Noonans Sell The Medals of the Soldier Who Kept Florence Nightingale Safe During the Crimean War

The Distinguished Conduct Medal awarded to Private Samuel Vickery of the Coldstream Guards who kept Florence Nightingale safe during the Crimean War is to be offered in an auction of Orders, Decorations, Medals and Militaria at Noonans Mayfair (16 Bolton Street) on Wednesday, January 14, 2026. It is expected to fetch £7,000-9,000 and is being sold by a private collector.

As Oliver Pepys, Associate Director and Medal Specialist at Noonans explained: “Devon-born Vickery was struck down by frostbite after the battle of Inkermann and found himself facing an uncertain future. That was until Florence Nightingale, a close colleague, came to his aid.”

He added: “The heroine of the Crimea intervened to ask that Vickery be appointed her orderly and effective bodyguard. It was an appointment that was to prove crucial to the success of her role in treating the wounded and introducing new health practices that have echoed down the years.”

He finishes: “The auction brings to life once more the fascinating tale of how an army private became Florence Nightingale’s indispensable and trusted bodyguard, about whom she wrote “I cannot speak too highly of Vickery’s honesty and trustworthiness”.”

Vickery had won his D.C.M during hand-to-hand fighting at Inkermann on 5 November 1854, when he was part of a force that held the Russian enemy at the point of a bayonet and helped recapture a vital battery. Private William Wilden, a contemporary of Vickery who also received the D.C.M. for his actions at Inkermann, wrote an eyewitness account of the Coldstream’s experience during the battle. He tells us that such was the ferocity of the fighting that at one point, not only were bayonets used freely on both sides, but the British had to use stones to beat back the enemy from the northwestern embrasure. However, the forces pitched against the British were too great, and despite several bayonet charges, they could no longer hold their ground against overwhelming numbers and had to retire, fighting over every inch of ground as they retreated. As the enemy moved forward, they killed the wounded British who remained on the battlefield. The Coldstream Guards lost eight of their 16 officers and upwards of 200 rank-and-file of the 400 men that had advanced.

As his Discharge Examination reported no marks or scars on his face or the visible parts of his body, Vickery’s frostbite was almost certainly mostly in his feet, and he probably lost several toes, which may have permanently affected his balance. He was certainly too serious a case to stay in the regimental hospital camp and was evacuated, first to the British Army Hospital at Balaklava and then to the Base Hospital at Scutari, on the Asian side of the Bosphorus, opposite Constantinople. At Scutari, he found himself in the care of the 34-year-old Florence Nightingale, who had arrived from England only a few weeks before. She oversaw what was still at that time a filthy Barrack Hospital where infection was rife and such care as existed was provided by male army orderlies who lacked any nursing skills and were usually drunk and frequently ill disciplined. This was the moment that Nightingale secured her place in the history books. Submitting a written damning indictment about the conditions and lack of cleanliness, she also railed at the vermin and disgusting condition of the food supplies.

Vickery is mentioned several times by O’Malley in his work Florence Nightingale 1820-56. ‘When Miss Nightingale left the hospital to go home at night, an orderly (Robert Robinson) led the way, carrying a lantern, while Vickery protected the rear, assisted by a 12-year-old Russian boy called Peter. “He was a prisoner and was in the General Hospital at Balaclava. He is a fine-looking, hearty little fellow, speaks English. He goes with my bodyguard Vickery and Robert, when I go home at night and sleeps in a little bed in their room.”’

Vickery turned his hand to other tasks when security conditions were normal. For example, during the day he worked in the hospital stores and kitchens and cooked ‘Extras’ (special Additional Diet food and comforts purchased with cash and outside of the Army Commissary system). He always waited for Miss Nightingale to finish her rounds at night and accompanied her on her daily journeys between the hospital and her house, where he had a room on the lower floor, close to the entrance.

It was Vickery who ensured Nightingale’s safety and protection from unwanted advances from drunken and licentious convalescents. As the only woman allowed to enter the awards after eight at night, she soon acquired the admiring title, the Lady of the Lamp. A most important impact of her innovations was a dramatic drop in the death rate at Scutari Hospital from 42% in February 1855 to 2% in June that year.

The significance of Vickery to the success of the Nightingale regime is reflected in an important letter she wrote to Colonel Gordon Drummond of the Coldstream Guards, General Hospital, Balaclava, on April 15, 1856. It sold at Christie’s in November 2011. In it, Nightingale asks permission to retain Vickery as an orderly in the case of the regiment being ordered home: Vickery “was frostbitten soon after Inkermann & sent down to Hospital in Scutari. He recovered sufficiently to become one of my Orderlies and has since become indispensable” – “I cannot speak too highly of Vickery’s honesty & trustworthiness. On one occasion, he was the principal means of discovering a robbery, of a large amount, of Stores.”

When the war ended, the hospitals closed in July 1856, and the British Army returned home. Vickery applied to be discharged, and his request was granted on December 3, with his character described as Very Good. He was still only 30 years old.

Little is known about him after that time, except that he married Sarah, a woman four years older than himself (possibly a widow). He would have had a significant sum of money at his discharge because of the very few chances to spend his pay while in the Crimea, and he also benefited from his D.C.M gratuity (worth £475 in 2025, according to the Bank of England).

By the census of 1871 he was listed as an ‘unemployed servant’, living with his wife in Broadclyst, south Devon, near to his sister. No children are recorded as living in the house. Tragedy struck later that year when Vickery was killed in an accident while working as an agricultural labourer at Thorverton Mills on December 9. His leg became trapped in a water-powered chaff-cutting machine, pulling him into its mechanism. He died in the Devon and Exeter Hospital of a fractured leg and concussion of the brain, aged 45.

Mr Pepys finishes with: “It is astonishing to think that this ordinary private soldier, who led a largely simple, unnoted and unremarkable life, can claim to have had such a significant impact on not just the health and survival rate of the wounded in the Crimea, but also on the entire future of healthcare for the British nation. It is clear from what Florence Nightingale had to say about Samuel Vickery that he was essential to her wellbeing and ability to succeed in her vital work on a day-to-day basis.”