Letter from Sidney Herbert asking Florence Nightingale taking a party of nurses to the Crimea

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Dear Miss Nightingale,

You will have seen in the papers that there is a great deficiency of nurses at the Hospital of Scutari.

The other alleged deficiencies, namely of medical men, link, sheets, etc., must, if they have really ever existed, have been remedied ere this, as the number of medical officers with the Army amounted to one to every 95 men in the whole force, being nearly double what we have ever had before, and 30 more surgeons went out 3 weeks ago, and would by this time, therefore, be at Constantinople. A further supply went on Thursday, and a fresh batch sail next week.

As to medical stores, they have been sent out in profusion; lint by the ton weight, 15,000 pairs of sheets, medicine, wine, arrowroot in the same proportion; and the only way of accounting for the deficiency at Scutari, if it exists, is that the mass of stores went to Varna, and was not sent back when the Army left for the Crimea; but four days would have remedied this. In the meanwhile fresh stores are arriving.

But the deficiency of female nurses is undoubted, none but male nurses having ever been admitted to military hospitals.

It would be impossible to carry about a large staff of female nurses with the Army in the field. But at Scutari, having now a fixed hospital, no military reason exists against their introduction, and I am confident they might be introduced with great benefit, for hospital orderlies must be very rough hands, and most of them, on such on occasion as this, ver inexperienced ones.

I receive numbers of offers from ladies to go out, but they are ladies who have no conception of what an hospital is, nor of the nature of its duties; and they would, when the time came, either recoil from the work or be entirely useless, and consequently - what is worse - entirely in the way. Nor would these ladies probably ever understand the necessity, especially in a military hospital, of strict obedience to rule. . . .

There is but one person in England that I know of who would be capable of organising and superintending such a scheme; and I have been several times on the point of asking you hypothetically if, supposing the attempt were made, you would undertake to direct it.

The selection of the rank and file of nurses will be very difficult; no one knows it better than yourself. The difficulty of finding women equal to a task, after all, full of horrors, and requiring, besides knowledge and goodwill, great energy and great courage, will be great. The task of ruling them and introducing system among the, great; and not the least will be the difficulty of making the whole work smoothly with the medical and military authorities out there. This it is which makes it so important that the experiment should be carried out by one with a capacity for administration and experience. A number of sentimental enthusiastic ladies turned loose into the Hospital at Scutari would probably, after a few days, be mises a la porte by those whose business they would interrupt, and whose authority they would dispute.

My question simply is, Would you listen to the request to go and superintend the whole thing? You would of course have plenary authority over all the nurses, and I think I could secure you the fullest assistance and co-operation from the medical staff, and you would also have an unlimited power of drawing on the Government for whatever you thought requisite for the success of your mission. On this part of the subject the details are too many for a letter, and I reserve it for our meeting; for whatever decision you take, I know you will give me every assistance and advice.

I do not say one word to press you. You are the only person who can judge for yourself which of conflicting of incompatible duties is the first, or the highest; but I must not conceal from you that I think upon your decision will depend the ultimate success or failure of the plan. Your own personal qualities, your knowledge and your power of administration, and among greater things your rank and position in Society give you advantages in such a work which no other person possesses.

If this succeeds, an enormous amount of good will be done now, and to persons deserving everything at our hands; and a prejudice will have been broken through, and a precedent established, which will multiply the good to all time.

I hardly like to be sanguine as to your answer. If it were "yes", I am certain the Bracebridges would go with you and give you all the comfort you would require, and which their society and sympathy only could give you. I have written very long, for the subject is very near to my heart. Liz is writing to Mrs Bracebridge to tell her what I am doing. I go back to town tomorrow morning. Shall I come to you between 3 and 5? Will you let me have a line at the War Office to let me know?

There is one point which I have hardly a right to touch upon, but I know you will pardon me. If you were inclined to undertake this great work, would Mr and Mrs Nightingale give their consent? The work would be so national, and the request made to you proceeding from the Government who represent the nation comes at such a moment, that I do not despair of their consent. Deriving your authority from the Government, your position would secure the respect and consideration of every one, especially in a service where official rank carries so much weight. This would secure to you every attention comfort on your way and there, together with a complete submission to your orders. I know these things are a matter of indifference to you except so far as they may further the great objects you have in view; but they are of importance in themselves, and of every importance to those who have a right to take an interest in your personal position and comfort.

I know you will come to a wise decision. God grant it may be in accordance with my hopes!

Believe me, dear Miss Nightingale,

Ever yours,

SIDNEY HERBERT.

Letter from Queen Victoria to Lord Palmerston regarding the McNeill and Tullock report, on supplies in the Crimea

Taken from: Letters of Queen Victoria vol. iii pages 174-175

Queen Victoria to Viscount Palmerston

BUCKINGHAM PALACE, 16^th February 1856

The subject to which Lord Palmerston refers in his letter of last night, and upon which the Cabinet is going to deliberate to-day, has also caused the Queen much anxiety.

A Civil Commission is sent out by the Government to enquire into the conduct of the officers in command in the Crimea; this is done without any consultation with the Commander-in-Chief. They report to the Government, inculpating several general officers and others in high command; this report is not communicated to the military authorities, nor to the persons affected by it, but is laid on the table of both Houses of Parliament. These officers then for the first time find themselves accused under the authority of Government, and that accusation communicated to the Legislature without ever having been heard in answer or allowed an opportunity to defend themselves. It is stated in both Houses by the Government that the officers may send papers in reply if they choose! But who is to be the Judge on the trial? The Press, of course, and the Times as the head, have already judged and condemned and the House of Commons is now moving in default of another Judge to constitute its tribunal by a Committee of Enquiry.

