The Life of Clara Barton - Essay Example

THE LIFE OF CLARA BARTON Due INTRODUCTION Throughout the patriarchal history of the world we hear tales of great men, be they leaders, war heroes, political innovators, and the favored and dominant of genders. While women throughout history are often relegated to the roles supportive wives and dutiful homemakers; their place in history, much like the women themselves, is downplayed, underestimated, and, ideally, submissive. Of course today in this modern era we know that men and women, while different, are all deserving of equal treatment, rights, and liberties. However, not all women in our past accepted the status, station, and social norms of their gender. Women who stood out, stood up, and spoke out. These are women that history would call ahead of their time. Clara Barton is one such woman. During this country’s most traumatic war on American soil, the Civil War, is where Clara Barton, against all tradition and norms, lead women into the battlefields with the purpose of aiding and caring for the wounded and sick (Grimm, 2012). This diligence and humanitarian endeavors established the first war-time nurses and would lead to her later leadership of the Red Cross organization. Clara Barton’s contribution to the United States and to the whole world is profound; the American Red Cross remains the primary organization to offer aid and support to peoples across the globe. BACKGROUND Clarissa Harlowe Barton, or Clara as she preferred to be addressed, was born in the state of Massachusetts on Christmas Day 1821. She was the youngest of six children. As a child when one of her brother’s was injured in a barn raising accident, she nursed him, at his bedside, for two years. She was, soon after, sent to boarding school, despite being incredibly bright and literate student, she was, however, innately shy, which made her a poor student ,and she returned home (American Red Cross, 2014). Her mother enlisted the help of a doctor and it was decided that Clara should become a teacher in order to overcome her painful shyness. In 1838 Clara took the certification exam to become a teacher. She excelled as a teacher. The children were inspired by her and her anti-corporal punishment viewpoint gained her the favor of even more children. Within 6 years she would open a school of her own. She also enrolled in college to increase her credentials. She would ultimately move to New Jersey. In 1854 she moved to Washington DC and began working as a clerk for the U.S. Patent Office (Civil War Trust, 2014). However, the innate sexism present in Washington resulted in her being demoted to a more “female appropriate” position, a copyist, which was paid far less than her previous clerk position. She would leave Washington shortly after and return to Massachusetts. However that same position was made available again, after the presidency of Buchanan ended and the election of Abraham Lincoln. In 1861 the Civil War began, when southern states proclaimed their intention to secede from the new nation and the first shots were fired at Fort Sumner in South Carolina (National Park Service, 2014). DISCUSSION With the onset of the Civil War, Clara Barton’s goals, and life path would be revealed. In April of 1861, while she was working, Southern sympathizers attacked the Baltimore regiment stationed there. History would record the event as the Boston Riots. A number of soldiers and civilians had been injured or killed. When Clara heard about the riot and about the makeshift hospital established at the Capital Building she left the Patent Office and immediately began collecting food, medicine, clean linens, and other needed supplies for those wounded in the attacks, This cemented the potential horrors of warfare in her mind and she became dedicated to wanting to aid in the war effort. She contacted friends in New Jersey, Massachusetts, and throughout Washington encouraging them to participate in the need for the aid. A voluntary effort was undertaken throughout these 3 states, this supply network would remain active throughout the course of the war. However, Clara wanted to see the aid come to the soldiers where they need it most, on the battlefield. In August of 1862 she received formal permission to travel and provide supplies to the battlefields of Union soldiers during the Civil War throughout 1862 and a number of serious and bloody battles. In April of 1863, she joined her own brother, a Captain in the Union Army, at the bombardment of Charleston, South Carolina. At this point the Union Army was not faring well in the war. All the same Barton continued to provide supplies and establish field hospitals. These wartime hospitals saw horrific wounds, amputations, and soldiers who died from slow and painful deaths from injuries that could not be treated. She continued to work and train other women who were interested in traveling with and acting as nurses on the battlefields of the Civil War. One of the most significant issues in the Civil War was slavery. While this humanitarian concern played a large role in the Civil War it was not the only contributor to the Civil War, Barton was an outspoken advocate of the abolitionist ideologies; she participated in establishing schools that would aid freed slaves to adapt to their future emancipation from slavery. Barton’s views on slavery would, ultimately, get her into trouble in teaching circles, however, at this point; she was solely focused and dedicated to the war effort. Sadly, amidst the wounded and dying that would come before her, one was her own brother who died under her attendance. This early humanitarian did not stop nursing soldiers and educating freed slaves. She, also, had a deep concern for the fate of those soldiers who were MIA, or missing in action, throughout the course of the war. While some may be deserters along the way, some of these men may have been killed and it went unrecorded or they could have been taken prisoner by southern forces. She received permission from President Lincoln to establish “The Office of Correspondence with Friends of the Missing Men of the United States Army,” which represented a four-year search endeavor that would continue well-after the war would ultimately end. Her efforts would result in discovering of the fate of more than 22,000 men (National Parks Service, 2014). Shortly after the historic and bloody battle at Gettysburg and the mass Southern Surrender in Vicksburg, the Civil War officially ended when General Lee signed his surrender in April of 1865 at Appomattox Court House, Virginia. After the war, her work did not end. While the fighting had concluded, there were still more humanitarian efforts to be undertaken. Andersonville