Emma Fischel - Florence Nightingale

www.franklinwatts.co.uk This ebook edition published in 2012 Franklin Watts 338 Euston Road London NW1 3BH Franklin Watts Australia Level 17/207 Kent Street Sydney NSW 2000 Text first published as Famous People, Famous Lives: Florence Nightingale in 1997 text Emma Fischel 1997, 2012 illustrations Peter Kent 1997, 2012 The right of the author to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted. The right of the illustrator to be identified as the illustrator of this work has been asserted. ISBN 978 1 4451 1328 9 A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library. Series editor: Sarah Peutrill Original series editor: Sarah Ridley Artwork: Peter Kent (line), Lisa Williams (colour) Consultant: Dr Anne Millard Franklin Watts is a division of Hachette Childrens Books, an Hachette UK company. www.hachette.co.uk

Lets take a long trip round Europe, said Mrs Nightingale to Mr Nightingale, like other rich people do. By the time they got home they had had two daughters.

Each was named after the city she was born in. Parthenope and Florence. The Nightingales lived in a house in Derbyshire. It was a very big house, but not big enough for Mrs Nightingale. So they bought a bigger house in Hampshire too. Florence had lots of toys and pets to play with and twenty-seven cousins.

Life was very different then for girls. There was no school at all for poor girls and even rich ones werent taught much. Florence was, though, thanks to her father. Florences mother was worried. No one likes CLEVER girls! she said. Piano playing, embroidery, flower arranging thats what my daughter needs to learn! But Florence would grow up to do a lot more than flower arranging.

When Florence was seventeen the Nightingales went to Europe again. They visited many different places and had lots of fun. But Florence got bored in the end. She was glad when they arrived back home. Ive had enough of parties, she said. Id like to study maths now, please.

Her parents didnt think much of that idea. So Florence found something her parents WOULD let her do. She went visiting the poor and sick. She did her best to help them.

Florence wanted to learn more. I must work in a hospital now, she said.

Even her father got cross this time but, then, hospitals were not the same in those days. But one person was on her side. He was a very important man called Sidney Herbert. Nursing needs people like you, he said. If you really want to learn, then start with these! Florence took the books and studied every one of them in secret. We shall send you abroad, said her mother. We shall send you abroad, said her mother.

That will get this crazy notion of nursing out of your head once and for all! But it didnt. In fact, it did the opposite. While she was away Florence found just the place to learn, and this time no one was there to stop her. At the Kaiserwerth Institution hospital Florence got up at five every morning and worked late into the night. When she came home three months later, she found plenty of work to do right in her own house. As Florence nursed her sick family back to health, word was spreading about her.

Florence was asked to run a big hospital. She quickly found that running a big hospital meant doing everything. Then a horrible disease called cholera broke out. Soon thousands of people were ill. Florence moved to a big hospital packed with cholera victims. Her family worried about her.

Cholera was very easy to catch and many people died from it. But disease was not the only danger looming. The Crimean War was going on between Russia and Turkey. After a year, Britain and France joined in against Russia. Soon bad news came back. Wounded soldiers were taken to a hosptial in a place called Scutari in Turkey, but there were no nurses there to help the doctors.

Soldiers are dying needlessly. I must DO something, said Florence. So Florence wrote to Sidney Herbert just as Sidney Herbert wrote to Florence. Sidney asked Florence to run the hospital at Scutari.

Soon Florence and thirty-eight nurses set off for Turkey. They arrived at Scutari on the 4th November, 1854.

Florence was now thirty-four years old.

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