Chapter I: H. R. Prince Guy De Lusignan (2)

Utica (N. Y.) _Observer_.

I know there is a God, and he hates injustice. A. LINCOLN.

There were no heroes, there were no martyrs.

BULWER-LYTTON.

Great women belong to history and self-sacrifice.

LEIGH HUNT.

I am in the Garden of Gethsemane now, and my cup of bitterness is full
to the overflowing. A. LINCOLN.

Let us have faith that right makes might. A. LINCOLN.

Why should there not be a patient confidence in the ultimate justice
of the people? Is there any better, or equal, hope in the world? A.
LINCOLN.

Beneficence breeds gratitude, gratitude admiration, admiration fame,
and the world remembers its benefactors.

PRESIDENT WOODROW WILSON.

To be great is to be misunderstood. RALPH WALDO EMERSON.

The people will never understand the motive, and of course cannot
comprehend that it was necessary for the “aspirants” to resort to
“charges” in order to accomplish their purpose,—to gain possession of
the Red Cross. CLARA BARTON.

What you are speaks so loud I cannot hear what you say.

RALPH WALDO EMERSON.

Crowns of roses fade; crowns of thorns endure. Calvaries and
Crucifixions take deepest hold of humanity; the triumphs of might are
transient, they pass and are forgotten; the sufferings of the right
are graven deepest on the chronicles of nations.

FATHER RYAN.

Alas! I have not words to tell my grief:
To vent my sorrows would be some relief. DRYDEN.

For the heart must speak when
The lips are dumb. KATE PUTNAM OSGOOD.

Clara Barton speaketh from the heart in eloquence pathetic and
convincing; through her own words, written to Professor Charles Sumner
Young at this time (1904), are “The most vital, and interesting of a
wonderful life and a wonderful work, and few men hear of it without
envy and emulation.” _New York Sun._

THE PERSONAL CORRESPONDENCE—CLARA BARTON’S PROPOSED SELF-EXPATRIATION

Occurring in October, 1911, in the sick room at Oxford, was the following interview:

Mr. Young: Miss Barton, you once requested me to do a certain thing for you. I did not do it then and I won’t do it now, so please don’t ask it.

Miss Barton: What’s that? I don’t understand.

Mr. Young: You requested me to destroy a certain letter. I did not do it.

Miss Barton: Was that the letter in which I asked you to take me to Mexico? And why did you not destroy it as I requested?

Mr. Young: That’s the letter. It is now in a safe deposit box in Los Angeles. I did not destroy it because, in my opinion, that letter would do more in your defense than any argument that could be put up by the greatest lawyers in America. What you wrote at the time of your persecution, in confidence to a friend with a request that the letter be destroyed, the American people would believe. No slander would stand for a moment against your heart’s secrets, thus told to a friend. In case I should die before you do, I have arrangements with a mutual personal friend that in any event the letter will be published after you shall have passed.

Miss Barton: (Hesitatingly, then very frankly): Mr. Young, you are a very wise man; possibly you are right. Anyway, do what you please with that letter when I am gone. Now, Mr. Young, I meant it. For several months I was getting together my belongings and adjusting my affairs so that I could go. There were but two countries where the _Red Cross_ did not exist; one was China, and the other Mexico. I did not want to go to China, but I did want to go to Mexico. Oh! Well, it’s probably best that I did not go; if I had gone I might not be alive now.

Freedom lives hence, and banishment is here. SHAKESPEARE.

Have stooped my neck under your injuries, eating the bitter bread of
banishment. SHAKESPEARE.

The letter referred to and similar correspondence follow:

THE WAIL OF AN ACHING HEART

Glen Echo, Maryland,
January 13, 1904.

My dear Mr. Young:

It is a blessing to your friends that you have a good memory.
Otherwise, how should you have carried the recollection of poor me,
all these weary months running into years and, through friends all
unknown to me, sent such tribute of respect.

I waited, after receiving the notices from you, to be sure of the
arrival. I have directed the acknowledgement to be made to Mr. and
Mrs. Canfield, but words tell so little; you will, I am sure, thank
them for me.

You will never know how many times I have thought of you, in this
last, hard and dreadful year to me. I cannot tell you, I must _not_,
and yet I _must_. So much of the time, under all the persecution it
has seemed to me I _could_ not remain in the _country_, and have
sought the range of the world for _some_ place among strangers and out
of the way of people and mails—and longed for some one to _point_ out
a quiet place in some _other_ land; my thoughts have fled to you, who
would at least tell me a _road_ to take, outside of America, and who
would ask of the authorities of Mexico if a woman who could not live
in her own country might find a home, or a resting place, in theirs.