Prison is infamously recalled as one of the singularly most horrific war-time prisons in the South recorded in the Civil War. Barton participated in the identifying of more than 13,000 Union soldiers, most of which were left in mass graves and raised the flag later that summer at a dedication marking Andersonville grounds as a National Cemetery. The following year, during court proceedings discussing Andersonville she testified that, although much of the evidence of the deplorable conditions men were once kept was lost after the captives were freed, she estimated more than 30,000 men were kept in a few acre area. She describes cramped, unhygienic, and inhumane conditions, where sickness, infection, hunger, and mistreatment was quite evident (Barton, 1866) For the next 2 years she would spend her time traveling from state to state giving speeches and telling the tales of her experiences in the Civil War. During her travels she became acquainted with Elizabeth Cady Stanton and Susan B. Anthony, the figureheads of the women’s suffrage movement. In 1869 her health had taken a poor turn and her physician suggested that she go to Europe to rest and recuperate. While in Switzerland she met Dr. Louis Appi; this meeting would change Clara Barton’s future and place in history forever (National Park Reserve, 2014). It is a misconception that Clara Barton invented and founded the Red Cross organization. In fact, the Red Cross was conceived several years earlier at the Geneva Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of Wounded in Armies in the Field in 1864; at the time Clara Barton knew nothing about it and the United States was not a participant. As a representative of the Red Cross she traveled throughout France and other parts of Europe bringing aid to the German soldiers during the Franco-Prussian War in the 1870s. After a few years of efforts in Europe she returned to the United States and moved to Dansville, New York and spending a short time in a sanitarium to deal with the stress and anxiety of her work. In 1881 the United States established the American Association of the Red Cross and Clara Barton was named its fist President in June of that year (American Red Cross, 2014). From forest fires in Michigan and devastating floods in Ohio and Mississippi and from influenza outbreaks to New York’s Typhoid Fever epidemic the Red Cross, under Barton’s leadership, throughout the 1880s, distributed hundreds of thousands of dollars to displaced families, to aid in rebuilding lost structures, providing food and temporary shelters, as well as, medical care as needed (National Park Service, 2014). The latter part of the decade the American Red Cross was incredibly efficient and successful at achieving its humanitarian goals would ally with the international branches and aid in the war in the Balkans. In 1888, she used her position as President of the Red Cross to share her support for the women’s suffrage movement. In fact, she would serve as Vice-President and regular speaker of the “First International Women’s Suffrage Conference” in Washington DC (Grimm, 2012). The United States would spend the better part of the last years of the 19th century aiding the victims of domestic natural disasters and accidents. However in 1898 Barton made a humanitarian voyage to Cuba, where she worked and spoke for the good of orphans, the most innocent of war victims (Ardalan, 2011). As the new century began and the American Victorian era became the norm, Barton turned less to physical efforts and more to the recording of her thoughts and ideas about the experiences of her life. Always a strong writer she penned a number of books discussing her own childhood, life story, and her time serving victims in the Red Cross. One of her most famous and poignant works is a poem title, “The Women Who Went to the Field,” which was a lyrical response to the negative attitudes of men towards women who chose to serve as nurses during the Civil War (National Park Service, 2014). Many men felt that women on the battlefield would be distracting, that they would be in the way, and that they would cry, faint, or flee at the fist site of battle and the shedding of blood. This multiline poem details that perspective and then retaliates with the reality of those women’s place, hard work, and the value of the contribution; the power of which is found in the following excerpt. And what would they do if war came again? The scarlet cross floats where all was blank then. They would bind on their "brassards" and march to the fray, And the man liveth not who could say to them nay; They would stand with you now, as they stood with you then, The nurses, consolers, and saviours of men. (Barton, 1892). CONCLUSION From innovating education to speaking for the rights of slaves, from the goal of gaining women’s rights and to the humanitarian works with the Red Cross, Clara Barton is a true American hero. Her dedication, focus, and lifelong pursuit is deserving of the respect, homage, and place that all American heroes receive. She was significant to this country in ways that many of her time would never have believed women could ever achieve. She was truly a woman well ahead of her time. The American Red Cross is the primary source of aid when disasters strike in this country, without the efforts of Clara Barton this organization may not exist here. For that reason her contributions did not conclude with her death in Maryland, at the age of 90, in April of 1912. In fact, her contributions continue and remain incredibly relevant to this day, more than a hundred years later. REFERENCES Ardalan, C. (2011). Clara Barton’s 1898 battles in Cuba: A reexamination of her nursing contributions. Florida Atlantic Comparative Studies Journal, 12, 1-20. Retrieved from http://home.fau.edu/peralta/web/FACS/CLARABARTON.pdf Barton, C. (1866, February 21). The reports of the committees of the house of representatives, 39th congress, first session. Retrieved from http://www.nps.gov/clba/historyculture/cbcongress.htm Barton, C. (1892, November 18). The women who went to the field. Retrieved from http://www.nps.gov/clba/historyculture/fieldpoem.htm Grimm, L. (2012, March 6). Little-known facts about clara barton. Biography, 1. Retrieved from http://www.biography.com/news/little-known-facts-about-clara-barton-20763979 American Red Cross. (2014). Founder clara barton . Retrieved from http://www.redcross.org/about-us/history/clara-barton Civil War Trust. (2014). Clara barton. Retrieved from http://www.civilwar.org/education/history/biographies/clara-barton.html National Park Service. (2014). Clara Barton Chronology 1870-1912. Retrieved from http://www.nps.gov/clba/forkids/chron3.htm Read More