WASHINGTON — In the middle of a disaster, we expect to see Red Cross volunteers rushing to the aid of those hit the hardest. The American Red Cross represents a hope for all Americans: that volunteers will rush to the aid of those suffering.
It was a hope started on a Civil War battlefield and became the personal mission of one nurse: Clara Barton.
Barton was born in the 1821 in Massachusetts. She graduated school early and became a teacher at 18. She then founded and was the headmaster of a school at 27. But she was replaced by a man.
After that, she headed to Washington, D.C. to work In the U.S. Patent Office as a clerk. It was right around this time the Civil War started.
The city became a refuge for wounded soldiers. Barton volunteered to care for the soldiers. She offered them treatment and rest in D.C.
On Sept. 17, 1862, she drove medical supplies to the help the wounded Union soldiers, but she found herself in the middle of the bloodiest single day of the war.
Barton was on hand to tend to the wounded. She stayed after the battle and worked into the night cooking and caring for the soldiers. After seeing her that day, a Union Army surgeon called her "the Angel of the battlefield."
From Antietam on Barton was on a mission. She dedicated the next few years to helping soldiers across the country, even after the Civil War.
Several years after the war, she made a trip to Switzerland. It was there she learned about the International Red Cross and their coordinated mission to care for the sick and wounded in war time.
She came back to America and lobbied to create an American branch. In 1882, President Chester A. Arthur created what we know now as the American Red Cross. He had the sense to put Clara Barton as the head of the organization.
As she did in all things, Barton even pioneered a new mission for the Red Cross. It was to be more than just a wartime response. She molded it into a healthcare organization dedicated to helping during natural disasters.
She spearheaded relief efforts to hurricanes and floods.
She would go on to found other rescue and aid organizations. By the time she died in 1912, Barton left a mark on America that we have a duty to care for one another in a time of crisis.
