Derbyshire Record Office volunteer Roger Jennens has discovered a fascinating link between Florence Nightingale and Manchester City Football Club. Here’s how the founder of nursing, the football giant and the ‘footballer’s doctor’ were linked.
DERBYSHIRE Record Office in Matlock holds about 80 letters written by Florence Nightingale to Christopher Dunn, the doctor whose practice covered the villages of Holloway, Whatstandwell and Lea, the location of the Nightingale family home at Lea Hurst. Much of the correspondence concerns the health and welfare of individual village residents. Among those for whom Florence Nightingale arranged, and paid for, medical care were Thomas Allison and his children. Thomas and his wife Hannah originally lived in Winster where, between 1827 and 1843, they had eight children. At some point between 1843 and 1851, they moved to Holloway where Thomas Allison worked as a wood cutter. It is clear from her letters to Christopher Dunn that Florence Nightingale was very knowledgeable about Thomas and his family and that she held a favourable view of them…