When Nightingale was 17 years old, she refused a marriage proposal from a “suitable” gentleman, Richard Monckton Milnes. During the Victorian Era, a young lady of Nightingale’s social stature was expected to marry a man of means-not take up a job that was viewed as lowly menial labor by the upper social classes. In fact, her parents forbade her to pursue nursing. When Nightingale approached her parents and told them about her ambitions to become a nurse, they were not pleased. She believed it to be her divine purpose. By the time she was 16 years old, it was clear to her that nursing was her calling. Florence was raised on the family estate at Lea Hurst, where her father provided her with a classical education, including studies in German, French and Italian.įrom a very young age, Florence Nightingale was active in philanthropy, ministering to the ill and poor people in the village neighboring her family’s estate. Florence’s father was William Shore Nightingale, a wealthy landowner who had inherited two estates-one at Lea Hurst, Derbyshire, and the other in Hampshire, Embley Park-when Florence was five years old.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |