Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class from how
Speaker 1: Stuff Works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 1: I'm Katie Lambert and I'm Sarah Dowdy, and today we're
Speaker 1: going to be covering our third installment in our Black
Speaker 1: History series. And the woman we're going to talk about today,
Speaker 1: Mary Sekel, is actually someone Katie blogged about recently and
Speaker 1: we both liked her so much that we wanted to
Speaker 1: look into her life even more. I love her even
Speaker 1: more because she is a nurse, as is my mother,
Speaker 1: and I have a lot of respect for the professions.
Speaker 1: So today we'd like to introduce you to Mary Sekel.
Speaker 1: She was born Mary Anne Grant in Jamaica in eighteen
Speaker 1: o five and she was born free and of mixed race.
Speaker 1: She was the daughter of a Scottish Army officer and
Speaker 1: a free black boarding housekeeper. And she says in her autobiography,
Speaker 1: I am a Creole and have good Scotch blood coursing
Speaker 1: in my veins. And she gets a travel bug pretty
Speaker 1: early on. She takes two trips to England when she's
Speaker 1: young and um gets her start and what would become
Speaker 1: her life's calling eventually, which is nursing through her mother. Um,
Speaker 1: she's really knowledgeable about herbal medicine. She's actually called a doctress. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I like that term a lot. It's like when I
Speaker 1: call myself an edit trix, because I don't feel like
Speaker 1: just being an editor. She did marry, but it's interesting
Speaker 1: that he doesn't figure too much into her autobiography or
Speaker 1: even really the story of her life. When you're looking
Speaker 1: at it, she does mention that he was delicate and
Speaker 1: that she nursed him through illness, and that when she died,
Speaker 1: she didn't leave her room for days, and her mother
Speaker 1: died soon after that. So these were two big personal
Speaker 1: blows in her life. Yeah. Well, and it comes with
Speaker 1: money problems too, because as a widow she's not bringing
Speaker 1: in as much income, and eventually her Kingston house burns
Speaker 1: down in eighteen forty three, leaving her in even worse
Speaker 1: financial straits. But she resolved to work hard and she
Speaker 1: gained this reputation as being a very capable nurse. And
Speaker 1: it's funny, she says, one of the hardest struggles of
Speaker 1: my life in Kingston was to resist the pressing candidates
Speaker 1: for the late Mr Sea Cole's shoes, which is just
Speaker 1: a little aside that I love like well, I was
Speaker 1: very much in demand. But however, I said no, well,
Speaker 1: and we were talking about how it's interesting that she
Speaker 1: doesn't remarry because it would certainly make her financial problems
Speaker 1: a little easier to deal with. But she wouldn't have
Speaker 1: been able to do all these amazing things that she
Speaker 1: goes onto when she seemed to have a very independent street,
Speaker 1: she must have had something in mind. I think a
Speaker 1: husband would have been a bit of a hindrance. So
Speaker 1: in eighteen fifties there weren't any formal nursing programs. Mary
Speaker 1: see Cole learned to care for patients during an eighteen
Speaker 1: fifty collar epidemic in Jamaica which killed thousands and thousands
Speaker 1: of people, by watching and experimenting and gathering evidence on
Speaker 1: what techniques and remedies seemed to work, you know, taking
Speaker 1: a rigorous scientific approach to what she was doing. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this reminded us of our episode we did a while
Speaker 1: ago and John Snow and the go Smap, which is
Speaker 1: also cholera, and also this very scientific approach to medicine
Speaker 1: which is so second nature to how we think of
Speaker 1: it now. But not in the days of intre No,
Speaker 1: not at all. So she goes off traveling again when
Speaker 1: she's through with this epidemic, which she really loved to do,
Speaker 1: and she is of course alone, which you know, horrors
Speaker 1: for a Victorian woman. And she ended up at her
Speaker 1: brother's hotel in Cruisis, Panama, which was a place that
Speaker 1: many California gold seekers stopped by, and cholera has broken
Speaker 1: out there too in eighteen fifty one, and there aren't
Speaker 1: many doctors around. Two important takeaways from her time in Panama.
Speaker 1: She saves a lot of people, and she advances her
Speaker 1: medical knowledge. She even does an autopsy on a little
Speaker 1: boy who's died of color. She wants to know what
Speaker 1: what the insides look like of someone who's been ravaged
Speaker 1: by cholera, and she says she learned a lot from
Speaker 1: that too. She was one of the few who believed
Speaker 1: that hera was contagious, and she also thought cleanliness was important,
Speaker 1: which again, like our GHO s up, yeah, not smuch.
