happiness. TOLSTOI.
Kindness in women, not their beauteous looks
Shall win my love. SHAKESPEARE.
I have always refused a tent unless the army had tents also, and I
have never eaten a mouthful of my own soft bread or fresh meat, until
the sick of the army were abundantly supplied with both.
CLARA BARTON.
Clara Barton is the noblest, bravest, and most unselfish woman God
Almighty ever made. JUDGE JOSEPH SHELDON.
HIS COMFORT, NOT HERS; HIS LIFE, NOT HERS
In the winter of 1863–64 Clara Barton lived for a time in an old
plantation house on Chapin’s farm, in Virginia. Chapin’s farm was not
far from the field hospital. In the hospital were the sick and wounded;
her services there were greatly needed. An ambulance was sent as a
detail to bring her to the hospital. The soldier-messenger arrived at
the house, and called for her. It was in the midst of a snow storm, the
thermometer indicator hovering around zero. “Wait a minute,” she said;
“tie your horses and come in. Have you had any dinner?” “No marm,” he
replied. The soldier sat down to a dinner of cold meat, hot biscuit,
cake and cocoa,—a refreshing change from “hardtack” and “salt hash,” the
daily rations of the soldier.
While the soldier-messenger was eating his meal she had been thinking.
“The soldier has generally no part nor voice in creating the war in
which he fights. He simply obeys, as he must, his superiors and the
laws of his country.” The soldier is under orders, but he is under
_my_ orders now. It’s bitter cold and, while I can ride comfortably on
the inside of the ambulance, he must ride outside on the seat in the
snow. She considered his comfort, not her own; his life, not hers. She
_ordered_ him to put his horses in the barn and care for them. She
made him her guest, standing sponsor for him at military
headquarters—awaiting a pleasant day for the trip. In soliloquizing on
her conduct she said: “God forbid that I should ask the useless
exposure of _one_ man, the desolation of _one_ home.”
XXVII
Advice is seldom welcome. LORD CHESTERFIELD.
Men give away nothing so liberally as their advice.
ROCHEFOUCAULD.
I do not like giving advice; it is incurring an unnecessary
responsibility. BEACONSFIELD.
Those who give bad advice to the prudent both lose their pains and are
laughed to scorn. PHAEDRUS.
I pray thee cease thy counsel, which falls into my ears as profitless
as water in a sieve. MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING.
Clara Barton—in her 77th year—followed to the fever ridden tropics, to
lead in the relief work on Spanish battle grounds.
Grand Rapids (Mich.) _Herald_.
In Cuba one saw only
Nodding plumes over their bier to wave,
And God’s own hand in that lonely land
To lay them in their grave. CLARA BARTON.
Mr. Cottrell, private secretary of Clara Barton, says: “Miss Barton
was the means of saving thousands of lives in Cuba. She was a small,
unostentatious woman, very quiet in her demeanor and spoke in a soft,
sweet tone. Her habits were simple, but she had a great capacity for
organization work.”
New Orleans (La.) _Times-Democrat_.
My post is the open field between the bullet and the hospital.
CLARA BARTON.
DOES NOT NEED ANY ADVICE
At Santiago Miss Barton approached Admiral Sampson and said, “There is
some doubt about our being able to unload.”
“Miss Barton,” replied Sampson, “Tell the world that the Red Cross
Society does not need any advice. We only need an opportunity. If any
trouble happens you, let me know.”
On one of the boats in the harbor of Santiago, the following
conversation took place between a Major-Surgeon and Clara Barton:
Major: “You have been at the front?”
Clara Barton: “Yes, Major.”
Major: “I should think you would find it very unpleasant there.”
Clara Barton: “Such things are not supposed to be pleasant.”
Major: “What do you go for? There is no need of your going there; it is
no place for women. I consider women very much out of place in a field
hospital.”
Clara Barton: “Then I must have been out of place a good deal in my
lifetime, Major, for I have been there a great deal.”
Major: “That does not change my opinion; if I had my way I would send
you home.”
Miss Barton: “Fortunately for me, if for no one else, Major, you have
not your way.” Major: “I know it, but again that does not change my
opinion. I would send you home....”
Miss Barton: “Good morning, Major.”
“I am with the wounded,” flashed along the wire
From the Isle of Cuba swept with sword and fire.
Angel sweet of mercy, may your Cross of Red
Cheer the wounded living; bless the wounded dead.
XXVIII
Clara Barton—humanity is richer for her having lived.
Grand Rapids (Mich.) _Press_.
Life is a shuttle. MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR.
Life is a bubble. WM. BROWNE.
Life is a miracle. KING LEAR.