© _Hartsook._

CHAMP CLARK

Clara Barton rendered her country and her kind great and noble
service.—CHAMP CLARK, of Missouri. Congress, 1893–1895; 1897–1921;
Speaker of the House, 1911–1921.
]

REPRESENTATIVE OF UNITED STATES CONGRESS

CHARLES F. CURRY
]

DENVER S. CHURCH
]

Clara Barton, one of the great characters of history; unselfish and
altruistic in her service for humanity; an American, intensely
patriotic, but with an international mind and sympathy that embraced
all humanity.—CHARLES F. CURRY, of California. Congress 1913—

I regard Clara Barton one of the greatest women that ever
lived.—DENVER S. CHURCH, of California. Congress, 1913–1919.

This will all sound very strange to you—you will wonder if I am “out
of my mind”—let me answer—no; and if you had only a glimpse of what is
put upon me to endure, you would not wonder, and in the goodness of
your heart, would hold the gate open to show me a mule-track to some
little mountain nook, where I might escape and wait in peace. Don’t
think this is _common_ talk with me, I have never said it to others;
and yet I think they, who know me best, may _mistrust_ that I cannot
endure _everything_ and will try in some way to relieve myself.

To think of sitting here through an “_investigation_” by the country I
have tried to serve,—“in the interest of _harmony_,” they say, when I
have never spoken a discordant word in my life, meaningly, but have
worked on in _silence_ under the fire of the entire press of the U. S.
for twelve months,—forgiven all, offered friendship,—and am still to
be “investigated,” for “inharmony,” “unbusinesslike methods,” and too
many years—all of these I cannot help. I am still unanimously bidden
to work on for “life,” bear the burden of an organization—meet its
costs myself—and am now threatened with the expenses of an
“investigation.”

Can you wonder that I ask a bridle track? And that some other country
might look inviting to me?

Mr. Young, this unhappy letter is a poor return to make for your
friendly courtesy, but _so long_ my dark thoughts have turned to you
that I cannot find myself with the privilege of communicating with you
without expressing them. I cannot think where I have found the courage
to do it, but I _have_.

I know how unwise a thing it seems but if the pressure is too great
the bands may break, that may be my case, and fearing that my better
judgment might bid me put these sheets in the fire—I send them without
once glancing over. You will glance them over and put them in the
fire. Forgive me. You need not forget, but kindly _remember_, rather,
that they are the wail of an aching heart and that is all. Nature has
provided a sure and final rest for all the heart aches that mortals
are called to endure.

If you are in the East again, and I am here, I pray you come to me.

Receive again my thanks and permit me to remain,

Your friend,
(Signed) CLARA BARTON.

Earth naught nobler knows
Than is the victim brave beneath his cross.
’Tis in the shadow that the dawn-light grows.
ARCHAG TCHOBANIAN.

SCHEMERS—DEFAMERS—PIRATES

Bakersfield Club,
Bakersfield, Cal., February 2, 1904.

My Dear Miss Barton:

Your favor of January 13 received, and read with exceeding interest.
Mr. and Mrs. Canfield appreciate your letter to them personally, as
well as your kind words sent through me, in recognition of their
slight token of high regard for you. While here a day or two ago, Mrs.
Canfield requested me to convey these sentiments to you.

Now, Miss Barton, why you have confided in obscure me is a mystery I
cannot solve; such a compliment is more than I can hope to deserve.
(Having written the above General W. R. Shafter came into the Library
and sat beside me at the table. I stopped writing and we entered into
a discussion of you and your affairs. He is exceedingly complimentary
to you and of your work. He especially requested me to extend to you
his greetings and sincerest good wishes.)

I have known for several years more of the secret plottings than you
think. From our mutual friends I have known also of your heart aches
and the causes, and a thousand times have wished that I might say
something, or do something, so that you might know that in my inmost
heart I was in sympathy with you and your struggle against the coterie
of schemers. I have also wished that I might have power long enough to
show you in what esteem you are held by the households in America;
what a charm attaches to your name wherever spoken,—such as neither
royalty possesses nor money buys.

Your defamers no more represent the American people than pirates upon
the high seas the country from which they spring.

The unanimous vote of confidence, last week by the Woman’s Club of
Bakersfield enthusiastically expressed by all present rising to their
feet, was but one manifestation among tens of thousands of similar
ones which would occur if the facts were known. I hope you will soon
hear of similar evidence of love for you and fidelity of your friends
from organizations elsewhere in California, including the State
Federation of Women soon to convene in Sacramento.

