago.
Her dress, as I have said, was black, made high to the throat, its
only ornament being a large enamelled brooch, which looked to me
like the colours of a regiment surmounted with a wreath of laurel,
no doubt some graceful offering from our men. To hide the close
white cap a little, she had tied a white crape handkerchief over
the back of it, only allowing the border of lace to be seen; and
this gave the nun-like appearance which first struck me on her
entering the room; otherwise Miss Nightingale is by no means
striking in appearance. Only her plain black dress, quiet manner
and great renown told so powerfully altogether in that assembly of
brilliant dress and uniforms. She is very slight, rather above the
middle height; her face is long and thin, but this may be from
recent illness and great fatigue. She has a very prominent nose,
slightly Roman; and small dark eyes, kind, yet penetrating; but her
face does not give you at all the idea of great talent. She looks a
quiet, persevering, orderly, lady-like woman.... She was still very
weak, and could not join in the games, but she sat on a sofa, and
looked on, laughing until the tears came into her eyes.[213]
[213] Letter from Lady Hornby to her sister Mrs. Vaillant, Jan. 5, 1856;
_Hornby_, pp. 150, 152. The enamelled brooch was the Queen's jewel.
It was during this latter portion of Miss Nightingale's sojourn at
Scutari that she made a new friendship, which was of some importance to
her work. In October 1855 Colonel Lefroy,[214] confidential adviser on
scientific matters to the Secretary for War, was sent out by Lord
Panmure to report privately on the state of the hospitals. He formed a
high opinion of Miss Nightingale's work and abilities, and a friendship
with her then began which continued to the end of his life. Lord
Panmure's confidence in her, and the full authority with which, as
already related (p. 292), he invested her, were partly due to Colonel
Lefroy's reports.[215] At the time when the matter was under discussion,
he had returned to his post at the War Office, and the papers were sent
to him. His view of the case was the same as Miss Nightingale's, and he
expressed it with a force inspired by his personal observation, alike of
her services and of her difficulties. The medical men, he wrote in one
minute, are jealous of her mission. "Dr. Hall would gladly upset it
to-morrow." "A General Order," he wrote in another minute, "recognizing
and defining her position would save her much annoyance and harassing
correspondence. It is due, I think, to all she has done and has
sacrificed. Among other reasons for it, it will put a stop to any spirit
of growing independence among these ladies and nurses who are still
under her, a spirit encouraged with no friendly intention in more than
one quarter." For many years Colonel Lefroy was one of Miss
Nightingale's most constant correspondents on subjects connected with
military hospitals and nurses, and they often co-operated in schemes for
the welfare of the soldiers. Colonel Lefroy's services to the army,
both in scientific matters and in philanthropic directions, were long
and distinguished. Miss Nightingale had detractors and opponents in the
service; but the more progressive an officer was, the more probably may
he be included among her admirers and supporters.
[214] John Henry Lefroy (1817-90), Lieut. R.A., 1837; engaged in a
magnetical survey, 1839-42; F.R.S., 1848; at the War Office,
1854-57; inspector-general of army schools, 1857; afterwards
governor successively of the Bermudas and Tasmania; K.C.M.G., 1877.
[215] See a letter of Sidney Herbert printed in _Stanmore_, vol. i.
p. 417.