Speaker 1: This makes her a little bit different from your average
Speaker 1: nurse who's usually under the direction of a doctor. She's
Speaker 1: got a broader practice. She's diagnosing, she's um prescribing, you know,
Speaker 1: herbals or pharmaceutical medicines. And um, she's even doing light
Speaker 1: surgery eventually and this postmortem. So she's of a different
Speaker 1: mold than your than your average nineteenth century nurse, and
Speaker 1: she's extremely talented. But she didn't enjoy her acquaintance with
Speaker 1: Americans in Panama, and she returned to Jamaica just in
Speaker 1: time to fight a big outbreak of halo fever. But
Speaker 1: when the Crimean War broke out, she was convinced that
Speaker 1: she found her real calling. She wanted to go to
Speaker 1: the front lines and take care of the men. So
Speaker 1: we're going to take you on a little detour to
Speaker 1: understand a bit more about the Crimean War. Well, the
Speaker 1: Crimean War ultimately breaks down to a lot of European
Speaker 1: powers against Russia. But specifically it's a war fought on
Speaker 1: the Crimean Peninsula between the Russians and the British, French,
Speaker 1: and Ottoman Turkish later with the support of Sardinia Piedmont.
Speaker 1: So we've got all of these European powers u nining together.
Speaker 1: And to understand why that happens, we have to go
Speaker 1: back even further further away from Mary Siegel. Sorry, but
Speaker 1: we've had the Napoleonic Wars at the beginning of the
Speaker 1: nineteenth century and the great powers have gotten together and
Speaker 1: weren't to rebalance the European states, and they want peace
Speaker 1: and monarchies. No revolutions please, no republics, and so Russia, yeah,
Speaker 1: to be cool everyone, Russia, Prussia, Austria, Britain and France
Speaker 1: all want different things. But they managed to come together
Speaker 1: and work out the Treaty of Vienna after the Napoleonic
Speaker 1: Wars and they established a kind of shaky but still
Speaker 1: impressive peace. Peace for the most part for thirty years
Speaker 1: um until the Vienna system breaks down. So this initial
Speaker 1: problem is that the Ottoman Turkish Empire, which you know,
Speaker 1: is this vast ancient, actual year old, it's weakening, and
Speaker 1: the other European countries are starting to butt in to
Speaker 1: support the various Christian populations. Yeah, we have issues going
Speaker 1: on between France and Russia that we're not going to
Speaker 1: get into too much. But our main point here is
Speaker 1: that Czar Nicholas the First is seeing an opportunity to
Speaker 1: cash in on this breakdown of the Ottoman Turkish Empire,
Speaker 1: and he wants to exercise protection over the Orthodox subjects
Speaker 1: of the Ottoman Empire. So this is the Christian populations
Speaker 1: we're mentioning and um. He thinks that he'll settle the
Speaker 1: sick man of Europe as he calls the Empire the
Speaker 1: Aging Empire UM, and carve it up. And he thinks
Speaker 1: that Prussia, Austria and Britain will be into this, they'll
Speaker 1: stand behind him because they might stand to benefit too.
Speaker 1: But the surprise, Yeah, Britain and Austria are not interested
Speaker 1: in Russia controlling this huge contentious area, this area that
Speaker 1: links Europe to Asia, so it's important. And the Turks
Speaker 1: resist the Czar. They put up quite a fight, which
Speaker 1: I don't think Russia was entirely expecting, and I supported
Speaker 1: by not only Britain in Austria, but also France. So
Speaker 1: the Turks put up a fight, and the Brits and
Speaker 1: French get involved in not just diplomatic way. They're they're
Speaker 1: still thinking that maybe we can all talk this out,
Speaker 1: but that's not going to happen. They get involved after
Speaker 1: the Russian Black Sea fleet destroys a Turkish squadron and
Speaker 1: the British and French fleets are entering the Black Sea
Speaker 1: to protect Turkish transports. And this is the important part
Speaker 1: we were talking about earlier. You don't mess with Britain
Speaker 1: or Frances trading operation. They will fight back, and they
Speaker 1: will fight a little bit dirty. So by September eighteen
Speaker 1: fifty four, we have all out war as the Allies
Speaker 1: land troops in the Russian Crimea, which is the north
Speaker 1: shore of the Black Sea, and they start a year
Speaker 1: long siege on the Russian fortress of Sebastopol, and that's
Speaker 1: where our focus and Mary Segel is going to be.
Speaker 1: So over the next year we have some big battles,
Speaker 1: particularly at Alma River, Balaclava and Anchorman, and there's a
Speaker 1: desperate need for medical help, not because there are a
Speaker 1: lot of casualties, because on that front we're actually doing
Speaker 1: all right, but because of infection and poor hygiene. And
Speaker 1: that brings us back to Mary Siegel, who again really
Speaker 1: wants to go to the front, but she's met with
Speaker 1: an obstacle. Despite the fact that nurses are desperately needed,
Speaker 1: she's turned down by every single war office she applied to,
Speaker 1: including the one that Florence Nightingale headed up. And it
Speaker 1: was because of her race. Apparently that happened with a
Speaker 1: lot of black female nurses who wanted to go find
Speaker 1: at the war. They were turned down everywhere they went.
