Nursing for Nightingale in
South Street, Mayfair, London|alt=Blue plaque for Nightingale in Mayfair Nightingale's lasting contribution has been her role in founding the modern nursing profession. She set an example of compassion, commitment to patient care and diligent and thoughtful hospital administration. The first official nurses' training programme, her
Nightingale School for Nurses, opened in 1860 and is now called the Florence Nightingale Faculty of Nursing and Midwifery at
King's College London. In 1912, the
International Committee of the Red Cross instituted the
Florence Nightingale Medal, which is awarded every two years to nurses or nursing aides for outstanding service. It is the highest international distinction a nurse can achieve and is awarded to nurses or nursing aides for "exceptional courage and devotion to the wounded, sick or disabled or to civilian victims of a conflict or disaster" or "exemplary services or a creative and pioneering spirit in the areas of public health or nursing education". Since 1965,
International Nurses Day has been celebrated on her birthday (12 May) each year. The
President of India honours nursing professionals with the "National Florence Nightingale Award" every year on International Nurses Day. The award, established in 1973, is given in recognition of meritorious services of nursing professionals characterised by devotion, sincerity, dedication and compassion. |alt=Nightingale Pledge The Florence Nightingale Declaration Campaign, established by nursing leaders throughout the world through the Nightingale Initiative for Global Health (NIGH), aims to build a global grassroots movement to achieve two
United Nations Resolutions for adoption by the UN General Assembly of 2008. They will declare: The International Year of the Nurse–2010 (the centenary of Nightingale's death); The UN Decade for a Healthy World – 2011 to 2020 (the bicentenary of Nightingale's birth). NIGH also works to rekindle awareness about the important issues highlighted by Florence Nightingale, such as preventive medicine and holistic health. As of 2016, the Florence Nightingale Declaration has been signed by over 25,000 signatories from 106 countries. During the
Vietnam War, Nightingale inspired many
US Army nurses, sparking a renewal of interest in her life and work. Her admirers include
Country Joe of
Country Joe and the Fish, who has assembled an extensive website in her honour. The Agostino Gemelli Medical School in Rome, the first university-based hospital in Italy and one of its most respected medical centres, honoured Nightingale's contribution to the nursing profession by giving the name "Bedside Florence" to a wireless computer system it developed to assist nursing.
Hospitals Four hospitals in Istanbul are named after Nightingale: Florence Nightingale Hospital in
Şişli (the biggest private hospital in Turkey), Metropolitan Florence Nightingale Hospital in Gayrettepe, European Florence Nightingale Hospital in
Mecidiyeköy, and Florence Nightingale Hospital in
Kadıköy, all belonging to the Turkish Cardiology Foundation. In 2011, an appeal was made for the former
Derbyshire Royal Infirmary hospital in Derby, England to be named after Nightingale. It was suggested the name could be either Nightingale Community Hospital or Florence Nightingale Community Hospital. The area where the hospital is situated is sometimes referred to as the "Nightingale Quarter". During the
COVID-19 pandemic, a number of temporary
NHS Nightingale Hospitals were set up in readiness for an expected rise in the number of patients needing critical care. The first was housed in the
ExCeL London and several others followed across England. Celebrations to mark her bicentenary in 2020, were disrupted by the coronavirus pandemic and Nightingale's contribution to scientific and statistical analysis of infectious disease and nursing practice may have led to the new temporary hospitals being in her name, in Scotland named the
NHS Louisa Jordan after a nurse who followed in Nightingale's footsteps in battlefield nursing in
World War One. The Nightingale-Macmillan continuing care unit is now at the
Royal Derby Hospital, formerly known as The City Hospital, Derby. A
stained glass window was commissioned for inclusion in the DRI chapel in the late 1950s. When the chapel was demolished the window was removed and installed in the replacement chapel. At the closure of the DRI, the window was again removed and stored. In October 2010, () was raised to reposition the window in