My Uncle, General Ross, never told me of any event in his military
career with so much pride as that of offering you his services, and
acting as your lieutenant in the ware-house of the Red Cross at
Havana. Likewise would I be proud of the distinction to serve you in
the most humble capacity, either for the cause you represent or for
yourself personally.

While I do not, and can not, take seriously even the remotest
suggestion that you might seek retirement and seclusion, I would
gladly volunteer to be your Kit Carson over any mountain trail leading
to happiness. I don’t think the American people will ever permit your
forced retirement, but in the event you should voluntarily withdraw
from public service, I would indeed be glad to suggest to some of my
friends, who I am sure would esteem it an honor and privilege, to
offer you a home in Los Angeles and a competence the rest of your
life.

I expect to be in the East again soon and hope to have the honor of
seeing you. I have in mind several things I would like to talk over
with you, and thank you kindly for the invitation to call at your home
in Glen Echo.

If in my humble way I can be of any service to you, you will please
remember that you have but to command me.

Believe me,

Sincerely your friend,
(Signed) C. S. YOUNG.

To
Miss Clara Barton,
Glen Echo, Maryland.

Whispering tongues can poison truth.

SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE.

The paths of charity are over roadways of ashes; and he who would
travel them must be prepared to meet opposition, misconstruction,
jealousy, and calumny. CLARA BARTON.

And when they had crucified him, they parted his garments, casting
lots upon them what every man should take. ST. MARK.

SHE READ THE ACTORS LIKE A BOOK

EXECUTIVE OFFICE
6 Beacon Street,
Boston, Mass.

July 11th, 1907.

Mr. C. S. Young,
Los Angeles, California.

My dear Mr. Young:

I wonder if I have ever said a word in reply to your comforting letter
of May. If I have or have not said anything on paper I have in my
heart answered it many times and bless both you and Mrs. Logan for
your kindliness and trust. I have never in my life had a moment’s
doubt of the loyalty of Mrs. Logan. She stood the brunt of the battle
while she could, and longer than I wished her to. She foresaw what was
coming with her keen knowledge of human nature and thorough political
training. She read the actors like a book. I well remember one night
when she made this remark, and it was comparatively early in the game.
Looking earnestly at me she said, calling me by name, “At first I
called this prosecution, then I called it persecution, but now I name
it crucifixion, and that is what they mean.” I knew it too but there
was no redress, no course but to wait the resurrection if it came.

The trust even of one’s best friends, under the circumstances, and
knowing nothing of the facts could not be expected to withstand it.
That it was physically withstood was beyond either the expectation or
the intention. But, my good friend, that is all passed. The press no
longer turns its arrows upon me. The harvest was not what the reapers
expected, and I suspect if it were all to be done over again in the
light of their newly gained experience it would not be done.

I would like to tell you some day of the newer work that occupies, and
will take pleasure in sending you a report issued at our second annual
meeting when it leaves the press. I am writing from Boston, where I am
spending a few days at our headquarters, but return soon to Glen Echo,
where I hope to see you whenever circumstances call you to the East.

Again thanking you most warmly for your letter, which brought me much
satisfaction, and wishing the best of all good things for you I am,
dear Mr. Young,

Most cordially yours,
(Signed) CLARA BARTON.

A TRIBUTE

And Marie of Logan; she went with them too,
A bride, scarcely more than a sweetheart, ’tis true,
Her young cheek grows pale when bold troopers ride
Where the “Black Eagle” soars she is close at his side.
CLARA BARTON.

The name of Clara Barton will forever shine among women who won
deathless fame in the days of war that called for loyal effort.

PHEBE A. HANAFORD, Author.

For patriotism, for national honor, I would stand by that at all cost.
CLARA BARTON.

If my life could have purchased the life of the patriot martyrs who
fell for their country and mine, how cheerfully and quickly would the
exchange have been made. CLARA BARTON.

What king so strong,
Can tie the gall up in the slanderous tongue?
SHAKESPEARE.

The following are excerpts from letters written to the author:

LOVED AND LOYALLY TRIED TO SERVE

In April, 1909, she writes as follows:

“Does ‘Mexico’ recall to your mind a request I once made of you that you should see me across the border line of that strange country? However much I needed it and whether well or ill I never knew. I only know I did not go. But my own country seemed to me so hard that I thought I could not live it through.

“The Government which I thought I loved and loyally tried to serve has shut every door in my face and stared at me insultingly through its windows. What wonder I want to leave?