Speaker 1: But if you think that stopped her, it did not.
Speaker 1: She makes her own way to Bala Clava on her
Speaker 1: own dime and sets up a British hotel which was
Speaker 1: kind of half boarding house, half sick bay. She went
Speaker 1: into partnership with Thomas Day, who was a sort of
Speaker 1: distant connection to her late husband, and stocked up on
Speaker 1: food and medicine and all sorts of supplies and left
Speaker 1: for Turkey as a sutler, which is um somebody who
Speaker 1: provides supplies to troops on the front line. She worked
Speaker 1: with a lot of men who didn't want to go
Speaker 1: to the hospitals, but eventually she got to pass, allowing
Speaker 1: her to be the first woman to enter Sebastopol, and
Speaker 1: the soldiers started calling her the Black Nightingale. Later she
Speaker 1: moved onto the battlefields themselves, and she was known for
Speaker 1: wearing really really bright clothing, lots of yellows and reds,
Speaker 1: red ribbons on her cap. It was apparently a very
Speaker 1: welcome sight to the men, who started calling her mother's
Speaker 1: sea coal, and she really thrived there. This is exactly
Speaker 1: where she wanted to be, right in the middle of
Speaker 1: the action, doing what she loved to do best well.
Speaker 1: In all her experience with hygiene and treating these tropical
Speaker 1: diseases prepared her for dealing with the infections and the
Speaker 1: horrible hygiene of the Crimean War. But the war ended suddenly,
Speaker 1: so we know what's been going on with Mary. Let's
Speaker 1: switch back to the rest of Europe. So by September eleven,
Speaker 1: eighteen fifty five, are year long siege of Sebastopol. The
Speaker 1: Russian fortress is coming to an end and the Russians
Speaker 1: are forced to evacuate it, and they blow up their
Speaker 1: forts and sink their ships, and the war sort of
Speaker 1: straggles on a bit and the Caucuses in the Baltic Sea,
Speaker 1: but Russia finally accepts preliminary peace terms in eighteen fifty
Speaker 1: six and later signed the Treaty of Paris. There's some
Speaker 1: important takeaways from the Crimean War. When we got was
Speaker 1: from the BBC, which said in military terms that this
Speaker 1: war was a midway point between Waterloo and World War One. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and that's because you've got the Napoleonic strategies, which on
Speaker 1: a side note here, this war was terribly managed on
Speaker 1: all sides. That's why there's so much disease and so
Speaker 1: much need for nurses like Mary or Florence Nightingale. But
Speaker 1: when when you have these sort of antiquated military strategies,
Speaker 1: you also have modern weaponry, armored warships, rifles at least
Speaker 1: for the British, um intercontinental electric telegraphs, and submarine minds,
Speaker 1: and war photography and even um even war journalism, which
Speaker 1: is something that you just it goes without saying. Now, yeah,
Speaker 1: this was the first real media war. There was a
Speaker 1: Times correspondent, William Howard Russell, who was sending firsthand dispatches
Speaker 1: from the front line. That's a pretty big deal. We
Speaker 1: might talk about him in another podcast. But of course
Speaker 1: the Crimean War doesn't sort out Europe's problems. Russia does
Speaker 1: realize that it better get its act together if it's
Speaker 1: gonna compete on the same level as the rest of Europe.
Speaker 1: And also Austria loses Russia support because they haven't behaved
Speaker 1: neutral or they haven't behaved with complete neutrality during this war,
Speaker 1: not at all. Um So they've become dependent on Britain
Speaker 1: and France, which don't end up supporting them through the
Speaker 1: rest of the century. And consequently we have Italy and
Speaker 1: Austria left prime for nation building and UM ready for unification.
Speaker 1: So this is the collapse of the Vienna Settlement and
Speaker 1: of thirty years of relative peace, and we end up
Speaker 1: with this new six power system, but that, of course
Speaker 1: is also terribly unstable, and Europe re enters war in
Speaker 1: nineteen fourteen, ninety nine years after the vienn S Settlement.