Life is a walking shadow. MEREDITH.
Life is like a stroll on the beach. THOREAU.
Life is scarcely the twinkle of a star. BAYARD TAYLOR.
Life lives only in success. SWIFT.
That life is long that answers life’s great end.
YOUNG’S NIGHT THOUGHTS.
For the multitude of failures I have encountered I am sorry.
CLARA BARTON.
Life is so short at best. CLARA BARTON.
It’s now three minutes past twelve and I am thirty-three. Alas, my
friend, the years pass swiftly by, but I do not regret them so much
for what I have done, as what I _might_ have done. BYRON.
HAD BUT A FEW MOMENTS TO LIVE
Clara Barton supplied the place of mother and sister to the sick
soldiers, and this she did for many months, while in the deadly miasma
of the South Carolina marshes. Much of this time she was with the
soldiers and facing the guns of Fort Wagner. There with the shot and
shell whistling about her, the heroic woman could be seen at all hours
of the day and night stooping over the wounded soldiers, and tenderly
administering to their wants. An officer who had been with the Army of
the Potomac said that he had seen this woman upon the field of battle,
sitting with the head of a dying soldier in her lap, apparently
unconcerned and then only for the comfort of the poor fellow who had but
a few moments to live.
XXIX
Clara Barton—representing the mercy and magnanimity of the nation.
Columbus (Ohio) _Despatch_.
Clara Barton—her works of mercy in war and peace made her an
international figure. _New York Tribune._
Everybody’s business was nobody’s business, and the stricken victims
perished. CLARA BARTON.
The door that never creaked a hinge for the feeble child of want may
swing wide open at the thundering knock of the Marshal’s Staff. CLARA
BARTON.
The incentive to help and heal another in distress is spontaneous,
generally the result of sympathetic impulse and kindness—a thing of
the feelings and consequently of sudden growth.
CLARA BARTON.
“The other ladies could not endure the climate at Morris Island,” and,
as I knew somebody must take care of the soldiers, I went.
CLARA BARTON.
The idea of humanity in distress is not entirely modern;
Alexander was accompanied in his march by the most famous physicians
of the age. CLARA BARTON.
Homer and Plato were so struck with Egyptian Science and skill that
they declared the Egyptians were all doctors.
CLARA BARTON.
It is probable that the first practitioners in common life were women.
CLARA BARTON.
A wise physician, skilled, our wounds to heal
Is more than armies to the public weal.
A sister and family followed me to Washington that I should not be
quite alone in that slave city, for up to 1860 they bought and sold
slaves at the Capital. CLARA BARTON.
When I think, I fear how supreme an International Court must have been
to be able to induce the Southerners to liberate the slaves, or to
convince them that “mudsills” and “greasy mechanics” and “horned
yankees” are a people entitled to sufficient respect to be treated on
fair international grounds. CLARA BARTON.
ENLISTED MEN FIRST—THE COLONEL’S LIFE SAVED
In ancient Greece, in the Roman Empire, in Europe through the middle
ages, in the more modern chivalry of “Dixie,” among soldiers no slave,
no servant—none but a _gentleman_ carried a gun to kill. Killing in war
time was the occupation of “gentlemen” only. For the first time in the
history of the Centuries—in 1863—the ex-slave alongside the “gentlemen”
on the battlefield, fought for human rights. It was at the battle of
Fort Wagner on Morris Island; Colonel Shaw had led his “colored
regiment” to that field of slaughter.
The first woman nurse on any battlefield, a veteran nurse at the front,
was there,—the only woman present among the thousands of boys in blue.
The chivalric southern soldiers hated the “mudsills,” the “greasy
mechanics” and the “horned yankees,” but with a still more deadly hatred
the “nigger in blue”—the ex-slave now marshalled in battle array against
his former master. The onslaught there amidst the whizzing of bullets
and bursting of shells is pictured as the “orgy of hell.”
The Colonel while leading that colored regiment was among the wounded.
“Miss Barton, Colonel Shaw is lying on a dissecting table. His leg has
been taken off. His life is ebbing away; won’t you go to him?”
Bearing the bandage, water and sponge,
Straight and swift to the wounded I go—
Miss Barton replied: “Officers generally have friends enough to see that
their wants are attended to, while the poor enlisted men are neglected.
I will go to see the Colonel as soon as I have attended to my charges
here.” When she was through with the wounded enlisted men, Clara Barton
gave her attention to the Colonel, and through her services his life was
saved.
XXX
If any number of Americans were asked off-hand to name the woman who
stands highest in the esteem of the American people, the reply would
be unanimously, “Clara Barton.”
