In
July 1853 Russia occupied territories in
the Crimea that had previously been controlled by Turkey.
Britain
and France
was concerned about Russian expansion and attempted to achieve a negotiation
withdrawal. Turkey, unwilling to grant concessions declared war on
Russia.
After the Russians destroyed the Turkish fleet at Sinope in the Black
Sea in November 1853, Britain and France joined the war against Russia.
On the 20th September 1854 the Allied army defeated the Russian army
at the battle of Alma River (September 1854) but the battle of Balaklava
(October 1854) was inconclusive.
Soon after British soldiers
arrived in Turkey, they began going down with cholera
and malaria.
Within a few weeks an estimated 8,000 men were suffering from these
two diseases.
When Mary
Seacole heard
about the cholera
epidemic she
travelled to London
to offer her services to
the British Army. There was considerable
prejudice against women's involvement in medicine and her offer was
rejected.
Newspaper
reports on the way the war was being conducted by
W. H. Russell of The Times led
to strong criticism of the British Army.
When the newspaper publicised
the fact that a large number of British soldiers were dying of cholera
there was a public outcry, and the government was forced to change
its mind. Florence
Nightingale
volunteered her services and was eventually given permission to take
a group of thirty-eight nurses to Turkey.
Nightingale found the conditions in the army hospital in Scutari appalling.
The men were kept in rooms without blankets or decent food. Unwashed,
they were still wearing their army uniforms that were "stiff
with dirt and gore". In these conditions, it was not surprising
that in army hospitals, war wounds only accounted for one death in
six. Diseases such as typhus, cholera
and dysentery were the main reasons
why the death-rate was so high amongst wounded soldiers.
Military officers and doctors objected to Nightingale's views on reforming
military hospitals. They interpreted her comments as an attack on
their professionalism and she was made to feel unwelcome. Nightingale
received very little help from the military until she used her contacts
at The Times to report details of
the way that the British Army treated its wounded soldiers. John
Delane, the editor of newspaper took up her cause, and after a
great deal of publicity, Nightingale was given the task of organizing
the barracks hospital after the battle of Inkerman and by improving
the quality of the sanitation she was able to dramatically reduce
the death-rate of her patients.
Although Mary
Seacole was an
expert at dealing with cholera,
her application to join Florence Nightingale's team was rejected.
Mary, who had become a successful business woman in Jamaica, decided
to travel to the Crimea at her own expense. She visited Nightingale
at her hospital at Scutari but once again Mary's offer of help was
refused.
Unwilling to accept defeat,
Mary Seacole started up a business called the British Hotel, a few
miles from the battlefront. Here she sold food and drink to the British
soldiers. With the money she earned from her business Mary was able
to finance the medical treatment she gave to the soldiers.
Whereas Florence
Nightingale and
her nurses were based in a hospital several miles from the front,
Mary Seacole treated her patients on the battlefield. On several occasions
she was found treating wounded soldiers from both sides while the
battle was still going on.
Sevastopol
fell to the Allied troops on 8th September 1855 and the new Russian
Emperor, Alexander II, agreed to sign a peace treaty at the Congress
of Paris in 1856.
Florence
Nightingale and Mary Seacole: Classroom Activities
(1)
Mary
Seacole wrote about the rejection
of her offer of help during the Crimean
War in her autobiography, Wonderful
Adventures of Mrs. Seacole (1857).
In my country, where people know our use, it would have been different;
but here (England) it was natural enough that they should laugh, good-naturedly
enough, at my offer... Once again I tried, and had an interview this
time with one of Miss Nightingale's companions. She gave me the same
reply, and I read in her face the fact, that had there been a vacancy,
I should not have been chosen to fill it... Was it possible that American
prejudices against colour had some root here? Did these ladies shrink
from accepting my aid because my blood flowed beneath a somewhat duskier
skin than theirs?
(2)
The Morning Advertiser (19 January, 1855)
She (Mary Seacole) is often
seen riding out to the front with baskets of medicines of her own
preparation, and this is particularly the case after an engagement
with the enemy.
(3)
Letter written by Sir John Hall, Inspector-General of Hospitals (30
June, 1856)
She (Mary Seacole) not only, from the knowledge she had acquired in
the West Indies, was enabled to administer appropriate remedies for
their ailments, but, what was of as much importance, she charitably
furnished them with proper nourishment, which they had no means of
obtaining except in hospital, and most of that class had an objection
to go into hospital.
(4)
Illustrated London News (24th
February, 1855)
Although the public have been presented with several portrait-sketches
of the lady who has so generously left this country to attend to the
sufferings of the sick and wounded at Constantinople, we have assurance
that these pictures are "singularly and painfully unlike".
We have, therefore, taken the most direct means of obtaining a sketch
of this excellent lady, in the dress she now wears, in one of "the
corridors of the sick".
(5)
Letter in The Times on the activities
of Florence Nightingale at Scutari (February, 1855)
Wherever there is disease in its most dangerous form, and the hand
of the spoiler distressingly nigh, there is that incomparable woman
sure to be seen; her benignant presence is an influence for good comfort
even amid the struggles of expiring nature. She is a 'ministering
angel' without any exaggeration in these hospitals, and, as her slender
form glides quietly along each corridor, every fellow's face softens
with gratitude at the sight of her.
(6)
Lady Alicia Blackwood, A Narrative of Personal Experiences and
Impressions during a Residence on the Bosphorous throughout the Crimean
War (1881)
She (Mary Seacole) had,
during the time of battle, and in the time of fearful distress, personally
spared no pains and no exertion to visit the field of woe, and minister
with her own hands such things as she could comfort, or alleviate
the sufferings of those around her; freely giving to such as could
not pay, and to many whose eyes were closing in death, from whom payment
could never be expected.
(7)
Report in The
Times newspaper on the Royal
Guards Regimental Dinner (26 August, 1856)
Among the visitors was Mrs Seacole, whose appearance awakened the
most rapturous enthusiasm. The soldiers not only cheered her, but
chaired her around the gardens, and she might have suffered from the
oppressive attentions of her admirers, were it not that two sergeants
of extraordinary stature gallantly undertook to protect her from the
pressure of the crowd. However, the excellent lady did not appear
in the least alarmed, but, on the contrary, smiled most graciously
and seemed highly gratified.
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