Speaker 1: Perhaps you've heard of that war. But another takeaway from
Speaker 1: the Crimean War is the deaths. We've got twenty five
Speaker 1: thousand for the British, one thousand for the French, and
Speaker 1: up to a million for the Russians. And a lot
Speaker 1: of this was because of disease and neglect, not outright
Speaker 1: battle casualties. No, so what people like Mary see Cole
Speaker 1: we're doing was really important. And after the war, Mary
Speaker 1: herself came into a lot of financial difficulty. She had
Speaker 1: lost money from her war efforts, since she did a
Speaker 1: lot of this on her own, and since part of
Speaker 1: what she was doing was buying supplies and selling them
Speaker 1: to people. Once the war suddenly ended, she was left
Speaker 1: with all the supplies and no one to sell them too.
Speaker 1: She's not totally unappreciated by the Brits though, and um
Speaker 1: some people, especially those who have seen the service that
Speaker 1: she provided during the war, want to help her get
Speaker 1: out of her financial straits. Um, the Brits try to
Speaker 1: help her raise money to get out of debt. It
Speaker 1: doesn't go as well as hoped. You know a lot
Speaker 1: of those fundraising efforts, you know, you throw the charity
Speaker 1: ball and then it turns out you spent so much
Speaker 1: money and trying to set up the book that happened before.
Speaker 1: There's not a lot of money left over to actually
Speaker 1: give to Mary see Cole. But the publication of her
Speaker 1: autobiography in eighteen fifty seven really helped. And Sarah and
Speaker 1: I think this is the most fantastic title for autobiography,
Speaker 1: the Wonderful Adventures of Mrs Sekele in Many Lands. And
Speaker 1: part of the reason her book is so notable is
Speaker 1: because it wasn't a slave narrative. It was the story
Speaker 1: of a free woman of color who was doing interesting,
Speaker 1: courageous work in wartime which you know was considered a
Speaker 1: man's sphere, and she was doing it on her own
Speaker 1: because she was also a widow. Yeah, as we were
Speaker 1: talking about earlier, she's chosen to have this um single
Speaker 1: life when she easily could have remarried so that makes
Speaker 1: it different from some of the earlier nineteenth century narratives
Speaker 1: we have from women. The fundraising eventually sways a little
Speaker 1: more in her favor too. By the late eighteen sixties,
Speaker 1: some of the royals in London have gotten involved in
Speaker 1: um raising money and publicity to celebrate Mary Sekel. She
Speaker 1: died in eighteen eighty one, and while she was honored
Speaker 1: during her lifetime, her name dropped out of public con
Speaker 1: bousness after her death. Now when you're reading things about her,
Speaker 1: it's pretty much always a reference to the black Florence Nightingale,
Speaker 1: which is a it's kind of a shame. Well, and
Speaker 1: it wasn't even a competition between the two of them.
Speaker 1: They did completely different things. Like you were saying earlier,
Speaker 1: Florence Nightingale did a lot more with bureaucracy. Well, I
Speaker 1: was reading a piece by Helen J. Seaton, and yeah,
Speaker 1: she was raising the point that it doesn't need to
Speaker 1: be a competition between them, and people will try to,
Speaker 1: I guess, defend Mary Seckel by saying, oh, she does
Speaker 1: so much more hands on stuff than Florence Nightingale. But yeah,
Speaker 1: there there is no reason why there shouldn't be room
Speaker 1: for two, at least two amazing nurses during the Crimean War.
Speaker 1: He always have to pit the women against each other.
Speaker 1: Let's stop doing that. They're completely different. Although supposedly Florence
Speaker 1: Nightingale wasn't entirely too fond of Mary Secuel's work, but
Speaker 1: that's a story for another day. So after Mary's short
Speaker 1: lived Victorian celebrity, which extends a little bit beyond her death,
Speaker 1: she really slips into obscurity and doesn't have a major
Speaker 1: effort to restore her place in history until nineteen fifty four,
Speaker 1: which is the centenary of the Crimean War. UM the
Speaker 1: Jamaican General Trained Nurses Association decided to name Mark Kingston
Speaker 1: Headquarters Mary's Seckel House, and British recognition didn't come until
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy three. But she's a bit late, a bit late, yeah,
Speaker 1: But since then we've had kind of a movement to
Speaker 1: UM revitalized Mary Seckel's image and she's almost become a
Speaker 1: rallying point for minority nurses trying to UM gain equal status.
Speaker 1: But we would like to bring her name back. So
Speaker 1: the next time you think of Florence Nightingale, think of
Speaker 1: Mary's Seckel as well, and that brings us to a
Speaker 1: listener mail, which today is actually more of an in
Speaker 1: person mail. A girl in Mrs Barnett's third grade class
Speaker 1: told Marshall Brain, the founder of how stuff Works dot com,
Speaker 1: that we were her favorite ist podcast. So thank you,
Speaker 1: Fiona for the fantastic compliment. Our favorites are completely Our
Speaker 1: favorite is that. That's our favorite is listener mails so far.
Speaker 1: And if you want to learn more about cholera and
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