_Republic Magazine._
The patience, the nobility of soul, the resignation and bravery of our
gallant troops! CLARA BARTON.
Love chivalry. ARMAND.
Chivalry is the essence of virtue. LORD JOHN RUSSELL.
Chivalry was the parent of honor. A. DELEVAN.
The true spirit of chivalry is a generous impatience of wrong.
CHATFIELD.
Chivalry has not entirely died out in this prosaic age.
CECILIA FINDLAY.
“People say that I must have been born brave,” said Clara Barton.
“Why, I seem to remember nothing but terrors in my early days, I was a
shrinking little bundle of fears, fears of thunder, fears of strange
faces, fears of my strange self.”
MARY R. PARKMAN—In _Heroines of Service_.
Fear loves the idea of danger. S. CROXALL.
The moment my fear begins, I cease to fear. SCHILLER.
The weak most fear, the timid tremble, but the brave and stout of
heart will work and hope and trust. CLARA BARTON.
YOU’RE RIGHT, MADAM—GOOD DAY
Immediately following the Battle of Fredericksburg, every house in the
city became a hospital. Among the thousands of wounded Clara Barton, in
her usual unobtrusive manner, passed in and out of the houses, first on
one side of the street then on the other, on her mission of mercy.
Provost Marshal General Patrick seeing her alone among the soldiers
mistook her for a resident driven from her home.
The general did not seem to know that any good woman is safe among men,
brave and true, and nowhere else more so than among soldiers. He did not
fully appreciate that when a woman is true to herself
So dear to heav’n is saintly chastity,
That when a soul is found sincerely so,
A thousand liveried angels lackey her;
and he did not know Clara Barton.
So, with admirable southern chivalry, he dashed to her side, bowing with
hat in hand, and said: “Madam, you are alone and in great danger here!”
“No, I think not, Marshal.”
“Yes, you are, Madam. May I offer you my protection?”
“No, Marshal, I think it is not necessary.” Then turning to the ranks of
the soldiers she further commented: “No, Marshal, I am the best
protected woman in the United States.”
The soldiers appreciating the compliment sent up cheer after cheer,
accompanied with “That’s so! that’s so!”
The Marshal, taking in the situation and waving his hand towards Miss
Barton with a broad smile, said: “I think you are right, Madam, Good
day!”
XXXI
Clara Barton dared the bullets on the battlefield with the abandon of
a dashing cavalry leader. Pawtucket (R. I.) _Times_.
In Clara Barton, the world has lost a guardian angel.
PUEBLO CHIEFTAIN.
Death grinned a horrible ghastly smile. JOHN MILTON.
Says Clara Barton, in one of the battles of the Civil War, “A little
sibley tent had been hastily pitched for me in a slight hollow upon a
hillside. How many times I fell from sheer exhaustion in the darkness
and mud of that slippery hillside I have no knowledge; but at last I
grasped the welcome canvas, and a well established brook which washed
in on the upper side, at the opening which served as the door, met me
on my entrance to the tent.”
PERCY H. EPLER.
Clara Barton slept on the ground, wrapped in a blanket like a soldier,
but her zeal was in no way diminished by hardship.
St. Paul (Minn.) _Pioneer Press_.
Clara Barton gave a lifetime of glorious service to humanity—a
ministering angel like a benediction of her God amid the desolate, the
stricken, the hungry and despairing. _Los Angeles Examiner._
Sickness, confusion and death—these are inseparable from every
conflict. CLARA BARTON.
I can never see a poor mutilated wreck, blown to pieces with powder
and lead, without wondering if visions of such an end ever floated
before his mother’s mind when she washed and dressed her fair-skinned
boy. CLARA BARTON.
When giant misery stalks to the very threshold, and raps with bloody
hands on one’s door, it is almost a libel upon the good Christian term
to call it charity that answers. CLARA BARTON.
Women should certainly have some voice in the matter of war, either
affirmative or negative, and the fact that she has not this should not
be made the ground to deprive her of other privileges.
CLARA BARTON.
“They say”:
Imagine their skirts ’mong artillery wheels,
And watch for their flutter as they flee ’cross the fields,
When the charge is rammed home and the fire belches hot;—
They never will wait for the answering shot.
They would faint at the first drop of blood in sight—
CLARA BARTON.
