Letters of military surgeon depict Nightingale as no heroine
3 September 2007
The letters of a famous military surgeon have been purchased by the Wellcome Library, Europe's leading resource for the study of history of medicine, and reveal an opinion of Florence Nightingale a far cry from the heroic image that we have of her today.
Sir John Hall was Head of Medical Services during the Crimean War (1854-1856) and his letters, which are bound together in a book and were bought at Bonham's auction house for £4000, record his correspondence during the 1840s-1850s. Of particular note are his battles of control with Nightingale, who he referred to as the "petticoat imperium". Writing to his superiors he defends the army medical services from her criticisms, and pulls no punches in accusing her of arrogance and being an interfering busy body desperate for power. He states that her intervention deprived the army of perfectly good nurses who were working before her arrival.
Hall's judgement of Nightingale is given in a letter that he wrote in 1856 to Dr Andrew Smith in London, he says: "Miss Nightingale…shows an ambitious struggling after power inimical to the true interests of the medical department."
Hall started his military surgeon's career as the Napoleonic wars were ending, and in the late 1840s and 1850s he was stationed in South Africa and India. In June 1854, aged 60, he was sent to take charge of medical services in the Crimean War and was in the spotlight when Florence Nightingale criticised the provision. The military commission criticised him and his defence of the services came in the form of two pamphlets that he published in 1857 and 1858.
Florence Nightingale came to be known as 'The Lady of the Lamp', and was a pioneer of modern nursing. During the Crimean War reports began to filter back to Britain about the appalling conditions endured by the injured. On 21 October 1854, Nightingale and 38 volunteers travelled to Turkey across the Black Sea from the Crimea, where the main British camp was based. She and her nurses began to clean up the hospitals and equipment and drastically reorganise patient care.
After returning home to Britain she began collecting evidence before the Royal Commission on the health of the army, arguing that most of the soldiers were killed by poor living conditions. She later advocated sanitary living conditions of great importance and consequently reduced deaths in the army during peacetime.
Frances Norton, Head of the Wellcome Library explains: "The John Hall letter book adds to an already extensive collection of material held that we hold here at the Wellcome Library relating to Nightingale. Our other items include: the only known recording of her voice, made of a wax cylinder, which was taken for her famous speech in support of the Light Brigade Relief Fund made in response to a public scandal that erupted in May 1890; and a pair of her moccasins, which can be found on display in Wellcome Collection, our new public venue which on Euston Road."
Mike Findlay
Media Officer
Wellcome Trust
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m.findlay@wellcome.ac.uk
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