Clara Barton Research Paper

Words: 429
Pages: 2

Clarissa Harlowe Barton was born the 25th of December in 1821. She lived in North Oxford and her father Stephen Barton was the captain of the local militia. Clara’s mother was Sarah Barton. She had two older sisters(Sarah Barton Vassall, Dorothea Barton) and two older brothers(Stephen Barton, David Barton). Her interest in helping people sparked when her most adored brother David fell from a barn roof. Clara quickly learned how to give him his medicine and nursed him for the next two years. As she grew older, Noted English phrenologist advised her parents to have Clara teach school. She started teaching schools near her hometown in 1839. Barton went to Clinton Liberal Institute to further her education.When her mother died, Clara left school. …show more content…
She quit when a male principal was hired. She moved to Washington, DC, to work as a clerk for the U.S. Patent Office. This is when the civil war broke out. Clara distributed supplies to help the Union Army. Later, she became a nurse to help wounded Union soldiers in Fredericksburg, Virginia. When the war ended, Barton helped many people find missing soldiers. While visiting Europe, she worked with an organization called the Red Cross during the Franco-Prussian war. Clara Barton was the first American woman to receive the iron cross of merit from Germany.Clara brought the red cross to America too. She founded the American Red Cross Society in 1881.She realized where people needed help like the Johnstown Flood in 1889 and the Galveston flood in 1900.Clara also treated people who were on the U.S.S. Maine when there was an explosion in