This quiet book is dynamite - a groundbreaking account of what the women got up to in one of the most iconic wars ever fought by Britain, and in many ways a precursor to the First World War in its sheer mismanagement and negligence. Women were there to pick up the pieces, and many of them died in the process. Others you'll never see in the same light again: Florence Nightingale, a control freak and ambitious, bad-tempered administrator; Mary Seacole, the Creole Jamaican with shoulders broad enough to conquer every adversity and still have heart enough left to comfort despairing and injured men in a place bleaker than anywhere. There were the hapless lovelorn ones who were abandoned on lonely beaches weeping; the loyal ones who just simply died with their men (you can't help wondering why - did they really have no homes to go to?); the aristocrats who loved their horses and their flirting; the busy, enterprising ones who set up businesses wherever they went. Children didn't stand much of a chance; but the fact that any women came through at all is miracle enough.
Meticulously researched, compassionate and readable, this is a book written with a level head and a steady gaze, which looks at what we all want to see but few of us do. Victorian England is both kinder and more cruel than I'd thought. The women say it all.
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