.jpg)
Mary Seacole
1805-14 May 1881
‘I have witnessed her devotion and her courage ... and I trust that England will never forget one who has nursed her sick, who sought out her wounded to aid and succour them and who performed the last offices for some of her illustrious dead."William Howard Russell
Was Born Mary Jane Grant in 1805 in Kingston (Jamaica), to a free black Jamaican woman and a white Scottish Officer in the British Army. This pioneer nurse is best known for her spectacular involvement in the Crimean War. Mary was proud of her Scottish roots and very much proud to be ‘Creole’. Even if society classified her has a multiracial person with limited political rights, she overcame stereotypes that they were lazy people.
Background
Being the daughter of a free Jamaican with a respectable business and a Scottish officer meant that Mary Seacole held a high position in the Jamaican society. Mary’s mother ran one of the best hotels in the city and a boarding house called ’Blundell Hall’ for disable European sailors and soldiers; she was also called a ‘doctress’. During those times Seacole acquired her nursing skills, by imitating her mother and minister to doll, then on to pets before she was able to help her mother with human patients. Growing up she spent some years living with an elderly woman whom she called ’kind patroness’, where she received a good education.
In 1821 being chaperoned she visited London and stayed over at relative for a year.
In 1825 Seacole returns back to Jamaica, it was then she nursed her old indulgent patroness throughout her illness before she passed out several years later.
On the 10th of November 1836, Mary wedded Edwin Horatio Hamilton Seacole in Kingston. Together the couple opened a provisions store, which failed to prosper. So they returned back to Blundell Hall in the early 1840s.
In 29thAugust 1843, the family looses the boarding house as it turns to aches. Then was replaced by ‘New Blundell Hall’.
In October 1844, death of her husband followed by her mothers. Mary then took over her mother’s business. Dealing with her emotions she absorbed herself into work declining many offers of marriage.
Pioneer Nurse
In 1851 Seacole visited her half-brother in Cruces (Panama), shortly after the cholera stricken the town. Her reputation already established she was on hand to treat the first victims who survived kept on bringing her succession of patients. She treated them with many of her remedies’ like eschewed opium.
In late 1854 she returns to Panama to finalise her business affairs and moved to New Granada to provide medical support. Approaching her 50s Mary Seacole decided that she would travel to England to volunteer as a nurse for the Crimean War because she was concerned by the soldiers’ welfare that she treated in Jamaica as they too were fighting this battle.
People held high racial prejudice whether it was in America or in England. Along with Thomas Day (her new partner) on the 27th 1855 Mary embarked a maiden voyage to Constantinople with in mind to meet Florence Nightingale. At her arrival at the hospital she saw many of the wounded were familiar faces from the West- Indies. Sadly, her offer to help was once again declined. So she opened the New British Hotel in Marsh 1855. In the building she served free meals, assists casualties and stocked provisions from London and Constantinople. Anything was available for sale and was purchased on credit. The establishment prospered till the end of the war. Mary was left bankrupt as she returned to England destitute.
.jpg)
Returning in August 1856, Seacole despite being feted by a huge crowd and setting up a celebratory dinner for 2 000 soldiers. Creditors who have supplied during the Crimean War were still in pursuit.
7th November 1856 declared bankrupt by The Bankruptcy Court in Basinghall Street.
30th January 1857 Mary Seacole’s and Thomas Day received certificate discharging them from bankruptcy, later she moved from Travistock Street to 14 Soho Square.
In May 1857, she was dissuaded by her financial troubles and the new Secretary of War ‘Lord Panmure’ from travelling to India and minister to the wounded.
July 1857, her 200 page autobiography ‘Wonderful Adventures of Mary Seacole in Many Lands’ was published by James Blackwood. In fact this was the first autobiography written by a black woman in Britain.
1860 Seacole joined the Roman Catholic Church and returned to Jamaica to buy herself a property near Blundell Hall.
1870 back in London she joined the periphery of the royal circle.
On the 14th May 1881 Mary Seacole died at her home in Paddington.
Christelle Dasse
Hits : 233