“The locks have never turned, the doors are rusted in their hinges. The old warders go out and the new ones come in, sworn faithfully to their charge, with no knowledge of why they are charged to do it; ignorant of every fact, simply enemies by transmission; and yet I stay represented as of ‘doubtful integrity,’ ‘weak,’ ‘decrepit,’ ‘imbecile,’ but yet, very ‘dangerous.’”

She then draws a picture of a Sultan of Turkey who was made a prisoner.

“He was locked in and I locked out, but my whole country seemed my prison and I struggled to free myself of it. Pardon me, I never thought to recall the disagreeable subject again, but like the boy’s whistle it ‘blew itself.’”

A time to keep silence, and a time to speak. ECCLESIASTES.

I am reminded of what Theodore Parker used to say so piteously of
himself—‘I can never talk but I talk too much.’

CLARA BARTON.

The following is an excerpt from a letter under date of Nov. 9, 1909:

THE STRICTEST SILENCE

“There has never been an occasion, nor a time, when I have so missed
my old time privilege of speaking in behalf of a friend. I never
before have so fully realized what a pleasure that privilege had been
to me through half a century. It is a change to me, to come to feel
that my only help must lie in the _strictest_ silence; an expressed
wish for any one would be fatal; not perhaps with President Taft
_personally_, for I am of small importance to him, if he even knows
me, but from the advice he would be sure to receive from those he does
know. So I wait and hope....”

Excerpts from letter written under date of Dec. 14, 1909:

OVER THE MEXICAN LINE

May 31st, the date runs, and I know I never answered that letter, for
I never in my life could have answered a letter like that, but still
more, I never even tried to. Discouraged at the onset and gave up the
encounter. A glimpse at the topics it handled were so far beyond any
reply from the “likes o’ me.” “Great services unnoticed”—“Future
remembrances when others are forgotten”—“To be told in story and sung
in other lands”—poor little me who has never seen the present Ruler of
her own country!

“Then let us hope, and although you may never escort me over the
Mexican line, I have never lost sight of the darkness of the day when
I proposed that you should.”

If it were not my firm belief in an overruling Providence.

A. LINCOLN.

Excerpts from a letter under date of November 21, 1910:

A GREATER POWER AND A WISER MIND

“How well I remember when I once asked you to escort me over! and I
never can understand _why_ I failed to go; a Greater Power and a Wiser
Mind were guiding me, no doubt——”

To God my life was an open page,
He knew what I would be;
He knew how the tyrant passions rage,
How wind swept was all my anchorage,
And why I would drift to sea.

He who hath a thousand friends hath none to spare.

ALI BEN ABOU TALEB.

I am never weary when meeting my friends. CLARA BARTON.

Clara Barton’s intellect was never keener, clearer nor more alert than
it is now (1911). STEPHEN E. BARTON.

The report which went out that I was ill set the country, nay the
world, by the ears and the letters came pouring in by the score, yes,
and more. CLARA BARTON.

Such beautiful letters! I have read them through tears.

CLARA BARTON.

WRITE NONE—SEE ONLY THOSE I MUST[12]

Oxford, Sept. 21, 1911.

Prof. Young,

My Dear friend:

I am trying to speak to your letter of yesterday, myself, but it is
from a very sick bed.

I write none—see only those I must.

I _must see you_. Come and see me though only a week. I had hoped to
see you under better conditions.

I replied to your dispatch. Come when you will; all times are alike to
me.

Yours sincerely and always,
(Signed) CLARA BARTON.

Footnote 12:

Her friends who were with her through her last illness say the letter
of which the above is a copy is the last letter written by Clara
Barton.

I did not err: there does a sable cloud
Turn forth her silver lining on the night.

Virtue may be assailed, but never hurt,
Surprised by unjust force, but not enthralled;
Yea, even that which Mischief meant most harm
Shall in the happy trial prove most glory

DATA AS TO THE TWENTY-FIRST MASSACHUSETTS REGIMENT

Number

Enlisted men leaving Worcester, August 23, 1861 1,001
Total enlisted men throughout the war 1,277

Number Ages
1 Emery G. Wilson, Co. K. 15 years
5 17 years
101 18 years
111 19 years
140 20 years
———
358 Total number under 21 years

170 at the age of 21 years
574 between 22 years and 30 years
120 between 30 years and 40 years
50 between 40 years and 48 years
2 at the age of 46 years
1 at the age of 47 years
2 at the age of 53 years
————
1277

Of this number 560 were killed or wounded in battle. The regiment was a member of the ninth-army Corps under General Burnside, a corps that did not lose a color nor a gun.

