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Rare photograph of Florence Nightingale for sale

The black and white image of the silver-haired nursing pioneer shows her in the imposing bedroom of her home just off London's Park Lane, before her death in 1910 at the age of 90.

The photograph was taken by Lizzie Caswall Smith, who was a noted studio photographer in the early 1900s, who also took portraits of well-known subjects including George Bernard Shaw and JM Barrie who wrote Peter's Pan.

The photograph is all the more remarkable because, despite her fame, Florence Nightingale disliked being photographed and shrank from publicity.

Malcolm Claridge, of auctioneers Dreweatts who will sell the photograph at their Donnington Priory saleroom, near Newbury, on November 19, said: "It is a wonderful historic image."

Read entire article at Telegraph