Florence Nightingale and Edith Cavell celebrated at abbey

A service takes place each year to celebrate Florence Nightingale and is held as close to her birthday as possible on 12 May, now International Nurses’ Day.

This year, the service also marked 100 years since the funeral of World War I nurse Edith Cavell, who was executed in 1915 after helping over 200 Allied troops escape from German-occupied Belgium.

Her body was returned to the UK after the war in 1919. A state funeral was held that year at Westminster Abbey on 15 May, with crowds lining the route as her body was conveyed through London on a gun carriage. On 19 May, her body was reburied at the east side of Norwich Cathedral.

This week’s event was jointly organised by charities the Florence Nightingale Foundation and Cavell Nurses’ Trust.

The former provides nurses and midwives with the opportunity to take part in leadership and development programmes, while the latter offers financial support to struggling nursing staff.

A lamp is carried during the service to commemorate the nursing founder’s famous sobriquet as “The Lady with the Lamp”, which was acquired while caring for troops during the Crimean War.

The lamp is carried through the abbey to the high alter, where it is passed between Florence Nightingale Foundation scholars to represent the transfer of nursing knowledge.

This year it was carried by Florence Nightingale Foundation scholar Lieutenant Colonel Geoff Hall, of the Queen Alexandra’s Royal Army Nursing Corps.

Also in the lamp party, which was escorted by student nurses and midwives from the University of Hertfordshire, were foundation scholars Nayol Santos and Ross Anderson.

In addition, nurses from The Royal London Hospital took part this year by processing through the abbey in traditional uniforms in memory of Edith Cavell who trained at the hospital.

She went on to set up a nursing school in Belgium and worked on the front line during the First World War, where she told her students that they should treat all injured soldiers regardless of their nationality.

As well as the lamp, the Nurses’ Roll of Honour was taken to the alter. It records the names of British nurses who have died in conflict since the start of World War II.

The bearer of the roll for 2019 was Private Rachel Cousins, of Queen Alexandra’s Royal Army Nursing Corps, Joint Hospital Group (North).

She was escorted by three matrons-in-chief from the armed forces – Captain Alison Hofman, Colonel Alison McCourt and Group Captain Fionnuala Bradley.

Readings were given during the service by Dr Ruth May, chief nursing officer for England, and Jackie Kelly, dean of the health and social care school at the University of Hertfordshire.