The New Student's Reference Work/Nightingale, Florence

Nightingale, Florence, an English philanthropist, daughter of William Edward Nightingale, was born at Florence, Italy, in May, 1820, and during the course of her study of science, mathematics and classics with her father, showed a great desire to lessen human suffering, so much so that in 1844 she began a tour of Europe, looking into the condition of hospitals, and in 1851 entered upon a course of study as a trained nurse at Kaiserswerth on the Rhine. On Nov. 4, 1854, the year of the outbreak of the Crimean War, she arrived at Scutari with thirty trained nurses and took charge of the military hospitals until the close in July of 1856. She then turned her attention to the improvement of the sanitary condition of the army, and wrote many books and papers on that and kindred subjects, among them Notes on Nursing, Notes on Hospitals, Life or Death in India, etc. She was the founder of St. Thomas’ Home in London for the training of nurses and the recipient of a cross from the late Queen Victoria and a bracelet from the sultan of Turkey. Longfellow praised her in Santa Filomena. See Life by S. A. Tooley. She died Aug. 13, 1910.