Dear Sir Hugh

I appreciate your giving Wendy Mathews and myself time for a meeting in April this year. Since then, as you know, the Lambeth Planning Committee approved the placing of that massive Seacole statue at St Thomas’. Since then also a group has been formed, The Nightingale Society, to promote understanding of Nightingale’s work and reputation, and to contradict misinformation circulated about them.

You stated at our meeting that the board intended no disrespect to Nightingale with its promotion of Seacole. You seemed to be under the misimpression that the Seacole Memorial Appeal Campaign was as high minded. You mentioned specifically that Lord Soley never spoke against Nightingale, nor are we aware that he has. Other members of the campaign, however, have and do, notably the vice-chair, Professor emeritus Elizabeth Anionwu, the major spokesperson in the Nursing Standard and in the various films and electronic material supporting the campaign.

Prominent in the Seacole campaign is the nursing union Unison, which in 1999 voted to “ditch” Nightingale as the model of nursing. Its spokesperson gave as reasons the fact that Nightingale was “white, middle class and Protestant.” Unison’s president and its head of nursing were named respectively Patron and Ambassador for the campaign.

The BBC “Knowledge” film on Seacole, in which Anionwu is the presenter, makes disparaging remarks about Nightingale and compares her unfavourably with Seacole. For example, Seacole is said to have won 4 medals for bravery, while Nightingale won none, when in fact Queen Victoria gave Nightingale a medal, which she never wore, and Seacole won no medals, although she wore three or four after the war in London–it was not then a criminal offence to wear military medals not your own, although it would be now.

Anionwu’s many articles and interviews in the Nursing Standard also make unfavourable comparisons, such as that Seacole got on well with her “medical colleagues,” while Nightingale did not (Anionwu 2010 18), although Nightingale worked for decades after the war with doctors she first knew there, and there is no evidence that any doctor recognized Seacole as a “medical colleague,” although several acknowledged her kindness, and liked her food at the British Hotel.

In the meeting Mrs Mathews and I had with you, you thought that the hospital website could acknowledge Nightingale’s importance and relevance for the hospital. When? How can we help?

I repeat my offer to give your board a briefing on Nightingale and Seacole, when I am next in London, and several well-informed people are available now who could give you a briefing.

Dear Mr Lansley

We are writing with concern about the decision made by the Guy’s-St Thomas’ NHS Trust board of directors to approve the use of a “prestigious” site at St Thomas’ for the placement of a statue honouring Mary Seacole. We do not at all oppose the honouring of Mrs Seacole with a statue, but its placement at St Thomas’, Nightingale’s hospital.

The decision was made with flagrant disregard of due process. The then chair of the board was Patricia Moberly, a government appointee (by a previous government). Experts were not consulted, nor were the governors or staff consulted or even informed. The Nightingale Fellowship, whose members were trained at St Thomas’ when it was the home of the Nightingale School, was similarly excluded.

• 23 November 2005, a note from the chair, Patricia Moberly, for the directors meeting, reports the approach by the Seacole Statue Appeal and agreement “that we should explore without commitment the possibility of a position on the St Thomas’ site,” the board to be informed “as the discussions progress.”
• 25 April 2007, at a board meeting, the director of Capital, Estates and Facilities (hardly an expert on the history of nursing) asked for and received approval for the celebration of the nursing work of both Seacole and Nightingale, although there was still to be exploration as to the “viability” of the development.
• 23 January 2008, at a board meeting the decision was announced as a fait accompli: “commitment to support a Mary Seacole statue at St Thomas’”.

The current hospital board has added to the violation of due process by issuing blatantly false information used in support of the earlier board’s decision (see below).

The placement of the statue at St Thomas’ was approved by the Lambeth Planning Committee at a meeting 12 April 2012, however at this meeting no consideration was given to the merits of honouring Seacole there, any connection she might have had with the hospital (none); only purely technical matters were allowed, and there were no technical objections. Some of us sent letters of objection to the planning officer, but these were dismissed, reasonably enough, as not pertinent to the committee’s terms of reference.

We have appealed to the current chair of the board of directors, Sir Hugh Taylor, but he simply ignores letters objecting to a decision made by his predecessor and an earlier board. Two of us had a meeting with him early in April 2012, but he seemed quite unfamiliar with our objections, even to the misinformation campaign–he preferred simply to go along with the earlier decision.

In addition to St Thomas’ being the home base for Nightingale’s work on nursing, she substantially influenced the design of the 19th century hospital, when it was a pioneer of the pavilion, safer, mode of hospital construction. (Three of the pavilions still stand: the others were destroyed in World War II and the new hospital is of the current high-right design).

Placement of the statue opposite the Houses of Parliament compounds the insult to Nightingale, who got two royal commissions established, greatly contributed to their work, wrote a brief for a major Parliamentary committee on workhouse infirmaries, and influenced Cabinet ministers and MPs on numerous matters of public health. As concerns about hospital safety and good patient care continue to be salient matters of public policy, it would be well to have her gaze at the Houses of Parliament unimpeded by a replacement, who did none of those things.

We note that Seacole herself had no grudge against Nightingale and made no claim to have pioneered nursing. We note that alternative sites have been suggested and are available for a Seacole statue, that do not disregard Nightingale’s great work and its home base.

We urge that you direct the Guy’s-St Thomas’ board of directors to withdraw the offer of a site for the Seacole statue at St Thomas’, withdraw the false statements it made to justify that offer, and issue a corrected statement to explain why the site is inappropriate for the purpose of honouring Seacole.

Dear Prime Minister

Florence Nightingale’s work was in so many respects for the whole nation and indeed for the better health of the world, without regard to party (she was a lifelong Liberal supporter, but of course worked with ministers of both parties). Perhaps the fact that you have a daughter with her name reflects an appreciation of her vision and work.

We forward you a copy of a letter sent to your secretary for health regarding the decision of the Guy’s-St Thomas’ NHS Trust board to give a “prestigious” site at St Thomas’ for a gigantic statue to honour another person, Mary Seacole, a statue of sufficient size to be seen from Parliament. As explained in the copied letter, we have no objection to honouring Seacole, but rather to her designation as the “Pioneer Nurse,” when she never claimed to be a nurse at all, at St Thomas’ Hospital, home of Nightingale’s truly pioneering nursing work.

The international dimensions of the insult need also to be considered. Contributions to the Nightingale Fund, which paid for the Nightingale School, came from around the world, and Nightingale repaid that obligation by sending out trained nurses to the world–beginning with Australia, Canada, America and Europe. Japanese nurses, notably, still visit St Thomas’ Hospital to pay tribute to the source of their own profession. Yet the plan is for another person to be the visible “Pioneer Nurse” at St Thomas’ and to correct the misinformation it has circulated.

This becomes a matter of government responsibility given that the decision was made, in flagrant disregard of due process and any considerations of due diligence, by an NHS board of government appointment. We urge that the present board be directed to withdraw the offer of a site for the Seacole statue.