untitled

Travel also played a part in Nightingale’s educa-
tion. Eighteen years after Florence’s birth, the
Nightingales and both daughters made an extended
tour of France, Italy, and Switzerland between the
years of 1837 and 1838 and later to Egypt and
Greece (Sattin, 1987). From there, Nightingale vis-
ited Germany, making her first acquaintance with
Kaiserswerth, a Protestant religious community
that contained the Institution for the Training of
Deaconesses, with a hospital school, penitentiary,
and orphanage. A Protestant pastor, Theodore
Fleidner, and his young wife had established this
community in 1836, in part to provide training for
women deaconesses (Protestant “nuns”) who
wished to nurse. Nightingale was to return there in
1851 against much family opposition to stay from
July through October, participating in a period of
“nurses training” (Cook, Vol. I, 1913; Woodham-
Smith, 1983).
Life at Kaiserswerth was spartan. The trainees
were up at 5 A.M., ate bread and gruel, and then
worked on the hospital wards until noon. Then
they had a 10-minute break for broth with vegeta-
bles. Three P.M. saw another 10-minute break for
tea and bread. They worked until 7 P.M., had some
broth, and then Bible lessons until bed. What the
Kaiserswerth training lacked in expertise it made
up for in a spirit of reverence and dedication.
Florence wrote, “The world here fills my life with
interest and strengthens me in body and mind”
(Huxley, 1975).
In 1852, Nightingale visited Ireland, touring
hospitals and keeping notes on various institutions
along the way. Nightingale took two trips to Paris
in 1853, hospital training again was the goal, this
time with the sisters of St. Vincent de Paul, an order
of nursing sisters. In August 1853, she accepted her
first “official” nursing post as superintendent of an
“Establishment for Gentlewomen in Distressed
Circumstances during Illness,” located at 1 Harley
Street, London. After six months at Harley Street,
Nightingale wrote in a letter to her father: “I am in
the hey-day of my power” (Nightingale, cited in
Woodham-Smith, 1983, p. 77).
By October 1854, larger horizons beckoned.

Spirituality

Today I am 30—the age Christ began his Mission.
Now no more childish things, no more vain things, no
more love, no more marriage. Now, Lord let me think

only of Thy will, what Thou willest me to do. O, Lord,

Thy will, Thy will....

—Florence Nightingale, private note, 1850, cited

in Woodham-Smith (1983, p. 130)

By all accounts, Nightingale was an intense and

serious child, always concerned with the poor and

the ill, mature far beyond her years. A few months

before her seventeenth birthday, Nightingale

recorded in a personal note dated February 7, 1837,

that she had been called to God’s service. What that

service was to be was unknown at that point in

time. This was to be the first of four such experi-

ences that Nightingale documented.

The fundamental nature of her religious convic-

tions made her service to God, through service to

The fundamental nature of her religious

convictions made her service to God,

through service to humankind, a driving

force in her life.

humankind, a driving force in her life. She wrote:

“The kingdom of Heaven is within; but we must

make it without” (Nightingale, private note, cited in

Woodham-Smith, 1983).

It would take 16 long and torturous years, from

1837 to 1853, for Nightingale to actualize her call-

ing to the role of nurse. This was a revolutionary

choice for a woman of her social standing and po-

sition, and her desire to nurse met with vigorous

family opposition for many years. Along the way,

she turned down proposals of marriage, potentially,

in her mother’s view, “brilliant matches,” such as

that of Richard Monckton Milnes. However, her

need to serve God and to demonstrate her caring

through meaningful activity proved stronger. She

did not think that she could be married and also do

God’s will.

Calabria and Macrae (1994) note that for

Nightingale there was no conflict between science

and spirituality; actually, in her view, science is nec-

essary for the development of a mature concept of

God. The development of science allows for the

concept of one perfect God who regulates the uni-

verse through universal laws as opposed to random

happenings. Nightingale referred to these laws, or

the organizing principles of the universe, as

“Thoughts of God” (Macrae, 1995, p. 9). As part of

God’s plan of evolution, it was the responsibility of

human beings to discover the laws inherent in the

CHAPTER 5 Florence Nightingale’s Legacy of Caring and Its Applications 41