Membership of the Twenty-first Massachusetts Regiment Association August 23, 1921–61.

Carrie E. Cutter, Daughter, 1861–1862.
Clara Barton, Daughter, 1862–1912.
Flora S. Chapin, Secretary and Daughter, 1912——.

Miss Carrie E. Cutter, delicate and accomplished, was known as the Florence Nightingale of the Twenty-first. She was the daughter of Calvin E. Cutter, surgeon of the regiment; died in the service as nurse, March 24, 1862. Aged, nineteen years and eight months. Mrs. Flora S. Chapin is the daughter of Reverend Charles E. Simmons Hospital Steward in the Civil War, under Surgeons Calvin E. Cutter and James Oliver, of the Twenty-first Massachusetts Regiment. Clara Barton was the daughter of non-commissioned officer Stephen Barton. He enlisted in 1793, serving three years in the Indian wars (1793–97), and later was known by his friends as “Captain Barton.”

Clara Barton, then a war nurse and nearly forty-one years of age, was made Daughter of the Regiment on the battlefield of Antietam, in October, 1862. This was a few days after President Lincoln had reviewed the Army of the Potomac, the review occurring October third. The army at that time numbered about 145,000 men. It was towards nightfall, and the regiment was on dress parade. “She made a little speech,” says Comrade James Madison Stone, “and there was cemented a friendship begun under fire which was destined to last to the end of the lives of all the participants.”

Says Captain Charles F. Walcott of the Twenty-first Regiment (afterward Brigadier-General), and the author of the history of the regiment: “Our true friend, Miss Barton, a Twenty-first woman to the backbone, was now permanently associated with the regiment and, with two four-mule covered wagons which by her untiring efforts she kept well supplied with delicacies in the way of food and articles of clothing, was a ministering angel to our sick. General Sturgis kindly ordered a detail from the regiment of drivers and assistants about her wagon. And this true, noble woman, never sparing herself nor failing in her devotion to our suffering men, always maintained her womanly dignity, and won the lasting respect and love of our officers and men.”

Clara Barton’s last message to the regiment was delivered forty-five years after the Civil War, through an address and original poem, she then being eighty-nine years of age. The occasion was the annual reunion of the regiment, the date August 23, 1910; the reunion held at Worcester, Massachusetts.

REUNION OF 21ST MASSACHUSETTS REGIMENT
]

Picture taken on the occasion of the annual reunion of the
Twenty-first Massachusetts Regiment Association—on August 23,
1921—Sixtieth anniversary of the day the Regiment left Worcester for
the field.

On Fame’s eternal camping-ground
Their silent tents are spread;
And Glory guards, with solemn round,
The bivouac of the dead.
THEODORE O’HARA.

I hear the loved survivors tell
How naught from death could save,
’Til every sound appears a knell
And every spot a grave.
ABRAHAM LINCOLN.

“I never made a secret of the fact that of all the glorious regiments
that marched to the music of the Union and cooled their heated brows
in the shadows of the Stars and Stripes, the Twenty-first
Massachusetts was peculiarly my own—nearest in my thoughts, and
deepest in my love, and there are many who know that more than once my
heart went down in agony under the blood-stained soil with the
lifeless forms of its bravest and its best. I would divide the last
half of the last loaf with any soldier in that regiment, though I had
never met him.”—CLARA BARTON.

Top, left hand corner—Clara Barton. Top, right hand corner—Carrie E. Cutter. Lower row, center—Flora S. Chapin.

But evil on itself shall back recoil,
And mix no more with goodness when, at last,
Gathered like scum, and settled to itself,
It shall be an eternal restless change,
Self-fed and self-consumed. If this fail
The pillared firmament is rottenness,
And earth’s base built on stubble.

XCVII

CLOSING INCIDENTS—THE BIOGRAPHY—OTHER CORRESPONDENCE

I am so glad to see you; I was afraid you wouldn’t get here in _time_.
CLARA BARTON. From “Notes” at Oxford, Massachusetts, Oct. 2, 1911.

AUTHORIZED TO SPEAK FOR CLARA BARTON

Accompanying the letter under date of December 14, 1909, came data from Clara Barton to be used in her proposed biography, and which data the author had previously promised to make use of as soon as his private business would permit him to give the time necessary to do this literary work. Commenting on the author’s final acceptance of her commission, in her letter she said: “Your talent to writing a biography of me—of me! Your talent and time for such as this! ‘Why was this waste made’?” The object hoped for in her letter of September 21, 1911, wherein Clara Barton says “_I must see you_” and therein the “dispatch” referred to, was that she might consult the author on her biography and to make a final request that after her passing he would protect her good name which, continuously being assailed, she then thought to be in jeopardy.

