“REFUSES TO ANTE”
If there was any lack of consideration for Clara Barton, it would do no good now to remember it.
Reverend William E. Barton,
(In 1922)
One of the “Committee to Advise,” and
Author of “The Life of Clara Barton.”
Years were to Clara Barton merely opportunities of service, not measures of life. This attitude prolonged her life and kept her young in spirit.
At ninety (1911) there was no mark of physical infirmity upon her nor was there any slightest slacking in the interest of the object for which she long had cared.
Senility was farther removed from her at ninety (1911) than from most women at sixty.
At the age of ninety-one (1912) there was not a physical lesion nor a diseased organ in the body.
She lived to enter her tenth decade, and when she died (1912) was still so normal in the soundness of her bodily organs and in the clarity of her mind and memory that it seemed she might easily have lived to see her hundredth birthday.
William E. Barton
“Her Cousin, the Author.”
(“William E. Barton is one of our third or fourth cousins.
Stephen E. Barton,”)
Clara Barton’s Nephew, and Dedicatee of
Barton’s “Life of Clara Barton.”
At no time in her life has Miss Barton been in sounder bodily or mental health or better able to continue the work to which her years of experience and natural endowments have preeminently fitted her. Moreover, the nation’s confidence is Miss Barton’s, and no hand can better guide its Red Cross work than hers.
Red Cross Committee, officially, to Congress.
Written report unanimously concurred in.
(In 1903.)
Year after year your President has framed and offered her resignation to the preceding Board and Committees. These have been resolutely met by appointment for life. Clara Barton.
Miss Barton has resigned three times before this time (May 14, 1904) but every time we have elected her again unanimously; and twice we have elected her for life and every member, 315 in number, voted for her. W. H. Sears, Secretary for Clara Barton.
I certify that at the meeting of the American National Red Cross, held in Washington, D. C, December 9, 1902, on motion to elect Clara Barton President of the organization for life, a standing vote was taken, resulting as follows: Ayes 28, noes 3, the three negative votes being....
S. W. Briggs, Secretary, Red Cross Committee.
It is the Red Cross, without the glamor of war or disaster, to attract your interest, that I bring to you to nourish and protect.
Clara Barton.
When the Government accepted the Red Cross, perhaps a bit arrogantly, I felt that my end was accomplished and that I was ready to give it up. Clara Barton.
It is a pride as well as a pleasure to hand to you an organization perfectly formed, thoroughly officered, with no debts and a sum of from $12,000 to $14,000 available to our treasury as a working fund. (Amount realized $15,541.89. The Author.) Clara Barton (on May 14, 1904, in offering her resignation as President).
It would be strange, if after so many years of earnest effort for the relief of human suffering, during which time I have always lived and moved in the full glare of the public gaze, I could not now safely trust my character and good name to the care of the American people. Clara Barton.
MRS. JOHN A. LOGAN
Clara Barton is the greatest woman of this, or any other, age.—Mrs. John A. Logan, the Vice-President under Clara Barton; the President of the American Red Cross Society, May 14, 1904–June 16, 1904.
It is an unspeakable joy to me that the toil-worn, weary mantle, that drops from mine, falls upon the shoulders of my vice-president, the woman so cherished in our own country and honored and trusted in other countries.
Clara Barton.