Barton arrived in Johnstown five days after the tragedy on the first train that got through. She immediately began work, using a tent as living and office space, and a dry goods box as a desk. From that desk she administered a program that amounted to half a million dollars, conducted a publicity campaign, and joined forces with the other charitable societies working in Johnstown. One of her aides recalled the long hours and complex work that characterized their five months in Johnstown and noted that through it all she remained “calm, benign, tireless and devoted.”
Barton’s first concern was a warehouse for Red Cross supplies and under her direction workmen erected one in four days. She then turned to alleviating the acute housing shortage. Hotels, two stories high and containing more than 30 rooms each, were built and fully furnished to serve as temporary shelters. Crews of men were organized to clean up the wreckage, while women volunteered to oversee the distribution of clothing and other necessities. As in all its work, the Red Cross tried to supply jobs and a spirit of self-help along with material assistance.
Floodwaters roamed through Johnstown, Pennsylvania, in 1889, destroying a great number of homes and businesses. More than 2,200 persons lost their lives.
Clara Barton’s organization was only one of many that came to the aid of Johnstown, but its contribution was outstanding for its quick thinking and tireless energy. Gov. James A. Beaver of Pennsylvania noted in a letter of appreciation to the Red Cross that “she was among the first to arrive on the scene of calamity.... She was also the last of the ministering spirits to leave the scene of her labors.” The city of Johnstown scarcely knew how to express its thanks. “We cannot thank Miss Barton in words,” an editorial in the Johnstown Daily Tribune stated. “Hunt the dictionaries of all languages through and you will not find the signs to express our appreciation of her and her work. Try to describe the sunshine. Try to describe the starlight. Words fail.”
Field work took up a large portion of Barton’s time in the 1880s, but she was able to pursue some other interests and obligations. During 1883, for example, she was superintendent of the Women’s Reformatory Prison at Sherborn, Massachusetts. She undertook the position at the request of former general, now Gov. Benjamin F. Butler, but she took it reluctantly. Her administration was characterized by the extension of dignity and education to inmates, rather than punishment. She found the work annoying and depressing, and she was glad to leave it and get back to the Red Cross.
Between the burdensome paper work and correspondence of the Red Cross and actual relief work, Barton found time to be the official American representative to four International Red Cross conferences between 1882 and 1902. She enjoyed these trips to Europe, for they gave her a chance to see friends and to be honored, as she always was by court and convention. The international congress of 1884, at Geneva, was especially memorable. An “American Amendment” to the Geneva Treaty was adopted, and, as the head of the newest signatory power in the Red Cross she was the center of attention. The amendment sanctioned Red Cross work in peacetime calamities and was the direct result of her activities in the United States. The congress cheered as she was praised as having “the skill of a statesman, the heart of a woman, and the ‘final perserverance [sic] of the saints.’”
Barton was also concerned with planning a national headquarters for the American Red Cross. In the 1880s and early 1890s Red Cross headquarters were located at various spots in Washington, D.C. After 1891, however, plans were made to build a permanent home for the organization. Situated at Glen Echo, Maryland, a short distance outside Washington, the new building served both as office and home for Barton and her staff.
What few hours she could spare from Red Cross activities she devoted to raising the status of women. She was proud that the Red Cross embodied many of her beliefs. In the last two decades of the 19th century, she continued to speak at rallies and join conventions promoting women’s rights. Her lecture topics generally centered on philanthropic work done by women, but she spoke out most vehemently on female suffrage. She was incensed that the decision to let women vote hinged upon the assent of male legislators, but she remained optimistic about the ultimate outcome. She told one lecture audience that “there is no one to give woman the right to govern herself. But in one way or another, sooner or later, she is coming to it. And the number of thoughtful and right-minded men who will oppose will be much smaller than we think, and when it is really an accomplished fact, all women will wonder, as I have done, what the objection ever was.”
Barton’s prestige lent respect to the feminist cause, and she was in much demand as a lecturer and author. In 1888 alone, she spoke in Montclair, New Jersey; Dansville, New York; Boston and Dorchester, Massachusetts, and was a vice president and featured speaker at the First International Woman’s Suffrage Conference in Washington, D.C.