Arriving at Oxford, Massachusetts, at the end of a special trip from California for the final consultation as to the facts and motives involved in her persecution, on October 3, 1911, in the sick room and at the time when she thought that she had but a few hours to live, the author made the promise. The further object of the visit at Oxford, on the part of the author, was to try to stimulate her health, through a possible sea voyage. That there had been in anticipation for several months previous such sea voyage was well known in her household, and is personally indicated by her in her Easter Greetings for 1911. In this letter she writes: “And we may expect you in the East!! That is more than I _dared_ hope. It would surely be a luxury to visit the old _old_ countries of the world. I should indeed be glad to see them with you.”

I may come to California this winter; will do so, if I am able.

CLARA BARTON.
From “Notes” of a visit in the sick room at
Glen Echo, Maryland, Oct. 20, 1911.

PROPOSED HOME IN CALIFORNIA

A few days after the consultation at Oxford she rallied, and on a Pullman was taken to her Glen Echo home. Seriously ill and thinking this would be her last ride, she expressed the wish to have for the party of three, consisting of her physician, her nephew and herself, the Pullman exclusively. The cost for the use of the car would be three hundred dollars. This having been made known to her she protested the seeming extravagance whereupon a friend, after having been refused such tender by the Pullman office in New York, himself made the tender of the car, without cost to her. Characteristic of her, she declined to accept the courtesy, but said she would have accepted such courtesy from the Pullman Company. She accepted, instead, a drawing room—to save the proposed expense, even by another. Early on the way to Glen Echo, she is reported to have said to those accompanying her: If he were here now I would not leave the car until I shall have reached California, where I would make my home with my friend as long as I live, thereby accepting his invitation to become his guest permanently—in his home nearby and overlooking the Pacific ocean.

She stood the journey so well, says her physician, that again she said to us just before reaching Washington that she would be glad to remain on the train and continue on to California, emphasizing “That’s what I’d like to do.” The physician further comments: “Her faith in her friend’s loyalty would have been sufficient tonic to make the journey easy and a delight, and I feel sure now that had she taken the journey then, as she expressed the wish, the end of the journey would have found her in an _improved condition_, with constant-increasing physical strength.”

In the author’s diary for October 20, 1911, is found the following:

At ten A.M. visited Calumet Place. Mrs. John A. Logan and I then went
to Glen Echo on the street car. Visited Miss Clara Barton, who was in
a chair awaiting our presence. Spent an hour or so with her. She was
in good spirits, happy and much improved in health. Mrs. Logan and she
talked over personal matters. She received me most cordially, and said
she was most happy to see me; also said she would like to go to
California with me. Mrs. Logan, Dr. Hubbell, Stephen E. Barton and I
had a talk in the room downstairs on matters of personal interest to
Miss Barton, formulating a plan for her vindication.

FORECASTING THE BIOGRAPHY

In April, 1912, her physician, Dr. Julian B. Hubbell, wrote from Glen Echo that a few hours before her passing Clara Barton expressed the wish that, if not exclusively so, in any event the author _must be_ associated with her biographer. The protection of her “good name” by her biographer was more to her than a recital of her deeds of valor. She had in mind in selecting her biographer not what fame thereby might come to him, not kinship nor the family name, not what profit there might be in her biography. She had in mind her own “good name,” and the cause such “good name” represents. These were to her vital; these to her were dearer than life itself. Respect for the wish of the dying, and the dead, is regarded sacred; such wish has been regarded sacred, and binding, throughout the centuries, alike by Christian and Pagan. To do violence to the sentiment and well known wish of Clara Barton, on the part of the author, similarly would do violence to the sentiment of the country which would protect her “good name,” a name historic and beloved by the people—violence to the sentiment pervading all humanity.

As the financial executor had possession of, and control of, the historic data prerequisite, for all practical purposes he could name the biographer of the nation’s heroine;—could dictate what data and sentiment must be, and must not be, included in the biography of his Aunt. As soon after her passing as it could be written and reach California there came from her nephew, Mr. Stephen E. Barton, of her nearest of kin and by her made the Executor of her Estate, the following letter:

ONE OF MY AUNT’S LAST REQUESTS

Boston, Mass.,
April 20, 1912.

Col. Charles Sumner Young,
Los Angeles, Cal.

