Crimean War
During the Crimean War (1854-1856), the barracks was allocated to the British Army, which was on the way from Britain to the Crimea. After the troops of the 33rd and 41st left for the front, the barracks was converted into a temporary military hospital.
On November 4, 1854, Florence Nightingale arrived in Scutari with 38 volunteer nurses. They cared for thousands of wounded and infected soldiers until she returned home in 1857 as a heroine.
Around 6,000 soldiers died in the Selimiye Barracks during the war, mostly as the result of cholera epidemic. The dead were buried at a plot next to the barracks, which became later the Haydarpaşa Cemetery.
Today, the northmost tower of the barracks is a museum.
Read more about this topic: Selimiye Barracks
Famous quotes containing the word war:
“... the next war will be a war in which people not armies will suffer, and our boasted, hard-earned civilization will do us no good. Cannot the women rise to this great opportunity and work now, and not have the double horror, if another war comes, of losing their loved ones, and knowing that they lifted no finger when they might have worked hard?”
—Eleanor Roosevelt (1884–1962)