Clara Barton

“ By our geographical position and isolation we are far less liable to the disturbances of war than the nations of Europe, which are so frequently called upon that they do well to keep in readiness for the exigencies of war alone. But no country is more liable than our own to great overmastering calamities, various, widespread and terrible. Seldom a year passes that the nation from sea to sea is not, by the shock of some sudden, unforeseen disaster, brought to utter consternation, and stands shivering like a ship in a gale, powerless, horrified, and despairing. ”

“ It would have been no athlete at all that couldn’t jump from the great beams to the hay, in scant summer time before the new hay came in, and land on the feet safely. There was, and still is, directly in front of the house, a small, circular, natural pond, fed by springs in the bottom and surrounded by a cordon of hills forming a basin in which the little pond basks and sleeps through the summer, but in winter becomes a thing of beauty and a joy forever to the skater. ”

“ The great cry which had gone out had aroused the entire country, and our old-time helpers, full of rich experience and still richer love for the work, faithful to the cross of humanity as the devotee to the cross of the Master, came up from every point—the floods, the cyclones, the battle-fields—and kneeling before the shrine, pledged heart and service anew to the work. ”

“ By the obligations of the Geneva Treaty, all national controversies, racial distinctions, and differences in creed must be held in abeyance and only the needs of humanity considered. In this spirit alone can the Red Cross meet its obligations as the representative of the nations and governments of the world acting under it. But American enthusiasm is boundless, and its expression limitless; and the same breath that crushed the Ottoman Empire, scattered it to the winds or sunk it in the lowest depths, elevated the Red Cross and its proposed relief out of sight among the clouds. ”

“ War is in its very nature cruel—the very embodiment of cruelty in its effects—not necessarily in the hearts of the combatants. Baron Macaulay thought it not a mitigation but an aggravation of the evil, that men of tender culture and humane feelings, with no ill will, should stand up and kill each other. But men do not go to war to save life. They might save life by keeping the peace and staying at home. They go solely with intent to inflict so much pain, loss and disaster on the enemy that he will yield to their terms. ”

“ We find it hard enough to lay away our dead in consecrated ground, with all the care and tenderness that love can suggest, where we may water the sacred spot with our tears and place upon it the flowers they loved in life; but never to know whether their poor bodies were swallowed by the merciless Gulf, or fed to the fishes with those grewsome barge-loads, or left above ground to become an abomination in the nostrils of the living, or burned in indiscriminate heaps with horses and dogs and the mingled ashes scattered to the winds—must indeed have been well-nigh unbearable. ”

“ Among the dark hours that came to us in the hopeless waste of work and woe on every side, the strong sustaining power has been the Press of the United States. While naturally compelled to give circulation to unauthorized reports from other sources, it has evidently done it with regret, and hastened by strong editorials, in words of no uncertain sound, to set right before its readers any errors that may have crept in. The American press has always been loyal to the Red Cross and to its work, and once more it is our privilege to tender to it our meed of grateful praise. ”

“ To the merciful benefactors, the protectors of the poor, the feeders of the starving, the guardians of the orphans—Christ is risen! North Americans! May the Lord grant you a peaceful and long life and prosperity in your land, and may your fields give abundant harvests—Christ is risen. Your mercifulness gives us a helping hand. Through your charity you have satisfied the starving. And for your magnificent alms accept from me this humble gift which I send to the entire American people for your great beneficence, from all the hearts of the poor, filled with feelings of joy. ”

“ Yes, prosperous, for to these colored people, whose needs are small, whose ambition receives no stimulus, fifty or sixty bushels of corn is a bounteous harvest. But the storm came! In a few hours neat cottages were a heap of ruins, scattered perhaps miles away; giant trees lay across the roads, twisted and knotted into almost impossible shapes; corn and cotton gone, and human beings—missing. Roads flooded with water, almost impassable, but still alive with people—here a mother looking for her children, a husband for his wife, children for their parents. ”

“ It is only right that at length, in the cycle of ages, something should touch man’s heart and set him humbly down to find out some way of mending as much of his mischief as he could. Perhaps he “builded better than he knew,” for in that one effort he touched the spring that sooner or later will mend it all. No grander or truer prophecy has ever been made than uttered in that first convention: “The Red Cross shall teach war to make war upon itself.” It is the most practical and effective peace-maker and civilizer in the known world. It reaches where nothing else can. ”