My dear Col. Young:—

When the death of our beloved occurred at Glen Echo on the morning of
the 12th inst. Doctor Hubbell thought you were at the Palace Hotel in
San Francisco and I immediately wired you there, but I was notified
that you had left the city. I was exceedingly glad to receive your
beautiful message of the 13th from Los Angeles.

I followed your wishes by placing some beautiful flowers in your name
upon her bier at Oxford and I knew that the sympathy and tenderness of
your great heart were with us that day. I am sending you Worcester
newspapers, which will give an account of the last ceremonies, all of
which were carried out just as she desired them, both at Glen Echo and
Oxford....

I am sending you enclosed a copy of the tribute written by Mrs. Logan
and read at the Glen Echo services by her daughter.

Has it not the ring of eloquence, of justice and of fearless
friendship? I gave it to the Associated Press, but I believe it was
used only in a garbled form. You are at liberty to use it in any form
which you choose.

At this moment I have not time to say more, but I hope to hear from
you and to see you again. There is much to do and to say in the
future. I shall need the good advice and guidance of such friends as
your good self and one of my Aunt’s last requests was that I invite
you with a few other such friends to compose a committee to advise
with me in the future.

Very truly yours,
(Signed) STEPHEN E. BARTON.

EXCERPTS FROM OTHER LETTERS

Concerning the biography of my Aunt, she desired that I call to my
assistance several of her good friends, including your dear self.

STEPHEN E. BARTON.

From a letter to the author, and dated November 18, 1912.

I judge from your letter that you may not be aware that a preliminary
biography of my Aunt has been written by Reverend Percy H. Epler, of
Worcester, and published by the Macmillans.

I have organized a literary committee composed of Reverend William E.
Barton of Oak Park, Illinois, Reverend Percy H. Epler of Worcester,
Massachusetts, Honorable Francis Atwater of New Haven, Connecticut,
Dr. Julian B. Hubbell of Glen Echo, Maryland, and myself.

STEPHEN E. BARTON.

From a letter to the author, and dated February 29, 1916.

AUTHORIZED

Charles Sumner Young was authorized by Clara Barton to write the
history of her life and so far as I know the only person so
authorized.

JULIAN B. HUBBELL.

Clara Barton’s General Field Agent for the twenty-three years she was
President of the American Red Cross.

Glen Echo, Maryland,
July 8, 1922.

XCVIII

Last words of Clara Barton: Father, forgive them, for they know not
what they do. Let me go! Let me go!

PERCY H. EPLER, Author.

A diagnosis of Clara Barton’s illness was made a few months before she
passed. The report of the Doctors was that every organ in her body was
perfect—heart, lungs, stomach—every organ functioning as in her youth.
THE AUTHOR.

This morning’s papers (Tuesday, April 23, 1912) are filled with
startling stories to the effect that Miss Barton died of a broken
heart, caused by a clique of Washington politicians and ambitious
society people. That she died of a broken heart, so caused, is a fact.
W. H. SEARS, Secretary to Clara Barton.

Considerable comment was caused at the funeral of Clara Barton by the
absence of any representative of ——, or of the American National Red
Cross, the organization which Miss Barton founded; neither were there
any flowers from either the organization nor the White House in
evidence. Rockford (Ills.) _Register Gazette_.

Governments are but the voice of the people. CLARA BARTON.

The Government of my country _is_ my country, and the people of my
country are the government of my country as nearly as a representative
system will allow. CLARA BARTON.

The Government which I thought I loved, and loyally tried to serve,
has shut every door in my face, and stared at me insultingly through
its windows. CLARA BARTON.

The humanity of peoples is beyond that of Governments.

CLARA BARTON.

Ingratitude! Thou marble-hearted fiend, more hideous when thou showest
thee in a child than the sea monster.

SHAKESPEARE.

Of all the anguish our Heavenly Father calls us to endure—none pierces
more keenly, nor wounds more deeply, than the sting of ingratitude.
CLARA BARTON.

Dear Clara Barton! I hope that somewhere she is reaping a glorious
reward of her life-long heroism and self-sacrifice. MRS. LA SALLE
CORBELL PICKETT.

Clara Barton will still live as a potential force for good, and coming
centuries will see her labors carried on even as they were carried on
while she directed them in person.

Springfield (Illinois) _News_.

Sublime, O Life, when in Easter balms did cease,
When shadows of thy sunset hour bore thee “peace.”
E. May Glenn Toon.

