Florence Nightingale: The Woman and Her Legend

"Yes, the dynamic of the relationship between Florence Nightingale and Mary Seacole is very interesting. They did know each other because Mary was given a letter of introduction to Florence on her way out to the Crimea. So she called in at the hospital in Scutari and had a rather frosty interview with Florence. Florence very kindly said that Mary could stay in the washer woman’s quarters if she needed overnight accommodation that night. Mary took up that offer. Also, they met a couple of times on the battlefield because Florence, although she was based in Scutari, did go up to the Crimean peninsula. “You have to pinch yourself sometimes when you’re gently relating the story of Mary’s life” Florence was extremely suspicious of Mary Seacole. She was quite scathing about her in later life. I think that’s because she just didn’t understand Mary’s approach. As Mark Bostridge shows in this fantastic biography—it must be the definitive biography—Florence’s approach to medicine and to nursing was stringently clinical. That was her contribution to public health and is still recognised as such. She was a clear-eyed statistician who saw what needed to be done and how that could be achieved. Mary was far more holistic. I think that’s something to do with her mother’s influence back home in Kingston. It was important to her to make people feel better, as well as for them clinically to be rid of disease. And if that meant giving them a beaker of sherry or a large hug, whether they were the meanest private or the highest general, then that’s what she would do. Florence didn’t understand and mistrusted that approach. It’s irritating to me that Mary is called ‘the Black Nightingale’ because they were completely different people. What they did in the Crimea and elsewhere was complementary. This divisive approach is not helpful to either of them. It is. It’s a very engaging biography, more engaging than Florence Nightingale herself was, I think. It says a lot about her context, both within her family and within her society. When I read it I felt for the first time I really understood Florence Nightingale as a person, rather than as an icon, and that’s important."