The lady of the lamp lights up a little corner of London (Florence Nightingale Museum (London))

Member Name: Mildew82

Product:	Florence Nightingale Museum (London)
Date:	20/04/09 (107 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Informative and fun for both adults and kids

Disadvantages: A little hard to locate, not much in the gift shop

Finding myself in London with an afternoon free and wanting to make it worthwhile having spent the usual extortionate amount to pay for the pleasure of riding in a noisy, crowded and dirty train I wanted to find somewhere cheap that I could spend my time in a constructive way.

Having consulted the 2 for 1 offer booklet for all ye long suffering locomotive travellers (you can probably tell that me and trains do not see eye to eye) I stumbled across the Florence Nightingale Museum for a mere £5.80 (with two of us going that worked out at £2.90 - nice!). Thinking that yes, since there was such a huge gap in my Florence Nightingale / Crimean War knowledge that this was indeed the place to go.

At only about a 10 minute walk from Waterloo Station it was in a good location, although we did struggle to find it at first, it taking us a little while to locate the first signpost (although in all fairness I struggle to get anywhere without Sat Nav or divine intervention) but from then on it was plain sailing!

Estimated perusal time was about 1hr 30 mins and in this time you are taken through the complete journey of her life, starting from her childhood, through to her young adult years ,then the Crimean War and finally to the remainder of her life devoted to improving hospital care.

This museum was well ordered and had a lot of nice memorabilia from the time period so it wasn't just boring text to read all the time. There were a few opportunities to try on hats and dresses from the time period and (something I think every good museum should have) an interactive display where you can press buttons to light up a map - this particular one being of the Crimean War.

I have to confess, I always forget her devoted work after the events of the Crimean War which helped lead to a complete restructuring of the hospital system and to instigate massive improvements into the general sanitary conditions in hospitals, but the museum provides a nice insight into just how influential her work really was.

One final thing this museum manages to do is to dispel the common misconception of her doing her rounds about the hospital with a single candle when in fact it was a Turkish camping lamp (how could anyone get that wrong?). But when you think about it, walking round a draughty old hospital with the power of one candle light to see which could have been blown out with one overly eager breeze no longer seems all that plausible.

There is plenty at this museum for both adults and children, with some funny anecdotal quotes for the adults and some outrageous Papier Mache structures to please the kids, although there was not much to buy in the gift shop afterwards.

I came out knowing a lot more than before I went in, so if you're interested in either Florence Nightingale or the Crimean War this museum will not disappoint.

Prices:

Adult: £5.80 per ticket
Child: £4.80 per ticket
Family: From £16.00 per ticket
Concession: £4.80 per ticket

Opening times:

Monday - Friday 10.00 - 17.00 last admission 16.00. Saturday, Sunday & Bank Holiday Mondays: 10.00 - 16.30 (last admission 15.30)
Closed: Easter/Christmas

Address:
St Thomas Hospital
2 Lambeth Palace Road
London
SE1 7EW

Telephone: +44 (0)20 7620 0374
Fax: +44 (0)20 7928 1760

Summary: A very good resource for the life and times of Florence Nightingale