Representative women of New England/Clara Barton
CLARA BARTON, the first President of the American National Red Cross, was born in North Oxford, Mass., December 25, 1821, daughter of Stephen and Sally (Stone) Barton. She was named Clarissa Harlow. Her father, when a young man, fought under General Anthony Wayne in the Indian war in the West, and was afterward a Captain of militia. His parents were Dr. Stephen and Dorothy (Moore) Barton, the former a son of Edmund Barton, of Sutton, a soldier in the French war, and the latter a daughter of Elijah Moore, of Oxford, and his wife, Dorothy Learned. Clara Barton in girlhood pursued her studies under the direction of her older brothers and sisters, she being the youngest of the family of five. She learned something of business methods by serving as book-keeper for her brother Stephen, a majiufacturer. Adopting at an early age the profession of teacher, she taught school for several years in North Oxford, and then attended the Clinton Liberal Institute in Central New York, where she studied the higher branches of learning. On leaving the Institute she went with some friends to New Jersey. In that State there were then no public schools worthy the name.
At Bordentown she obtained permission of the local authorities to open a free school. The school began with six boys, others came in, and soon her room was filled. Before long the borough built a .school-house costing four thousand dollars, and a little later the free public school of Bordentown, with Miss Barton at its head, had six hundred pupils and eight teachers. On account of failing health she at length resigned her position as teacher and went to Washington to recuperate. A few months later she became a clerk in the Patent Office. This was in 1854. Losing her ])Osition when Buchanan was President, she regained it after the election of Lincoln. Immediately upon hearing of the assault on the Sixth Massachusetts Regiment at Baltimore, she offered her services to the War Department. Through her personal appeals and active effort train-loads of supplies were secured and forwarded ' to the front for the soldiers in the field.
She visited the hospitals, and went with the Army of the Potomac, ministering on the battle-fields to the wounded. She personally superintended the forwarding of supplies, often riding on wagon trains many days and nights, reaching the scenes of bloodshed in time to minister to the wounded and dying.
Although her sensitive nature shrank from these scenes of war, she continued her humanitarian work in the thickest of the conflict. She was in the siege of Charleston, and was at Fort Wagner, Petersburg, and some of the other most important fields of warfare. Her ability, good judgment, quick perception, and tireless energy were appreciated by surgeons, commanding generals, and the officials at Washington; and every facility possible was placed at her disposal by those in power, for they realized that her services were invaluable.
At the close of the Civil War there were eighty thousand missing men on the muster- rolls of the United States. The work of examining these rolls and locating the burial- places of the fallen who were left on the field was an undertaking that required skill, fortitude, and patience. Miss Barton, however, was equal to the task, and instituted the " Bureau of Missing Men of the Armies of the United States." This was a great comfort to the anxious friends of martyred thousands, whose records and names were secured and placed on the official rolls at Washington. Through her instrumentality stones were placed over the graves of twelve thousand, nine hun- dred and twenty soldiers at Andersonville and tablets erected in memory of the four hundred "Unknown."
Miss Barton continued this work four years, expen(Ung fifteen thousantl dollars of her own funds, for which she was reimbursed by Congress.
In order to extend the interest in the returned soldiers who had suffered for their country, she often related at public gatherings stories of her experiences on the field and in hospitals.
In 1869 she was advised by her physician to visit Europe and take a much needed rest. She intended leading a quiet life abroad three years, but her fame had ])receded her. Arriving in Geneva, Switzerland, in September, 1869, she was visited the following month by the President and members of the "Inter- national Conunittee for the Relief of the Wounded in War," who desired her co-of)eration in securing the adoption by the United States of the treaty of the Red Cross.
The idea of forming permanent societies for the relief of wounded sohUers originated with Henri Dunant, a Swi.ss gentleman who had been deeply impressed by the scenes of suffering following tlie liattle of Solferino in Jime, 1859. Lecturing in Geneva before the "Society of Public LTtility," he interested M. Gustave Moynier, its president. Dr. Louis A])pin, and others. At a meeting of the society held in February, 1863, the subject was discussed, and a committee was formed, with M. Moynier at its head, to take action. In response to a circular issued by the commit- tee some months later, there was held in Geneva in October, 1863, an international conference of thirty-six members, among them being representatives of fourteen governments. The conference lasted four days. Its proceed- ings were marked by a "general unanimity, as new as it was spontaneous, on a question of humanity, instantaneously developed into one of philanthropic urgency."
The result was the calling, by the conference, of an international convention, which held its sessions in Geneva in August, 1864. At this convention was adopted a treaty consist- ing of a code of ten articles, since known as the Geneva Treaty, or tlie International Red Cross Treaty, the sign or batlge agreed upon being a red cross on white ground.
The first government to adopt the treaty was that of France in September, 1864; the eleventh. Great Britain in February, 1865; the thirty-first, Peru in 1880. The formation of national and of local societies of the Red Cross followed in every case the adoption of the treaty.
Miss Barton listened with deepest interest to the account of the Red Cross movement given to her by its leaders in Geneva, and, as she says, was " impressed with the wisdom of its principles and the good practical sense of its details." During the Franco-Prussian War she saw the excellent work done under the Red Cross banner in the field — saw it and took part in it, and resolved that she would try to make the people of her native country understand the Red Cross and the treaty.
