LADY OF THE LAMP

Timaru Herald, Volume CXXXIX, Issue 20105, 11 May 1935, Page 4

LADY OF THE LAMP

BIRTHDAY FALLS TO-MORROW

RE-UNION OF NURSES To-morrow is the 115th anniversary of the birth of Florence Nightingale, and it brings to mind Longfellow’s poem “St. Filomena”:— A lady with a lamp shall stand In the great history of the land, A noble type of good, Noble womanhood. Florence Nightingale, the Lady of the Lamp, was born at Florence on May 12, 1820. Highly educated and brilliantly accomplished, she early exhibited an intense devotion to the alleviation of suffering, which in 1844 led her to give attention to the condition of hospitals. When she was only 17 the conviction that she should devote her life to nursing forced her to say to herself: ‘“The only way to make life real is to do something to relieve human suffering.” That was the call. After years of inspection of civil and military hospitals in Europe she went into training as a nurse in the instittftion of Protestant Deaconesses at Kaiserwerth, on the Rhine, and studied with the sisters of St. Vincent De Paul in Paris. On her return to England she put into thorough working order the sanatorium for governesses in Harley street. Ten years was the term of apprenticeship thus served in preparation for the work of her life. Unremitting Toil In the spring of 1854 war was declared with Russia; Alma was fought On September 20, and the wounded from the battle were sent down to the hospitals on the Bosphorus, which were soon crowded with sick and wounded, their unhealthy condition becoming apparent in the rate of mortality, to which the casualties of the fierce battle were as nothing. Florence Nightingale offered to go out and organise a nursing department at Scutari, and with thirty-four nurses she arrived at Constantinople on November 4, the eve of Inkermann—the beginning of the terrible winter campaign—in time to receive the wounded from that second battle. She saved the lives of many soldiers, but the cost was her own mental and physical health. She toiled unreipittingly in improving the hospitals. At the close of the Crimean War a fund of £50,000 was subscribed for the purpose of enabling her to form an institution for the training of nurses. From the Queen she received an autograph letter of thanks and a cross set with diamonds, and a bracelet set with brilliants from the Sultan of Turkey. Her experience in the Crimea turned the attention of Florence Nightingale to the general question of army sanitary reform, and first to that of army hospitals, her advice being sought from America and Europe. She assisted in founding the Red Cross Society. Hospital Sunday To bring before the world the noble services of the nursing profession and the hospitals National Hospital Week is held annually in England and America to coincide with the birthday of Florence Nightingale. The movement is spreading to other countries, and in Timaru to-morrow appropriate reference will be made to the day in the churches. A reunion of nurses is to be held at the Nurses’ Home to-night, and arrangements have been made for parties of girls from the secondary schools to visit the Hospital on dates to be arranged.