It is quite evident if matters are left so, and military officers of the Queen's Army are to be judged as to the manner in which they have discharged their military duties before an enemy by a Committee of the House of Commons, the command of the Army is at once transferred from the Crown to that Assembly.

This result is quite inevitable if the Government appear as accusers, as they do by the report of their Commission, and then submit the accusation for Parliament to deal with, without taking any steps of their own!

The course suggested by Sir James Graham and alluded to by Lord Palmerston, of following the precedent of the enquiry into the Convention of Cintra, appears therefore to the Queen to be the only prudent one.

The Queen thinks it most unfair to the officers to publish their statements beforehand, as these will not go before fudges feeling the weight of their responsibility, but before the newspapers who are their sworn enemies and determined to effect their ruin, for which they possess unlimited means.

The Queen wishes Lord Palmerston to read this letter to the Cabinet.

Letter from Dr Sutherland to Florence Nightingale regarding her visit to Lord Panmure, about her experiences in the Crimea.

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My Dear Miss Nightingale,

I have just received your letter of the 24^th, and am very glad to find you are so well as to write so long a letter containing so many questions. Depend on the whole matter being kept by me in strict confidence, and I now proceed to give you (the) best advice I can.

I hope you will enjoy your visit to Balmoral. It is a beautiful spot. You will also no doubt go to Birkdale where I am sure you will meet with a warm reception. I Dined with Sir James the other day and we talked over 'your case' but I fear from the character of your letter that you have already escaped our hands.

I am yours ever faithfully

John Sutherland

Letter from Robert Lowe to Florence Nightingale regarding her disapproval of Mr Simon 26th February 1864

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My Dear Miss Nightingale,

I should be glad to do anything in my power for the reform of hospitals but unhappily, my bolt is soon shot, and when I have laid the report which I have directed on the table of the House I have done all in my power.

I am sorry that you do not approve of Mr Simon, my official adviser. I have no pretensions to the knowledge which would enable me to form a judgement of his medical acquirements, but having had four years` experience of him I can say with great sincerity that he is singularly well informed with a great appetite for knowledge of all kinds and a most ardent zeal for sanitary reform as he understands it.

I cannot help feeling that you have met with those who have created an undue prejudice in your mind against him. The medical world has its factions as well as the political, and we would all cut strange figures if we were to be judged by the report of our antagonists. As a proof that Simon had not overlooked the subject of hospitals I may refer to pp. 18, 19, 36-40 of his report in 194 V (sic) on preventable disease, where he expatiates on the effects of ventilation and drainage on puerperal fever an erysipelas.

Will you allow me to point out what appears to me to be an oversight in your book on hospitals? You speak of hospitals as unhealthy (in a bad sense) because there is a large percentage of deaths to beds. In one sense every hospital ought to be unhealthy, that is, (that is the better it is conducted) the more unhealthy it will be.

Is it not rather in the number of patients received into the hospital in the course of the year, and the severity of the case, that the percentage of deaths to beds depends, and is it not quite unanswerable that a hospital may be unhealthy from bad management and yet show a small percentage of deaths because few people get to it? Before we infer the unhealthiness of a hospital from the percentage of deaths to beds, we ought to know how many people have occupied the beds in the course of the year.

It seems to me that this error vitiates the argument from statistics which is assumed to improve that the unhealthiness country hospital as 90 to 39. A better test I should have thought would have been the prevalence of hospital diseases. Pray excuse this long letter.

I have not of course shown your letter to Simon. Had I been able to do so he would, I do not doubt, have made a very different case for himself that I in my ignorance can do for him.

Believe me always in sincere respect.

ROBERT LOWE

Section of a Letter from Mr David Gregg regarding conditions in the Crimea 27 July 1855

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In the Courier of 11 July which I have just received I am sorry to see a letter extracted from the Times headed `Neglect of the Wounded in the Crimea,` on the 18th June.  I am sorry to see such a letter as I can tell you it is a lie from beginning to end and calculated not only to alarm the good folks at home but to hurt the service itself - I lived longer in Scutari Hospital that Mr Stafford and I must say I never saw what he describes.  The gentle men who writes the present article must either be mad or a most consummate fool, and ought to be drummed out of the service to the `rougue`s march.`  He said he could not get drinking cups, water, food, splints, etc.  Why?  Because he was an ass and did not know where to get them as he should have done.  I have never yet applied in vain for anything which would be of use to my patients, even to calf`s foot jelly, lemon jelly, soups, turtle soup or even champagne.  Everything can be got if you go the right way about it

Section of a Letter from Assistant Surgeon Arthur Henry Taylor regarding the Crimea 2 January 1855

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I went to Scutari to see the grand hospital there and was greatly pleased with the comfort of the men and arrangements, and astonished at the extent and excellence of the accommodation afforded.  The men are placed in long galleries with wards off them and all are clean and well ventilated.  It was the grand barracks of the Sultan`s troops; along the walls are fixed well-made racks for arms.  As a barracks its arrangements are very good and deserve credit.  It is the only good thing I have seen in Turkey.  As a hospital it is nearly perfect as can be imafined when its extent and hasty adoption for the purpose is considered.  However, unfortunately at present fever of a bad type has made its appearance and has carried off many men.

I did not see Miss Nightingale herself but I met several others of the `sympathizers` as we call them.  They all dress in plain black woollen dresses with unbleached linen aprons and a scarf across the shoulders from right to left embroidered in red thread with the words `Scutari Hospital,` it gives them quite a marial uniform appearance.  They all go about slip-shod and very meek looking but evidently proud of their office.  The M.O.`s say they are very kind and do a great deal of good but are very much in the way