31 replies to this topic

[Elliott]

Hello Elliot and Others,

I am in the same boat as you with regard to teaching this unit before january. I have six lessons a week which helps and am aiming to finish both Crimea and Boer war before half-term.

I am in the process of marking question on Nightingale and Seacole ( question page 44 of Edexcel Textbook. So far I have one excellent answer 37 out of 40 but the other 5 are mostly less than 20.

I will try to get a copy of the good answer which could be used as a kind of model answer I hope. I will post it here to see what other people think. I may have been too generous.

Regards

David

David - that would be really useful if you could upload, as I teach on my own, it would be good to double-check I am marking in line with expectations. I don't have the book handy, but I am assuming that it is the 'Angel of Mercy' question (with the picture) - I am setting my students this question next week, hence all the preparation on strengths/weaknesses of Seacole and Nightingale. I have amended the question slightly too add in a 3rd source from Ponting to allow greater cross-referencing. As the Crimea came up in Jan 09 as an a question and did not appear in June, it's a reasonable assumption that the Crimea will be on the Jan paper and as a b question, so will be building this in for revision in the couple of weeks after Christmas holidays. Perhaps the Boers will slot into the a question...but after the June paper I am not second-guessing the examiner!

[David_Blanchard]

deleted by D Blanchard

Edited by David_Blanchard, 12 October 2009 - 07:37 PM.

[David_Blanchard]

Nightingale v Seacole Essay

[David_Blanchard]

Nightingale v Seacole Essay (Sorry about previous posts having trouble with deleting process!)


David

[David_Blanchard]

Nightingale v Seacole Essay (Sorry about previous posts having trouble with deleting process!)


David

Attached Files

•  Nightingale vs Seacole Crimean War.docx   15.52K   334 downloads

[crimeanwar]

Hi Tom

What I'd be interested in is any information you have on the historiography of the Crimean War - there's obviously the revisionist view of Raglan/debate over Nightingale & Seacole - however I wondered if there were any other shifts in views on the war you could assist on, especially about the role of newspapers?

Well I think so yes. The classic case must be A W Kinglake's 'great' work on the war. When he started to produce his volumes in the 1860s The (London) Times started to review them. Devastingly. Kinglake was shown to be a complete apologist for Raglan - taking every opportunity to twist events ever-so-slightly to favour his friend and hero. There follows a plug (!) : the CWRS has a Special Publication which is a transcript of those reviews collected together. It is available from our online shop at Lulu.com, modestly priced at £8.50 (+p&p) This 160pp volume also contains a number of letters to The Times in response to the reviews. I find it a wonderful read!
http://www.lulu.com/content/6177045

During the war itself of course the public view was completely reversed by newspapers in a matter of months. Before any fighting (British & French that is) actually started public opinion was whipped up in favour of the war rather like the start of the Great War. By late 1854 with journos on the ground in the Crimea (like William Howard Russell of The Times) horrendous reports began to swing public opinion rapidly the other way. And the likes of Russell had plenty of horror, disaster and mismanagement to report of course - though it must be said they (the journos) often over-egged things for the sake of a good story - often out of ignorance rather than deliberately. Nothing new ( or old ) there then! (There are a number of publications of 'highlights' of Russell's reports)

Incidently, do teachers generally have access to The Times Digital Archive? I hope so.

PS I note elsewhere in this forum that the Osprey Essential History by John Sweatman is recommended. I would not endorse it myself, unless it has been thoroughly revised since the 1st edition which I reviewed when it came out ten (?) years ago. The first edition had wildly inaccurate maps and a number of factual errors. Much better I would have thought would be the book of the Channel 4 series (pretty good in itself)

Hope this helps

Tom Muir

[Elliott]

Nightingale v Seacole Essay (Sorry about previous posts having trouble with deleting process!)


David

David - could you possibly upload as a doc. file - I can't seem to open doc.x Thanks

[Helen S]

Thank you!

Having an A grade answer will really help me. (I'm teaching this course 1st time this year).

Helen.

[Lucy Harris]

Thanks very much Tom

All very useful

[crimeanwar]

Hi Tom

What I'd be interested in is any information you have on the historiography of the Crimean War - there's obviously the revisionist view of Raglan/debate over Nightingale & Seacole - however I wondered if there were any other shifts in views on the war you could assist on, especially about the role of newspapers?

