Notes for Users

Errors and searching
See the explanation in the "Search Letters" page for how to search for words or combinations of words.

The text of the items (letter summaries) still contains many errors due to the limitations of the hard copy used and the inaccuracy of Optical Character Recognition (OCR).  Proof reading and correction is continuing. Until it is completed, using the "Search Letters" facility will not be completely reliable.  A tip: use the stem of the word with the * wildcard, as described in the Search Letters page, to increase the chances of recognising a word containing OCR errors.  This is important in proper names, which are often followed by a footnote reference which the OCR has merged into the name, e.g. Gatling1.  Use Gatl*.

Correspondent Index
The Correspondent Index, is more reliable because it was compiled independently and the references have been checked.  The date on the first line of each item was calculated by looking for dates in the text. The method used did not recognise, for example, "Xmas Day, 1873" which would therefore be translated to 1873 on the top line (and in the Correspondent Index reference).  "Dec. 1873" would be translated into 12/73.  "25 Dec. 1873" would come out as 25/12/73.  If no date was recognised the calculated date field will be [nd].

References to the microfilm calendar
Sue Goldie identifies the items in her Calendar as published on microfiche by a reference with four terms e.g. B. 4. E1, 155.  This web edition identifies the same item by the reference 4_155 in the first line of the item before the date.  The two omitted terms are not necessary to identify the item - they are guides to physical location in hard copy or microfiche and are therefore not relevant to an electronic publication.  The letter B identified the Section, a group of hardcopy pages covering a defined epoch in Florence Nightingale's life.  Item numbering (e.g. 155) began again with each new Section.  The other term in Goldie's reference specified the coordinates of the image on a 98-image microfiche: E1 meant Row 5 Column 1.

References to B.M. Add. MSS.
Users should not put too much trust in these references, which identify a volume and folio number in the British Library Additional Manuscripts series.  The OCR software was erratic in deciphering these references, and some heroic assumptions have been made in automatically correcting the OCR errors.  The references now look plausible, but may be wrong.  If you are publishing a reference without checking the manuscript source, it is safer to quote the Sue Goldie Calendar reference.

Errors in the original Calendar:

• Section G cover sheet incorrectly lists item numbers in Fiche 19. Should be items 665 - 688
• Parthe Nightingale Correspondent Index entry 22 E13 1215 should be 1025
• Fiche 10 cover indicates items start at 377, should be 374
• Fiche 11 ditto items should start at 765
• Hilary Bonham Carter Correspondent Index A8 G11 358,259 should be 359
• JohnSutherland Correspondent Index 20 D14,280 should be E14,280
• Louis Mallet Correspondent Index 22.G11,1180 should be 25.G11,1180
• Edwin Chadwick Correspondent Index 9.E11,749 should be 249
• Section D page C9 item after 132 is un-numbered (there may be more of these)
• Section E page E1 item number 155 seems to be skipped (in Sue Goldie’s copy she has hand-numbered Mrs Herbert 17/11/55 as 155 but the index says it is 156)
• Parthenope Nightingale Correspondent Index 9.C9,132a should be 132

Characteristics of the original calendar which have been changed in the digital version:

• Items which flow over onto a new page have been merged into a single item e.g. 18.D9,477; D10,477

• Most sub-items a, b, c etc have been merged by grouping them together and giving them a numeric item identifier without a suffix, e.g. 4_36a and 4_36b become 4_36. A few, however, should be separate items and so a one-letter suffix in the item identifier is allowed. So the complete item identifier is now f_ia where f = fiche 1-33, i = item number within section and a = abcde (optional). The list below shows all the items that had suffixes. The underlined ones have been merged together. If there is no letter after the number then the items were only a and b. For example, Section L Fiche 34 item 458 now consists of two items 458a and 458b. Where there is a suffixed item, then all items with that item number have suffixes, except in the "special cases" mentioned below.
• B 4,36 5,336e
• C 6,273 7,477c 7,654 8,677 (sub-items b and c of this last one merged into b)
• D 9,132b (Special case of items 132 and 132b)
• D 9,326
• E 13,677
• E 14,876b (Special case of items 876 and 876b)
• F 15,83 16,363
• G 17,12 18,391 18,412 18,413 18,477d
• H 20,91 20,226 20,394 21,497c 22,924 22,972 22,1015 22,1017
• I 23,39 23,351 24, 549 26,1475
• J 28,395 28,662 28,686
• K 29,184 29,299 29,300 29,337 30,565 30,793 31,1041 31,1129c, 31,1293
• L 33, 27a (this is a special case where there are 2 items 27 and 27a)
• L 33,52 33,97 33,351c 34,458 34,562c 34,654 34,692 34,863
• L 33, 196a (Special case of 196 and 196a)
• M 36,124

20 March 2010

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