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Mary Jane Seacole (1805 – 14 May 1881), ''née'' Grant, was a Jamaican-born woman of Scottish and Creole descent who set up a "British Hotel" behind the lines during the Crimean War, which she described as "a mess-table and comfortable quarters for sick and convalescent officers," and provided succour for wounded servicemen on the battlefield.〔 She was posthumously awarded the Jamaican Order of Merit in 1991. In 2004 she was voted the greatest black Briton.〔("Nurse named greatest black Briton" ), BBC News, 10 February 2004.〕 She acquired knowledge of herbal medicine in the Caribbean. When the Crimean War broke out, she applied to the War Office to assist but was refused. She travelled independently and set up her hotel and assisted battlefield wounded. She became extremely popular among service personnel who raised money for her when she faced destitution after the war. After her death, she was forgotten for almost a century, but today is celebrated as a woman who successfully combatted racial prejudice.〔''Who's Who in British History'', p. 715.〕 Her biography, ''Wonderful Adventures of Mrs. Seacole in Many Lands'' (1857), is one of the earliest autobiographies of a mixed-race woman, although some aspects of its accuracy have been questioned. It has been claimed that Seacole's achievements have been exaggerated for political reasons〔("The black Florence Nightingale and the making of a PC myth: One historian explains how Mary Seacole's story never stood up" ), Mail Online, 31 December 2012.〕 and a plan to erect a statue of her at St Thomas' Hospital, London, describing her as a "pioneer nurse",〔(Mary Seacole Memorial Statue Appeal. )〕 has generated controversy.〔Natasha McEnroe, ("Beyond the Rivalry: Florence Nightingale and Mary Seacole" ), ''History Today'', 3 September 2012.〕〔Lynn McDonald, ("Comment is free: Statue of 'nurse' Mary Seacole will do Florence Nightingale a disservice" ), ''The Guardian'', 8 June 2012.〕 Further controversy broke out in the United Kingdom late in 2012 over reports of a proposal to remove her from the country's National Curriculum.〔("Michael Gove dumps Mary Seacole" ), OBV, 2 January 2013.〕 == Early life, 1805–25 == Mary Seacole was born Mary Jane Grant in Kingston, Jamaica,〔Robinson, p. 10.〕 the daughter of a Scottish〔''Scotland on Sunday'', 16 May 2010, p. 10.〕 soldier〔Seacole, Chapter 1.〕 in the British Army and a free Jamaican woman. Her mother was a "doctress", a healer who used traditional Caribbean and African herbal remedies. She ran Blundell Hall, a boarding house at 7 East Street, considered one of the best hotels in all Kingston.〔Robinson, p. 22.〕 Here Seacole acquired her nursing skills. Seacole's autobiography states that her early experiments in medicine were based on what she learned from her mother while ministering to a doll, then progressing to pets, before helping her mother treat humans.〔Robinson, p. 24.〕 Seacole was proud of her Scottish ancestry and called herself a Creole,〔Seacole, Chapter 1.〕 a term that was commonly used in a racially neutral sense or to refer to the children of white settlers. In her autobiography, ''The Wonderful Adventures of Mrs. Seacole'', she records her bloodline thus: "I am a Creole, and have good Scots blood coursing through my veins. My father was a soldier of an old Scottish family."〔〔''The Wonderful Adventures of Mrs. Seacole'', 1857.〕 Legally, she was classified as a mulatto, a multiracial person with limited political rights;〔Alexander & Dewjee, p. 10.〕 Robinson speculates that she may technically have been a quadroon.〔Robinson, p. 7.〕 Seacole emphasises her personal vigour in her autobiography, distancing herself from the contemporary stereotype of the "lazy Creole",〔〔Ramdin, p. 5.〕〔Salih, Chapter I, footnote 3, p. 183.〕 She was proud of her black ancestry, writing, "I have a few shades of deeper brown upon my skin which shows me related—and I am proud of the relationship—to those poor mortals whom you once held enslaved, and whose bodies America still owns."〔Seacole, Chapter II.〕 The West Indies were an outpost of the British Empire in the late 18th century, and in the 1790s one-third of Britain's foreign trade was with the British West Indies.〔Ramdin, p. 4.〕 Britain's economic interests were protected by a massive military presence, with 69 line infantry regiments serving there between 1793 to 1801, and another 24 between 1803 to 1815.〔Ramdin, p. 4, citing Rene Chartrand, ''British Forces in the West Indies 1793–1815'', Osprey (1996).〕 Seacole spent some years in the household of an elderly woman, whom she called her "kind patroness",〔 before returning to her mother. She was treated as a member of her patroness's family and received a good education.〔Robinson, p. 12.〕 As the educated daughter of a Scottish officer and a free black woman with a respectable business, Seacole would have held a high position in Jamaican society.〔Robinson, p. 13.〕 In about 1821, Seacole visited London, stayed for a year, and visited relatives, the merchant Henriques family. Although London had a number of black people,〔Ramdin, p. 8, estimates 10,000 in 1820, compared with an Inner London population of 1,263,975 as recorded in the United Kingdom Census 1821.〕 she records that a companion, a West Indian with skin darker than her own "dusky" shades, was taunted by children. Seacole herself was "only a little brown",〔 nearly white according to Ramdin.〔Ramdin, p. 8.〕 She returned to London approximately a year later, bringing a "large stock of West Indian pickles and preserves for sale".〔 Her later travels would be as an "unprotected" woman, without a chaperone or sponsor—an unusual practice.〔Robinson, p. 18.〕 Seacole returned to Jamaica in 1825.〔''Wonderful Adventures of Mrs. Seacole in Many Lands'' – p. 25.〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Mary Seacole」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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