What do these eminent Victorians have in common? Well, not much, according to the life histories detailed within the book. Each story is very different and is a reflection of the background events before which it takes place.
For example, Cardinal Manning's story summarizes how the Oxford Movement came to take place. The Oxford Movement was a movement comprising members of the High Church within the Church of England. The high church basically dictated the theology and liturgy of the church, and so were an extremely influential body of men (and they were always men - women were believed to have no place in the high church). The groundwork begun by Manning eventually led to the creation of Anglo-Catholicism, a denominational hybrid of Spanish Catholicism and English Anglicanism that would have Queen Elizabeth I turning angry cartwheels in her grave. Like many of his peers, Cardinal Manning was a truculent man and he did not particularly like working alongside his Anglican equivalents, particularly the influential John Henry Newman, whom he disliked so much that he worked behind the scenes to try and prevent him from becoming a Cardinal at all. Manning does not come across as a very nice man in the book, rather, as a manipulative and underhand church politician.
Thomas Arnold, the second man profiled in the book, does not fare much better in terms of the indictment of his general character. Arnold was both teacher and historian, and was primarily responsible for the development of the English private school (known as public schools in Britain). He developed schools that were run along military lines, in that there was a reliance on a prefect system where older boys maintained discipline amongst the younger ones. He also favored an education that emphasized religious observance. All of which would seem to make him a hero of the modern education system, except for several glaring inadequacies; he didn't believe in science and so therefore never advocated teaching it, preferring the classics of Greek, history and literature. He is also credited with the development of structured sports in schools, particularly rugby, but Strachey contends that this emphasis on the importance of physical education would have happened with or without him anyway.
Respected and revered Major-General Charles George Gordon does not fare much better in Strachey's assessment. Also known as Gordon of Khartoum, he was a British army officer who made his name and reputation in the Crimean War, and in China, where he put down a rebellion and defeated forces twice the size and number of theirs. Pretty impressive - unless you are Strachey, who portrays Gordon as more of a mercenary than a traditional soldier. He was often sent into enemy territory on secret missions by the British government. One such mission was in Khartoum, the capital of Sudan at the time, and the place that gave Gordon his nickname. Fundamentalist rebels had overthrown the government of the time and Gordon was sent in to clear up the military mess that ensued. He refused to withdraw despite orders to the contrary, instead setting in for a siege that caught the British government off-guard, and ended in almost total disaster. Rather than being a man with his nation's support, Gordon is revealed to be a lone wolf whose military brilliance was often at odds with the political policy of the day.
Florence Nightingale differs from the other subjects of the book because she is praised for both her actions and her general character. She is a woman before her time - strong, obstreperous and determined long before women were permitted to be so. In fact she was almost impossible to get along with on a personal level, but this only enhanced the success of her professional achievements. Nightingale's accomplishments are all the more admirable when shown in context of the obstructive War Office, who were the department of the British government in charge of the administration of the army during World War One. The War Office was a classic example of the left hand having no idea what the right hand was doing, and against almost insurmountable odds, Nightingale saved the lives of the almost un-savable injured soldiers at the Front.
