In reality, it was a vast, dilapidated, filthy set of barracks. Despite being classified as a 'General Hospital' it was assumed that the facilities would be more than adequate to the task. When cholera broke out among British troops at Varna, not long after their arrival, they were sent in ever increasing numbers to the Turkish Barrack Hospital in Scutari, Turkey. It was to be this contact that would lead to her most significant opportunity in the field of healthcare. Her social circle would include Sidney Herbert, the Secretary of War. Her social standing and education did open doors that may have been denied to women of a lower social standing of the era. In 1853 she was appointed superintendent of the Institution for the Care of Sick Gentlewomen in Harley Street. She became a recognised authority on hospitals and health care. She made herself an expert in public administration and the relatively new field of statistics - even more unusual for women at the time. She was a talented, determined lady who had a fine brain. She was more than just a caring individual. Her training included periods at the renowned hospitals at Kaiserwerth in Germany and the Maison de la Providence in Paris. In her first London 'Season', she took to inspecting military hospitals, and by the time she was thirty she had visited and worked in hospitals all over the continent. Indifferent to the charms of 'Society' and turning her back on marriage proposals, she spent her days studying official reports on health, sanitation and hospital conditions. And yet, Florence had felt a powerful calling and would not be diverted from her chosen path. How could such a cultured, wealthy, educated lady wish to spend her days with nurses whom everyone knew were a coarse, ignorant, disreputable class of female, all too often drunk or worse. 'It was as if I had wanted to be a kitchenmaid' said Florence of her family's horrified opposition to her plans to train as a nurse. However, she would not accept the social restrictions and ambitions of her parents and sought to carve out a life for herself. Her upbringing should have been conventional for a well-to-do family in Derbyshire. Florence Nightingale had been named after the Italian city of Florence where she was born in 1820 to a wealthy English family.
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