Watercolour by Edward Burney depicting the Nightingale Monument in Westminster, probably intended as the basis for an engraving. Great Britain, ca. 1800.

Watercolour depicting the Nightingale Monument in Westminster. Inscribed with a number and artist's name.

In St Michael’s chapel, off the north transept of Westminster Abbey, is a remarkable monument commemorating Lady Elizabeth Nightingale. She was born in 1704, the eldest of three daughters of Washington Shirley, Earl Ferrers and Viscount Tamworth (d.1729) and his wife Mary. Her sisters were Selina, Countess of Huntingdon (d.1791 aged 83) and Mary, Viscountess Kilmorey who died in1784. On 24 June 1725 Elizabeth married Joseph Gascoigne (1695-1752), son of the Revd. Joseph Gascoigne, Vicar of Enfield in Middlesex. He assumed the surname of Nightingale on becoming heir to his kinsman Sir Robert Nightingale. Of their three sons, Washington, Joseph and Robert, only the first survived his father but then only by two years. She died on 17 August 1731 following a miscarriage caused by the shock of a violent flash of lightning. The child, Elizabeth, survived and later married Wilmot Vaughan, 1st Earl of Lisburne and died in 1755. The monument was not erected until 1761, and gives an incorrect date of death for Lady Nightingale. The inscription reads:

“Here rest the ashes of JOSEPH GASCOIGNE NIGHTINGALE of Mamhead in the county of Devon Esqr., who died July the 20th 1752 aged 56. And of Lady ELIZABETH his wife, daughter and coheir of WASHINGTON Earl Ferrers; who died August the 17th 1734 aged 27. Their only son WASHINGTON GASCOIGNE NIGHTINGALE Esqr. deceas’d, in memory of their virtues, did by his last will order this monument to be erected”.

P.50-1982