biography
| name: |
Barton, Clara
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popular name of Clarissa Harlowe Barton
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| sex:
| female
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| lived:
| (1821–1912)
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| biography:
| Nurse and organizer, born in Oxford, Massachusetts, USA. An adventurous and strong-willed farmer's daughter, she nursed an invalid brother as a child, became a teacher at age 15, and worked in the US Patent Office in Washington, DC during the 1850s. After the Union defeat at the First Battle of Bull Run (Jul 1861) she advertized for provisions for the wounded, and received such a large contribution that she set herself up as a distributing agency. From mid-July 1862 she operated as a freelance front-line nurse, distributing comforts and tending the sick and wounded of the Army of the Potomac. She served as superintendent of nurses for the Army of the James (1864), her only official connection, but she had difficulty taking orders and preferred to work on her own. After the war she worked under the auspices of the International Red Cross in Europe to distribute relief to the French in the Franco-Prussian War. When she returned to the USA she campaigned for the establishment of an American Red Cross and became its first president (1881–1904). Small, slightly built, but physically strong, she expended a large portion of her substantial energies in the field, and even at age 79 she spent six weeks tending the sick and homeless in Galveston, TX after the disastrous flood there. A poor manager, unwilling to delegate or share authority, she resigned under pressure as head of the Red Cross (1904) after which the agency experienced a complete reorganization. |
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