St Peter's Church, Derby. The work features nine panels, of the original ten, depicting scenes of hospital life, Derby townscapes, and Nightingale herself. Some of the work was damaged and the tenth panel was dismantled for the glass to be used in the repair of the remaining panels. All the figures, who are said to be modelled on prominent Derby town figures of the early sixties, surround and praise a central pane of the triumphant Christ. A nurse who posed for the top right panel in 1959 attended the rededication service in October 2010. The
Florence Nightingale Museum at
St Thomas' Hospital in London reopened in May 2010 in time for the centenary of Nightingale's death. Another museum devoted to her is at her sister's family home,
Claydon House, now a property of the
National Trust. Upon the centenary of Nightingale's death in 2010, and to commemorate her connection with
Malvern, the
Malvern Museum held a Florence Nightingale exhibit with a school poster competition to promote some events. In Istanbul, the northernmost tower of the Selimiye Barracks building is now the Florence Nightingale Museum. and in several of its rooms, relics and reproductions related to Florence Nightingale and her nurses are on exhibition. When Nightingale moved on to the Crimea itself in May 1855, she often travelled on horseback to make hospital inspections. She later transferred to a mule cart and was reported to have escaped serious injury when the cart was toppled in an accident. Following this, she used a solid Russian-built black carriage, with a waterproof hood and curtains. The carriage was returned to England by Alexis Soyer after the war and subsequently given to the Nightingale training school. The carriage was damaged when the hospital was bombed during the Second World War. It was restored and transferred to Claydon House and is now displayed at the
Army Medical Services Museum in
Mytchett, Surrey, near
Aldershot. ,
Derby|alt=Florence Nightingale Statue in Derby A bronze plaque, attached to the plinth of the Crimean Memorial in the
Haydarpaşa Cemetery, Istanbul, Turkey and unveiled on
Empire Day, 1954, to celebrate the 100th anniversary of her nursing service in that region, bears the inscription: "To Florence Nightingale, whose work near this Cemetery a century ago relieved much human suffering and laid the foundations for the nursing profession." Other monuments of Nightingale include a statue at
Chiba University in Japan, a bust at
Tarlac State University in the Philippines, and a bust at
Gun Hill Park in Aldershot in the UK. Other nursing schools around the world are named after Nightingale, such as in
Anápolis in Brazil.
Audio Florence Nightingale's voice was saved for posterity in a
phonograph recording from 1890 preserved in the
British Library Sound Archive. The recording, made in aid of the
Light Brigade Relief Fund and available to hear online, says: When I am no longer even a memory, just a name, I hope my voice may perpetuate the great work of my life. God bless my dear old comrades of Balaclava and bring them safe to shore. Florence Nightingale.
Theatre The first theatrical representation of Nightingale was
Reginald Berkeley's
The Lady with the Lamp, premiering in London in 1929 with
Edith Evans in the title role. It did not portray her as an entirely sympathetic character and draws much characterisation from
Lytton Strachey's biography of her in
Eminent Victorians. In 2009, a stage musical play representation of Nightingale entitled
The Voyage of the Lass was produced by the Association of Nursing Service Administrators of the
Philippines. In 2019,
Nightingale, a stage musical produced by Pamela Gerke and directed by Rachel Rene, was performed in Seattle, Washington.
Film Florence Nightingale first appeared on screen in the silent era.
The Victoria Cross (1912) starred
Julia Swayne Gordon and was a biographical film; and
Florence Nightingale (1915) featured
Elisabeth Risdon. In 1936,
The White Angel starred
Kay Francis as Nightingale, depicting Florence Nightingale's pioneering work in nursing during the Crimean War. Her appearances in theatre returned to British cinema in
The Lady with a Lamp (1951), directed by
Herbert Wilcox and starring
Anna Neagle, based on a 1929 stage play. In 1993,
Nest Entertainment released an animated
Florence Nightingale for younger audiences.