Hello again Lucy,

I have been giving it a bit more thought (although I shall avoid FN and MJS revisionist debates - other than to say that our society generally smiles in a rather patronising way at all the brouhaha! [sp?] )

The Crimean War was, or became, the first real "soldiers' war" and the press were largely responsible for that with their coverage of veterans right up until the last were dying in the 1930s. Important to this process was the Victoria Cross of course - awarded to all ranks - and first put the 'common' soldier in the public eye, not just as anonymous long-suffering cannon-fodder (and probably thoroughly undesirable to boot), but as individual. A hero with his own story and personality. Few of the generals (or admirals) came out of the war with any credits on the other hand. Notable exceptions being Colin Campbell (general, later Lord Clyde) and Admiral Lord Lyons. The press also lost one of the few potential young officer-heroes all too soon in Captain William Peel RN, who got the VC for several truly brave actions in the Crimea but tragically died of smallpox during the Indian Mutiny. There were other officer-heroes of course (like William Nathan Wrighte 'Bulldog' Hewett RN VC) but they were outnumbered by the Other Rank VC veterans, and the local press across the country has always loved a local hero and most were fêted in their home towns. However it seems the two world wars overshadowed memories of the Crimea (and rightly so) and it is only in recent years that those older veteran's graves have been rediscovered and restored. I run a 'Google Alert' on the Crimean War and it is interesting how many reports there are from local newspapers of these old veterans' graves being discovered and restored by local appeal and local people. Full circle, you might say. And not to forget that modern phenomenon - family history research! It is how I and many others got interested in the Crimean War and I have often used it as the vehicle to explain to (and I use the phrase cautiously) 'the younger generation'. But then I am sure history teachers are well aware of that approach.

[David_Blanchard]

Nightingale v Seacole Essay in Word 2003

Attached Files

•  Nightingale v Seacole Word 2003.doc   25K   1546 downloads

[crimeanwar]

Nightingale v Seacole Essay in Word 2003

I would like to reply to this essay, David, (or at least get a colleague of mine at the CWRS to reply) but I can't find the sources you quote ('V' etc). Are they in a previous post?

[David_Blanchard]

Tom,

The two sources are in the Edexcel book on the Unit 2 Experience of Warfare Course page 45. I enclose the first three chapters of the book in PDF format


Regards

David

Attached Files

•  ExperienceOfWarfare Units 1 to 3.pdf   1.41MB   580 downloads

[crimeanwar]

Tom,

The two sources are in the Edexcel book on the Unit 2 Experience of Warfare Course page 45. I enclose the first three chapters of the book in PDF format


Regards

David

David,

OK great: got it. I will report back!
ATB
Tom

[Lucy Harris]

Again - all very useful

interesting points raised about the overshadowing of the Crimean & the significance of the establishment of the soldiering profession - my Dad has been fascinated by military history for decades, and did his History degree in the late 60s/into the 70s - he saw a real 'blossoming' of analysis & coverage of all military history - he's in his element these days in the History sections of Waterstones etc, and must notice a real difference to when he was a student. He also talks of being labelled a warmonger for his interests in military history - yet, as you say with the boom in geneaology, it is now perfectly acceptable to research & write about 'war' (I seem to remember this issue being raised on at least one other thread a while back)

Dad's particular long-term interests are the Napoleonic/Peninsular wars - he delivers an annual lesson to my Yr 12s, setting a context to the Crimean with his presentation on Napoleonic soldiers/recruitment/campaigns/tactics etc - this definitely helps the kids understand the public views of the troops by the 1850s as well as the change in attitude as a result of this war, mainly because of the development of the war correspondent

It is also interesting, however, how this more recent rediscovery of the Crimean has not spread as far as the Boer War (2nd in particular) - I wonder if that's next?

All of these things are vitally important to discuss & explore with the kids, don't you think?

I think 'what we remember & why', & how that has changed over the last century or so, is in itself a fascinating topic - an image that really springs to mind is seeing photos from the 1930s at Gettysburg, when Roosevelt met with some of the Gettysburg veterans to open the memorial there - when historical turning points collide!!

lots of food for thought from people on this thread - thanks

when I get to it, I'll also be using the assessment exemplars etc on here too - thanks guys

apologies for not giving my opinions on the A student - I don't have office on this laptop yet