In the years between 1854 and 1856, Britain fought its only European war between the ending of the Napoleonic conflict in 1815 and the opening of the Great War in 1914. Although eventually victorious, this was a hard war fought with little skill and filled with great loss. Indeed the Crimean War became infamously known for military and logistical incompetence, perhaps most aptly epitomised by the near annihilation of the British Light Brigade. Arguably the only bright light in this sorry tale was the work of Florence Nightingale, a nurse who almost single-handedly drastically cut mortality rates for the British wounded. The Crimean War had begun as a quarrel between Russian Orthodox monks and French Catholics over who had precedence at the holy sites in Jerusalem and Nazareth, but soon turned into a full scale "Clash of Empires" This superb documentary marks the 150th anniversary of the end of the Crimean War. Celebrated historian Thomas Vaughan expertly tells this compelling story and reports on the lessons to be learned.
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