Television Portrayals of Nightingale on television, in documentary as in fiction, vary – the BBC's 2008
Florence Nightingale, featuring
Laura Fraser, emphasised her independence and feeling of religious calling, but in Channel 4's 2006
Mary Seacole: The Real Angel of the Crimea, she is portrayed as narrow-minded and opposed to
Mary Seacole's efforts. Other various notable productions are:
Jaclyn Smith in the 1985 television biopic
Florence Nightingale,
Emma Thompson in an ITV comedy series
Alfresco episode (1983),
Janet Suzman in the 1974 stage-style biographical production
Miss Nightingale, Julie Harris in the
Hallmark Hall of Fame episode “
The Holy Terror” (1965), and
Sarah Churchill in the episode “Florence Nightingale” (1952).
Banknotes and coins issued in 2010 celebrating Nightingale and nursing|alt=2010 £2 coin celebrating Nightingale. Florence Nightingale's image appeared on the reverse of
£10 banknotes issued by the
Bank of England from 1975 until 1994. As well as a standing portrait, she was depicted on the notes in a field hospital, holding her lamp. Nightingale's note was in circulation alongside the images of
Isaac Newton,
William Shakespeare,
Charles Dickens,
Michael Faraday,
Sir Christopher Wren, the
Duke of Wellington and
George Stephenson, and prior to 2002, other than the female monarchs, she was the only woman whose image had ever adorned British paper currency. The photo shows her reading outside her family home in Embley Park, Hampshire. A black-and-white photograph taken in about 1907 by
Lizzie Caswall Smith at Nightingale's London home in South Street, Mayfair, was auctioned on 19 November 2008 by Dreweatts auction house in
Newbury, Berkshire, England, for (), which is the last currently-known photo of her. The picture shows her in Claydon House, Buckinghamshire.
Biographies The first biography of Nightingale was published in England in 1855. In 1911,
Edward Tyas Cook was authorised by Nightingale's executors to write the official life, published in two volumes in 1913. Nightingale was also the subject of one of Lytton Strachey's four mercilessly provocative biographical essays,
Eminent Victorians. Strachey regarded Nightingale as an intense, driven woman who was both personally intolerable and admirable in her achievements.
Cecil Woodham-Smith, like Strachey, relied heavily on Cook's
Life in her 1950 biography, though she did have access to new family material preserved at Claydon. In 2008, Mark Bostridge published a major new life of Nightingale, almost exclusively based on unpublished material from the Verney Collections at Claydon and from archival documents from about 200 archives around the world, some of which had been published by Lynn McDonald in her sixteen-volume edition of the
Collected Works of Florence Nightingale (2001—2012). Several churches in the
Anglican Communion commemorate Nightingale with a feast day on their
liturgical calendars. The
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America commemorates her as a
Renewer of Society with
Clara Maass on 13 August.
Florence Li Tim-Oi, the first woman ordained priest in the Anglican Communion, in 1944, took Florence as her baptismal name after Florence Nightingale.
Washington National Cathedral celebrates Nightingale's accomplishments with a double-lancet stained glass window featuring six scenes from her life, designed by artist Joseph G. Reynolds and installed in 1983. The
US Navy ship the was commissioned in 1942. Beginning in 1968, the
US Air Force operated a fleet of 20
C-9A "Nightingale" aeromedical evacuation aircraft, based on the
McDonnell Douglas DC-9 platform. The last of these planes was retired from service in 2005. In 1981, the asteroid
3122 Florence was named after her. A Dutch
KLM McDonnell-Douglas MD-11 (registered
PH-KCD) was also named in her honour; it served the airline for 20 years, from 1994 to 2014. Nightingale has appeared on international postage stamps, including, the UK,
Alderney, Australia, Belgium, Dominica, Hungary (showing the Florence Nightingale medal awarded by the International Red Cross), and Germany. Florence Nightingale is
remembered in the
Church of England with a
commemoration on 13 August. Celebrations to mark her bicentenary in 2020, were disrupted by the
coronavirus pandemic, but the
NHS Nightingale hospitals were named after her. Nightingale Road () in
Hong Kong, between the
Queen Elizabeth Hospital and the nursing school, was officially named by the
Lands Department after Florence Nightingale in 2008. == Works ==