On her return to America in 1873, after her exhausting labors in Strasburg, in Paris, and at Metz, she having previously aided the Duchess of Baden in establishing military hospitals. Miss Barton was more in need of rest than when she went abroad in 1869. A period of invalidism and suffering followed. Late in the year 1877 she was able to go to Washington as the official bearer of a letter from M. Moynier, president of the International Committee of Geneva, to President Hayes, urging the atloption by the United States of the Geneva Treaty. The letter was kindly received, but its appeal met with no response. Writing newspaper articles and publishing pamphlets. Miss Barton continued her ad- vocacy of the cause until the coming in of a new administration in March, 1881. She then lost little time in presenting a copy of M. Moynier 's letter to President Garfield, whose interest and sympathy were expressed a few weeks later in a letter of acknowledg- ment written to Miss Barton by Secretary Blaine.
Miss Barton now felt that it would be well to anticipate and facilitate the desired action of Congress by beginning to form societies. A meeting that was held in Washington in May, 1881, to further this end, resulted in the formation of "The American Association of the Reil Cross," of which Clara Barton was made president. The first local society of the Red Cross in the Ihiited States was formetl at Dansville, N.Y., the country home of Miss Barton, in August, 1881. The adhesion of the United States to the Treaty of Geneva was given on March 1, 1882, this nation being the thirty-second to take such action and the first to adopt the proposed amendment of October, 1868, concerning the Red Cross for the navy.
The American Association of the Red Cross, it should be mentio^ied, was legally incorporated in the District of- Columbia. A broader scope was given to its humane work by the adoption by the ratifying congress at Berne of the '"American amendment,' whereby the suffering incident to great floods, famines, epidemics, conflagrations, cyclones, or other disasters of national magnitude, may be ameliorated by the administering of necessary relief."
On April 17, 1893, was incorporated in the District of Columbia, to continue the work of the American Association above named, "The American National Red Cross," to constitute the Central National Committee of the United States, authorized by the International Committee of Geneva. The American National Red Cross was reincorporated by Congress in 1900. Miss Barton held the office of President till her retirement in the spring of the present year (1904), when she was succeeded by Mrs. John A. Logan. From the beginning the American Red Cross, so long under the efficient leadership of Clara Barton, has been in active relief work in times of national woe and calamity, finding its duties in such occasions as (to mention but a few) the forest fires of Michigan in 1881; the Ohio and Mississippi floods of 1884; the Johnstown disaster, 1889: the Russian famine, 1891-92; the South Carolina tidal wave, 1893; Armenian massacres, 1896; and later among the "reconcentrados" of Cuba and in field and camp and hospitals during the Spanish-American War. The story of these activities would fill volumes. Referring to the work in Cuba, the Hon. Retlfield Proctor, in a speech in the United States Senate, March 17, 1898, said: "Miss Barton and her work need no endorsement from me. I had known and esteemed her for many years, but had not half appreciated her capability and devotion to her work. I especially looked into her business methods, fearing there would be the greatest danger of mistake, that there might be want of system, waste, and extravagance, but found she could teach me on these points. In short, I saw nothing to criticise, but everything to com- mend."
The following extract from the official report of Lieutenant Colonel B. F. Pope, Chief Surgeon, Fifth Army Corps, battles of San Juan, El Caney, Santiago de Cuba, is additional testimony to the invaluable aid rendered by this distinguished woman: " In Major Wood's hospital over one thousand wounded men were received within three days; and, in spite of lack of shelter and the subsequent exposure to intense heat and drenching rains, the mortality rate was less than seven per cent. . . . Early after the battle the hospital was honored by the presence of Miss Clara Barton and her staff of four assistants, who immediately set up their tents and cooking apparatus, and labored incessantly, day and night, in the broiling sun and drenching rain, preparing sick food for the wountled and serving it to them, and in a thousand other ways giving the help that the Red Cross Society brings."
In his message to Congress, December 5, 1898, President McKinley .said: "In this con- nection it is a pleasure for me to mention in terms of cordial appreciation the timely and useful work of the American National Red Cross, both in relief measures preparatory to the cam]3aigns, in sanitary assistance at several of the camps of assemblage, and later, under the able and experienced leadership of the President of the society, Miss Clara Barton, on the fields of battle and in the hospitals at the front in Cuba. Working in conjunction with the governmental authorities and under their sanction and approval and with the enthusiastic co-operation of many patriotic women and societies in the various States, the Red Cross has fully maintained its alreatly high reputation for intense earnest- ness and abifity to exercise the noble purposes of this international organization, tluis justify- ing the confitlence and support which it has received at the hands of American people. To the members and officers of this society and all who aided them in philanthropic work the sincere and lasting gratitude of the sokliers and the public is due and is freely accorded."
It is estimated that the value of relief ex- tended under the direction of Miss Barton as president of the American Red Cross was nearly three million dollars. She represented the United States at several international conferences of the Red Cross in Europe.
Miss Barton is a quiet, unassuming woman in appearance, and never boasts of her achieve- ments. She is dignified in manner, self- possessed, and a tireless worker. Among the numerous decorations she has received in recognition of her meritorious services may be mentioned the Iron Cross of Prussia, a badge of rare distinction, and the Golden Cross of Baden.
In 1883 Miss Barton served as Superintendent of the Reformatory Prison for Women in Sherborn, Mass. While she has had but little time to devote to other work than that of the Red Cross, she is deeply interested in the Grand Army of the Republic and the
Woman's Relief Corps, the only recognized auxiliary to the G. A. R. She is a Past National Chaplain of the National Woman's Relief Corps and its only honorary member. She is often an honored guest at the annual gatherings of these national organizations, and has a warm place in the hearts of their members.
For several years Miss Barton resided in the mansion in Washington formerly occupied by General Grant as his headquarters. During the past few years she has made her home at Glen Echo, Md.