“ In carrying out its mission, to assist in the prevention and relief of suffering, the Red Cross has neither the desire nor the intention to be censorious, and is actuated neither by political opinion nor motives of interference. It is but the outward and practical expression of that universal sympathy that goes out from the millions of homes and firesides, from the great heart of the nation, to humanity in distress, to the soldier on the march, in the bivouac and on the field of battle. ”

“ In no other country does the organization of the Red Cross stand as an ordinary benevolent society. In all others its relation to the government is defined, pronounced, and its prestige assured. This is wise and just, and only this can make it of greatest service to the government and to the people.
It is a peculiar institution, without nationality, race, creed or sect, embracing the entire world in its humanizing bond of brotherhood, without arbitrary laws or rules, and yet stronger than armies, and higher than thrones. ”

“ The day is not far distant—if it has not already come—when the American people will recognize the Red Cross as one of the wisest and best systems of philanthropic work in modern times. Its mission is not accomplished when it has carried the generous offerings of the people to their brethren who have met with sudden calamity. It does not stop with the alleviation of bodily suffering and the clothing of the destitute—blessed as that work is, when wisely done, so as not to break down the manly spirit of self-help. ”

“ What have we in readiness to meet these emergencies save the good heart of our people and their impulsive, generous gifts? Certainly no organized system for collection, reception nor distribution; no agents, nurses nor material, and, worst of all, no funds; nowhere any resources in reserve for use in such an hour of peril and national woe; every movement crude, confused and unsystematized, every thing as unprepared as if we had never known a calamity before and had no reason to expect one again. ”

“ Camels heavy laden, not with ivory and jewels, gold in the ingot and silk in the bales, but food and raiment for the starving, the sick, and the dying. Onward they sweep toward dread Killis—the wild tribe’s knives before, the Moslem troops behind—“go on! we protect;” till at length the spires of Aintab rise in view. Weary the camels and weary the men—Hubbell, Fuller, Wistar, Wood, Mason—names that should live in story for the brave deeds of that march but just begun. ”

“ A first inspection of the devastated district was appalling, and even as the scenes of distress, sickness and destitution became more familiar, its sadness did not wear away. Here were pretty islands, where, a few days before, cotton had been in its full luxuriance, corn almost ready for harvesting waving in the breeze, a bounteous harvest smiling in the faces of a contented people, their little homes intact and comfortable and each one congratulating himself and each other on a prosperous season as the fruits of their labors. ”

“ Not a man could lie uncared for nor unfed. I thought of the Peninsula in McClellan’s campaign—of Pittsburg Landing, Cedar Mountain and second Bull Run, Antietam, Old Fredericksburg with its acres of snow-covered and gun-covered glacee, and its fourth-day flag of truce; of its dead, and starving wounded, frozen to the ground, and our commissions and their supplies in Washington, with no effective organization to go beyond; of the Petersburg mine, with its four thousand dead and wounded and no flag of truce, the wounded broiling in a July sun—died and rotted where they fell. ”

“ Deeply grateful for such evident signs of evangelical feeling and interest, the Assembly of Nobles of the government of St. Petersburg, as representatives of the intellectual class in Russia, has resolved to express their warm and heartfelt gratitude to those friendly people who form the great nation of the United States of America.
May the Lord bless and keep all those kind-hearted Americans, men, women and children, who took part in that great and good work of charity, and may the Hand that giveth unto us all, reward them bountifully, and ever keep them from a like misfortune. ”

“ Courage and charity go hand in hand, and when the smoke of battle has rolled away, and the tattoo and reveille are memories of the past; when the white tents of the camps are folded; the equipment of war is exchanged for the implements of peace the appreciation of the citizen soldier for the Red Cross will grow in volume as he sits by his fireside and tells how its ministries gave relief and aid to his comrades and himself in the camp, the hospital, at Siboney, Santiago, Porto Rico and elsewhere, and how it extended succor even to his enemies when the conflict ceased. ”

“ The Red Cross has become a grand educator, embodying the best principles of social science, and that true spirit of charity which counts it a sacred privilege to serve one’s fellowmen in time of trouble. The supplying of material wants—of food, raiment and shelter is only a small part of its ministry. In its work among suffering humanity, when fire or flood or pestilence has caused widespread desolation, the Red Cross seeks to carry to people’s hearts that message which speaks of a universal brotherhood. ”

