News-Info-Alerts

Re: Barton Museum Opens, Includes Roll of Missing

To: ALL

From: Andi Wolos & Bob Necci

(POW-MIA InterNetwork)

Date: August 25, 2002

"Museum tells story of American Red Cross founder Clara Barton

ADAM GORLICK THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

OXFORD, Mass. -- There's no fanfare calling attention to Clara Barton's birthplace -- just a faded signpost pointing to a simple farmhouse on a narrow wooded lane.

But a tour of the childhood home of the American Red Cross founder unlocks rich stories of the heroism, compassion and determination of a girl who outgrew extreme shyness to become one of the first women to nurse Civil War soldiers on the battlefield.

"Clara once said that the only thing she remembered about her childhood was fear," says museum curator Cathy Woods.

The relics in the 11-room home are a testament to anything but fear.

A quilt draping the bed on which she was born is a patchwork of panels autographed by 27 officers and surgeons she worked with during the Civil War.

The pine desk standing against a dining room wall is the portable station that Barton brought to battlefields to write letters asking everyone she could think of to send supplies for the wounded.

On another wall hangs one of Barton's Rolls of Missing Men, a list of names she used to help locate soldiers killed or taken prisoner.

"All I remember about Clara Barton is that she was a nurse during the Civil War," says museum visitor Dee Crosby, a teacher from Hutchinson, Minn. "But I guess there's a lot more to her."

Born on Christmas Day of 1821, Barton was the youngest of five children. She was also the quietest, never speaking up for herself or making many friends, Woods says.

After years as a school teacher in Worcester County and New Jersey, Barton quit the teaching profession and moved to Washington, D.C., to be with her sister. She was working at the U.S. Patent Office when the Civil War broke out in 1861.

She realized the country wasn't prepared to deal with the wounded when she saw a trainload of injured Union soldiers arrive in Washington. At the time, the closest military hospital was at Fort Leavenworth, Kan.

"When she heard those soldiers arrived, she gathered food, whiskey, clothing and bandages," Woods says. "She wanted to do whatever she could to help."

Barton began a massive letter-writing campaign to get people from around the country to send aid to the soldiers. She soon had three warehouses filled with supplies, and began carting packages of food and bandages to battlefields.

While other volunteer groups and civilians headed to aid Civil War soldiers on their own, Barton was the first to do so with government permission.

Known as the "Angel of the Battlefield," Barton became the superintendent of Union nurses in 1864 and began receiving supplies, assistants and military trains from the government.

When the war ended in 1865, people began seeking her help to locate missing soldiers.

President Lincoln authorized her to organize a search on behalf of the government, making her the first woman to head a federal agency. But she wasn't given any funding, so Barton raised money for the project on a speaking tour.

Barton had lists of the missing posted in public buildings and published in newspapers, and was able to account for about 22,000 of the 67,000 missing soldiers, Woods says.

After the project was completed in 1868, Barton's doctor ordered her to take a vacation.

While traveling in Europe, she met members of the International Red Cross organization who asked her why there wasn't a similar humanitarian group in North America.

Barton returned to Washington and spent 10 years organizing the American Red Cross.

Barton ran the group for two decades, expanding its mission to include disaster relief and emergency care. When she finally stepped down at age 84, it was not to retire. Instead, she founded the National First Aid Society to promote basic first aid care around the country.

In 1912, Barton died at age 90. She is buried near the house where she was born, in a simple North Oxford cemetery, under a red cross.

©2002 The Olympian

- Getting there: The Clara Barton birthplace museum is at 68 Clara Barton Road, North Oxford, Mass.
- Admission: $5 for adults; $2.50 for children 6-12.
- Hours: 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Wednesday through Sunday from late June to Labor Day.
- Information: Phone 508-987-5375."