BLEEDING TO DEATH—HIS HEADLESS BODY—WOMEN IN THE WAR
One day Miss Barton was asked to tell what was the most terrible
experience she had ever gone through on a field of disaster or war, and
she replied: “It was at the battle of Antietam. The poor boys were
falling so fast that I rushed up into the line of fire to save them from
bleeding to death by temporarily binding up their wounds. Bullets went
through my clothing, but I did not think of danger. I loaded myself with
canteens and went to a nearby spring and filled them with water, until I
staggered under the load. The wounded were crying for water and I went
to one poor boy who was wild with thirst and, stooping, I lifted his
head on my arm and knee and was giving him water from the canteen when a
cannon ball took his head off, covering me with blood and brains. I
dropped the headless body and went to the next wounded soldier, and so
all day I worked through this awful battle and refused to retire, though
officers and men tried to drive me back.”
In the Civil War there was widespread opposition to the presence of
women on the battlefield—both on the part of civilians and the military
officers. Lincoln was not the exception. He protested that a woman on
the battlefield would be a “fifth wheel to a wagon.” After the close of
the war Clara Barton penned the following, a part of the poem entitled
“The Women who went to the Field”:
Will he glance at the boats on the great western flood,
At Pittsburgh and Shiloh, did they faint at the blood?
And the brave wife of Grant stood there with them then,
And her calm stately presence gave strength to the men.
XXXII
In spite of her retiring nature and shrinking from publicity, Clara
Barton remained probably the best known woman in America, surely one
of the best-beloved.
New Orleans (La.) _Item_.
Miss Barton took the lecture platform, under an agreement to lecture
300 nights at $100 a night.
Louisville (Ky.) _Courier-Journal_.
Fear is the mother of foresight. HENRY TAYLOR.
Fear is the mother of safety. EDMUND BURKE.
Fear makes us feel for humanity. EARL OF BEACONSFIELD.
In the earlier years of my life, I remember nothing but fear.
CLARA BARTON.
It was high counsel that I once heard given to a young person: “Always
do what you are afraid to do.”
RALPH WALDO EMERSON.
Timid as a sheep. OUIDA.
Timid as a doe. ROBERT NOEL.
Timid as a fawn. THACKERAY.
I am the most timid person on earth. CLARA BARTON.
Some critic has said that I was visibly agitated when I arose to
address my audience;—the critic was right, and why should I not be?
CLARA BARTON.
All speech-making terrifies me. First I have no taste for it, and
lastly I hate it. CLARA BARTON.
Nothing could gratify me more than to know that I had been one of
these self-reliant American girls like our sweet poetess Lucy Larcrom.
CLARA BARTON.
If I could have gotten over my timid sensitiveness it would have given
far less annoyance to my friends, and trouble to myself, all through
life. CLARA BARTON.
TIMID CHILD—TIMID WOMAN
Fear is relative. The fear of death by flames is greater than by water.
The fear not to do is ofttimes greater than the fear to do. The fear of
failure is supplanted by courage. To the sensitive nature the fear that
others may suffer impels to the greatest courage. Despite innate fear,
courage is uppermost in the minds of those who would achieve results.
The most renowned in the fine arts, in oratory, in patriotism, in the
humanities, are those by nature timid.
John B. Gough and Clara Barton at one time lived in the same town; were
personal friends; in the lecture season, successively talked from the
same platform. These two Americans were each as timid, probably, as ever
appeared before a public audience. But each achieved an enviable
reputation as a platform lecturer.
The morning following one of his inimitable temperance lectures, I
remarked: “Mr. Gough, I wish I had your assurance before an audience.”
“Young man,” he replied, “you don’t know me. I have given thousands of
lectures, but I never rise to address an audience that my knees don’t
knock together, from stage fright. Last night, as I arose to address
that splendid body of college boys, I was scared stiff; for some moments
I was so frightened I couldn’t utter a word.”
In his autobiography he wrote: “For thirty-seven years I have been a
public speaker, but have never known the time when I did not dread an
audience. Often that fear amounts to positive suffering. In my
suffering, trembling seizes every nerve.”
Clara Barton was a timid child; so much so as to annoy her parents, and
other friends. When about eight years of age she was sent away to school
in the hope that, among strangers, she would become at ease in the
presence of others. At school she grew tired; became thin and pale; said
she was hungry, but refused to eat. It was suspected that it was all on
account of her timidity, and that she might die of starvation. Because
she dared not eat, the teacher returned her to her home. In referring to
this experience, and her later experiences in the presence of strangers,
a few years before she died, she said: “To this day I would rather stand
behind the lines of artillery at Antietam, or cross the pontoon bridge
under fire at Fredericksburg, than to preside at a public meeting.”
XXXIII
The negro has no linguistic laws—his pathetically musical speech is
fast dying away—only will linger the salient printed form to convey to
the future some idea of the olden dialect.
LA SALLE CORBELL PICKETT—“_In de Miz Series_.”
