Clara Barton: A Centenary Tribute to the World's Greatest Humanitarian / Founder of the American Red Cross Society, Author of the American Amendment to the International Red Cross Convention of Geneva, Founder of the National First Aid Association of America

by Charles Sumner Young

LXXVII

Clara Barton started the Red Cross alone.

Boston (Mass.) Transcript.

Miss Clara Barton, the American Red Cross is your society alone, and none other we will patronize. G. Moynier, President, International Red Cross Committee, Geneva, Switzerland.

The total expense connected with the acceptance of the Treaty by this Government, in addition to the personal service of more than five years, was defrayed individually by Clara Barton. Red Cross Committee (in 1903). House Document No. 552, Vol. 49, 58th Cong.

If we heed the teachings of history we shall not forget that in the life of every nation circumstances may arise when a resort to arms can alone save it from dishonor.—We must be prepared to enforce any policy which we think it wise to adopt. Chester A. Arthur, The President. (In advocacy before Congress of Clara Barton’s Red Cross Measure).

Legislation by Congress is needful to accomplish the humane end that your society has in view. It gives me, however, great pleasure, Miss Barton, to state that I shall be happy to give any (Red Cross) measure which you may propose careful attention and consideration. James G. Blaine, Secretary of State (in 1881).

The first official advocate of the Red Cross measure, and fearless friend from its presentation in 1877, was Omar D. Conger, now Senator from Michigan, then a member of the House.

Clara Barton (Sept. 6, 1882).

JAMES A. GARFIELD
The President, March 4, 1881–September 19, 1881.
Executive Mansion.
Will the Secretary of State please hear Miss Barton on the subject herein referred to? J. A. Garfield.
The first tribute to Clara Barton in her Red Cross measure, March 30, 1881.
Clara Barton, friend and counselor of Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, of Garfield, of Hayes, Harrison, Cleveland and McKinley. Organized the American Red Cross and was appointed for life by Garfield. While the republic lives and womanhood is honored, her place is sure among the millions she has blest and whose name and fame they will cherish and revere.
Kate Brownlee Sherwood,
in a letter to the Toledo (Ohio) Times.

CHESTER A. ARTHUR
The President, September 19, 1881–March 4, 1885.
The President in whose administration the American Red Cross was approved by the U. S. Government, also the first President of the Board of Consultation, American Red Cross Society.
Washington, March 3, 1882.
Whereas (certain facts of Red Cross history here detailed)....
Now, therefore, the President of the United States of America, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, do hereby declare that the United States accede to the said Convention of October 20, 1868.
Done at Washington this first day of March in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and eighty-two, and of the Independence of the United States the one hundred and sixth.
By the President, Chester A. Arthur.
Frederick T. Frelinghuysen,
Secretary of State.

In 1877 Monsieur Moynier, President of the International Red Cross Committee, decided to make a further effort to obtain the adherence to the Treaty by our Government. For this purpose a special letter was sent to Miss Barton to deliver to President Hayes. Mabel T. Boardman—In “Under the Red Cross at Home and Abroad.”

In 1869 Clara Barton went to Geneva, Switzerland. She was visited there by the President and members of the International Committee for Relief and of the Wounded in War, who came to learn why the United States had refused to sign the Treaty of Geneva.—Years of devoted missionary work by Miss Barton with preoccupied officials and a heedless, short-sighted public at length bore fruit. Mary R. Parkman—Author of “Heroines of Service.”

Miss Barton, I trust you will press this matter upon our present administration with all the weight of your well-earned influence. Having myself somewhat ignominiously failed to get any encouragement for this (Red Cross) measure from two administrations, I leave it in your more fortunate hands, hoping that the time is ripe for a less jealous policy than American isolation in international movements for extending and universalizing mercy towards the victims in war. Dr. H. W. Bellows (Nov. 21, 1881).

Later—Miss Barton, I advise you to give it up as hopeless.

Dr. H. W. Bellows

(Ex-Chairman U. S. Sanitary Commission).

Miss Clara Barton, I thank you in the name of all of us (myself and colleagues of the International Committee).—Thanks to a perseverance and zeal which has surmounted every obstacle. Wishing to testify to you its gratitude for the services you have already rendered to the Red Cross (in securing the adherence of the United States to the Treaty), the Committee decided to offer to you one of the medals which a German engraver caused to be struck off in honor of the Red Cross. Please to regard it only as a simple memorial, and as a proof of the esteem and gratitude we feel for you. G. Moynier, President Red Cross International Committee.

Note.—The silver medal referred to is beautifully engraved with the coat of arms of the nations within the Treaty compact,—the medal being a model both of skillful design and exquisite workmanship.

Department of State,

Washington, D. C.

February 16, 1883.

My dear Miss Barton:

It affords me great pleasure to transmit a parcel containing a book presented to you by Her Majesty, the Empress of Germany, as a token of her high appreciation of the success of your efforts for the formation of an Association of the Red Cross in America.—Congratulating you upon the compliment which the Empress has paid to you by her action in sending you this gift I am, my dear Madam,

Very truly yours,

Sevellon A. Brown,

Chief Clerk.

On the night that came to Europe the news of the accession of the U. S. Government to the Treaty of Geneva (news sent by cable) there were lit bonfires in the streets of Switzerland, France, Germany and Spain. The Author.

If I live to return to my country (from Switzerland) I will try to make my people understand the Red Cross and that Treaty.

Clara Barton.

Weak and weary from the war-soaked fields of Europe, I brought the germs of the thrice-rejected Red Cross of Geneva, and with personal solicitations from the international Committee sought its adoption. Clara Barton.

I stood with this unknown (Red Cross) immigrant from the little Republic of Switzerland, outside the doors of the Government, for five years before I could secure for him citizenship papers and recognition as a desirable resident of the United States.

Clara Barton.

Perhaps no act of this age or country has reflected more merit abroad upon those especially active in it than this simple and beneficent Red Cross measure. Clara Barton.

Transitions are neither rapid nor easy. Dark days, if not dark ages, have shadowed them all. Clara Barton.

The Red Cross is one of the thresholds to the Temple of Peace.

Clara Barton, President, Red Cross.

Respect for the rights of others is peace.

Benito Juarez, President, Republic of Mexico.

The history of a country is mainly the history of wars.

Clara Barton.

Men have worshipped at Valkyria’s shrine and followed her siren lead until war has cost a million times more than the whole world is worth; poured out the best blood and crushed the finest forms that God has ever created. Clara Barton.

There is in the Red Cross no entangling alliances that any but a barbarian at war can feel any restraint. Clara Barton.

There is not a peace society on the face of the earth today, nor can there be one, so potent, so effectual against war as the Red Cross of Geneva. Clara Barton.

There can be no estimate of the misery assuaged, and the deaths prevented, by the unselfish zeal and devotion of the Red Cross.

Clara Barton.

Your children and your children’s children will need the Red Cross, when your hands are powerless to do that which is within your grasp. Clara Barton.