Florence Nightingale famously wrote, “It breaks my heart to leave Lea Hurst.” Now, the same country estate in the U.K.
where the nurse and statistician grew up is looking for its next owner. Lea Hurst, a Grade II-listed home in Derbyshire, has hit the market for £3.75 million (or roughly $4.
8 million ) with England’s Blue Book Agency. According to the listing, Nightingale’s wealthy father, William Nightingale (née Shore), inherited the historic property from his great-uncle in 1815. At the time, the property had a 17th-century farmhouse, which was transformed into the grandiose Elizabethan-style dwelling seen today.
When the Nightingales relocated to Embley Park in Hampshire in 1825, they kept Lea Hurst as a summer house, and the estate remained in the family until 1946. Beginning in the mid-1950s, the estate served as a residence for retired nurses and later operated as a nursing home under the Royal Surgical Society until 2004. Nightingale, who died in 1910 at the age of 90, is best remembered for founding the world’s first professional nursing school in London .
RELATED: Cara Delevingne’s Childhood Home in London Lists for Nearly $30 Million The current owner, Peter Kay, snagged the property in 2011 and spent the next three years restoring the place to its former glory, including recreating the original Victorian gardens. The Kay family has even gathered historic letters written by Nightingale, along with old photographs, drawings, and furniture connected to.