I know of the intelligence of the negro, for I have heard of his
unquestioned loyalty between every war of our land from Bunker Hill to
the Argonne. SECRETARY OF THE NAVY DANIELS.
The only flag the negro ever carried was when his spirit was stirred
crimson by the sacrificial blood he gave for America. Cite me a negro
traitor! JUSTICE STAFFORD.
In the World War, in France up in the zone where death was spread
about I found the black man and the white man fallen side by side.
SECRETARY OF WAR BAKER.
The courage that faces death on the battlefield, or calmly awaits it
in the hospital, is not the courage of race or color.
CLARA BARTON.
Two of the bravest men I ever saw lay wounded, almost side by side,
one white and the other black. CLARA BARTON.
The patient suffering of the black soldier is fully equal to that of
the Anglo-Saxon. CLARA BARTON.
EZ EF WE WUZ WHITE FOLKS
At Galveston one day, when Miss Barton was busy dictating letters her
companion, Mrs. Fannie B. Ward, came in and told her that there were two
negro soldiers of the Civil War waiting to see her. Miss Barton said,
“Let them come in.” The two old negroes came in with their hats in their
hands and bowing at every step.
One of them asked, “Miss Barton, do you know us?” She replied, “No, I
don’t remember you.”
“We knows you, Miss Barton,” was the reply, “We wuz in de battle er Fo’t
Wagner an’ got wounded dyar, an’ you foun’ us an’ tied up our wounds an’
tuk cyar er us same ez ef we wuz white folks.”
Proud of their wounds, one of the negroes rolled up his sleeve and
showed a great scar on his arm, saying, “I wuz in de cha’ge, Miss
Barton, an’ a officer slashed me wid a swo’d.” The other pulled up his
trousers and displayed a very deep scar on the calf of his leg and said,
“En’ I got wounded in de leg wid a bullet.”
Miss Barton’s smile of appreciation and her cordial handshake sent them
away with happy memories.
[Illustration:
© _Harris & Ewing_
LEONARD WOOD
There is a call for women who will carry forward the work begun by
Florence Nightingale and Clara Barton.—LEONARD WOOD, Major-General
Spanish-American War; Major-General World War; Governor-General
Philippine Islands.
General Wood, alert, wise and untiring, with an eye single to the good
of all, toiled day and night.
CLARA BARTON.
]
XXXIV
Clara Barton’s name will take its place among the world’s heroines.
Denver (Colorado) _Times_.
Life is like a dream. DR. S. JOHNSON.
Our Life is a dream. CHARLES WESLEY.
I have a presentiment that I shall not outlast the rebellion.
A. LINCOLN.
Dreams are the bright evidence of poem and legend, who sport on the
earth in the night season. CHARLES DICKENS.
Dreams in their development have breath and tears, and torture and a
touch of joy. LORD BYRON.
I have dreamed of bloody turbulence; and this whole night
Hath nothing been but forms of slaughter. SHAKESPEARE.
It seems to me I have been dreaming a horrid dream for four years; now
the nightmare is gone. A. LINCOLN.
O Memory! that midway world,
’Twixt earth and paradise,
Where things decayed and loved ones lost
In dreamy shadows rise.
A. LINCOLN.
To dream of battle—danger of persecution.
MADAME CLAIRE ROUGEMONT, Author.
For a woman to dream that she is in battle is a very lucky omen.
_The Queen of the Romanies._
IN HER DREAMS—AGAIN IN BATTLE
“What’s that big barn of a house?”
“It’s the Red Cross house.”
“Who lives there?” “Clara Barton, don’t you know Clara Barton?” “And
what does she want to live in a house like that for?”
“It is her headquarters—her home. There is where she does her work;
there is where she keeps her supplies. Whenever there is a cry of
distress anywhere in the United States she is off at a moment’s notice.”
No paint on the outside of the house, none on the inside—a regular
barn—why wouldn’t the stranger ask questions?
The inside of the house is also strangely mysterious, with its great
central part open to the ceiling; the balconies protected by railings,
reminding one of a steamship, the atmosphere giving the stranger a sort
of weird, uncanny feeling.
The visitor when within is still curious, and would ask other questions.
“What are all these things on the wall?”
“They are diplomas, resolutions of cities, states and nations—medals won
for services rendered in distress—all kinds of souvenirs complimentary
to Clara Barton.”
“Interesting, very interesting!”
“Yes, no other place like it in all the world.”
“But what are these small doors for? They look like doors to sleeping
berths.”
“No, they are doors to closets. There are thirty-eight rooms in this
house and seventy-six closets.”
“What are the closets for?”