“ Perhaps one of the most romantic instances is that of a young American. A fine specimen of manhood as he stood before me and quietly told me his story, led on by my interest and questioning: tall, erect, well-knit and seasoned to meet emergencies; a refined, open, strong face, a well poised head; one felt the real courage in the man. Over three years ago, led by high hopes inspired by the cause of suffering Cuba, as set forth in our land of free press agency, and fanned to a holy flame by the pen of a ready writer, he set out with the zeal of a crusader to plant the ensign of true liberty. ”

“ Of all things, I would not have you get the impression that I desire to foist the Red Cross upon the government for support. That, because I say it is liable to equal a government bureau in point of work and care, I desire to have it made a government bureau. Nothing is more impossible. I would not have you feel that we have carried it to a certain extent, and now want the government to take it up. These things could not be; it would at once defeat the very objects of the organization, which mean people’s help for national needs, not national help for people’s necessities. ”

“ My first and greatest endeavor has been to wipe from the scroll of my country’s fame the stain of imputed lack of common humanity, to take her out of the roll of barbarism. I said that in 1869 there were twenty-two nations in the compact. There are now thirty-one, for since that date have been added Roumania, Persia, San Salvador, Montenegro, Servia, Bolivia, Chili, Argentine Republic and Peru. If the United States of America is fortunate and diligent she may, perhaps, come to stand No. 32 in the roll of civilization and humanity. ”

“ Fair hands laying aside their diamonds, and business men their cares, left homes of elegance and luxury to open rough boxes and barrels, handle second-hand clothing, eat coarse food at rough board tables, sleep on boxes under a dripping canvas tent, all for the love of humanity symbolized in the little flag that floated above them. ”

“ I would like to see for it a headquarters which, in point of activity, would be a national honor to us. The Red Cross of America should successfully undertake some difficult problems. Hospital and emergency work naturally fall to it. It has come to be the first thought of by any community suddenly overtaken by disaster.
With all our misdirected, criminal and incendiary immigration, which nothing seems to hinder, with our dangerous foreign leaders and teachers, our strikes, mobs and dynamite, who can foresee the moment when the United States flag shall be called to make peace and hold it? ”

“ We were wakened at daybreak to see the soldiers filing up over the hill in heavy marching order, forming in lines by ones and twos, winding up, in and out among the hills, higher and higher, like a great anaconda. As we watched them through a glass, they were a moving line trailing on toward the clouds, till lost in the mist, and we can only think as we look at them, on how many or on which is set the mark of death, He knows no more than we, poor fellow, and unthinkingly, perhaps, with his swinging, careless gait, toils up and up and waits for—he knows not what. ”

“ But here another picture rises; as if common woe were not enough, the angel of disease flaps his black wings like a pall, and in once bright Zeitoun and Marash contagion reigns. By scores, by hundreds, they die; no help, no medicine, no skill, little food, and the last yard of cotton gone to cover the sick and dying. To whom came the cry, “Help or we perish! Send us physicians!” The contributed gifts of America open the doors of classic Beyrout, and Ira Harris, with his band of doctors, speeds his way. In Eskandaroon sleep the waiting caravans. ”

“ For the fifty women who fought day by day that grim battle with disease and death could but have wrung their hands in hopeless impotence had it not been for the hundreds of other women by whose aid we were able to carry on our work. One could have no more eloquent testimony to this than that furnished by a walk through one of the fever wards of Detention Hospital, where the men lay on Red Cross cots, in Red Cross pajamas, covered by Red Cross sheets and blankets, and taking their Red Cross medicines or broth or delicacies from Red Cross cups and glasses at the hands of Red Cross nurses. ”

“ In the name of God and humanity this field must be carried, these people must be rescued; skill, care, medicines and food for the sick must reach them. And it is a glad sight to my soul to think of Turkish troops taking these bands of doctors on to Marash. They have done it, and are at this very hour marching on with them to their field of labor. What does one care for criticism, disapproval or approval, under circumstances like these. Don’t be troubled—we can carry it. We are fair financiers, not dismayed, and God helping, can save our hospitals. ”

“ If a morning paper should announce that three or four of the greatest political bosses or greatest railroad kings in the country had quietly met somewhere, and sat with closed doors till long after midnight, and then silently departed, people would ask, “What is the significance of that? What mischief have they been devising in secret?” In that sense of the word, significance—which is a very common one—the Red Cross has none that I ever heard of. It has no rich offices to bestow, no favorites to reward, no enemies to punish. It has no secrets to keep, no mystic word or sign. ”