A RECORD HISTORY AT THE FUNERAL

The funeral exercises for Clara Barton, who had served for 23 years as President of the Red Cross, were held in her Red Cross home in Glen Echo, Maryland. Flowers in profusion were there; her personal and _real_ friends, with moistened eyes and aching hearts, were there; hundreds of telegrams of sympathy from all over the country were there; millions of humanity-loving American men and women, in spirit, were there; her devoted friend and immediate successor as President of the Red Cross, Mrs. General John A. Logan, was there.

History will record that certain then acting officials of the Red Cross, either personally or in sympathy, were _not_ there; that not a flower, not a word of sympathy, from any Red Cross official was there; that not national honors, not even Red Cross honors, were then bestowed lovingly or at all upon the great and good Red Cross Mother, that made possible officially the very existence of the then Red Cross officers.

And history will record that no good reason could be given why these certain Red Cross officials were _not_ there; and history will further record that the reason must be understood as that in the case of Another when, on a similar occasion, no Pontius Pilate and no politicians were there, but “many women were there beholding from afar.” And finally history will again record that, centuries after the doer of “petty politics” shall have been forgotten, the doer of humane deeds will shine as a fixed star in humanity’s firmament, diffusing her beneficent rays upon the millions, in generations as they successive come and go.

XCIX

Clara Barton saved too many lives to count.

Worcester (Mass.) _Telegram_.

The lives he had saved were enough to gain Heaven’s chiefest diadem.
CLARA BARTON.

God’s plans are known only to Himself. He alone knows what plan He is
working out. CLARA BARTON.

The grave is but a covered bridge, leading from light to light through
a brief darkness. LONGFELLOW.

The paths of glory lead but to the grave. GREY.

FROM LINCOLN’S FAVORITE POEM

Oh, why should the spirit of mortal be proud?
Like a swift-fleeing meteor, a fast flying cloud,
A flash of the lightning, a break of the wave,
He passeth from life to his rest in the grave.

WILLIAM COLLINS.

CLARA BARTON’S LAST RIDE

On her last ride from Glen Echo, Maryland, to Oxford, Massachusetts, Clara Barton went by the Federal Express. She was accompanied by her three friends, Stephen E. Barton, Doctor Julian B. Hubbell and Doctor Eugene Underhill. Every consideration was shown her by her personal friends and the railway company. Because of the fog on New York Bay and certain formalities to be imposed by the New York City authorities, an embarrassing delay was menacing the party. To circumvent the delay the party ignored the advice of the railway authorities to take another route from Jersey City, and continued on to New York.

At New York, to make connections with the outgoing train, the party transferred themselves to a covered express wagon. It was nearly midnight. The streets were wet and slippery from the fog. The busy throng of human beings were in their slumbers. The streets were bereft of all things living, save now and then a belated traveler; and silent, except the tread of his footsteps on the sidewalk.

The party’s destination, Oxford, must be reached at a certain hour. There must be no delay. The driver was urged to hurry. He became impatient and, turning to one member of the party, asked: “Whom have you got in this box anyway?” Then came the reply: “It’s the body of Miss Clara Barton.” “You don’t mean the Civil War Nurse, the Red Cross woman!” “Yes, that’s the one.”

Then there followed a scene pathetic, and most dramatic. Dropping his lines and throwing up his hands the driver exclaimed: “My God! is it possible? My father was a Confederate soldier and, at the battle of Antietam, was wounded in the neck. Miss Barton found him on the battlefield and bound up his wounds in time to save his life. And just to think ‘the likes o’ me,’ a poor driver, is hauling her body across the city tonight.”

C

Clara Barton has to her credit 72 achievements, every one of which
entitles her to a page in history.

W. H. SEARS, Secretary to Miss Barton.

Clara Barton,—this woman’s immortal work.

_Boston Transcript._

Not all the noblest songs are worth one noble deed.

ALFRED AUSTIN.

Clara Barton,—her work and her achievements,—wonders wrought by that
noble woman of New England.

Oakland (Cal.) _Tribune_.

Clara Barton,—no other whose achievements even approximate hers; her
allegiance ran the whole race of mankind.

Sacramento (Cal.) _Union_.

Clara Barton,—measured by any scale you may choose, was the most
useful woman of her day and generation.

Bangor (Me.) _News_.

By our deeds, and by our deeds alone—
God judges us—if righteous God there be,
Creeds are as thistle-down, wind-tossed and blown,
But deeds abide throughout eternity. GEORGE BARLOW.

All who work beneath its glorious folds (Red Cross) are coworkers not
only with the noblest spirits of all ages and all countries but, even
reverently be it spoken, co-workers with the Divine beneficence whose
blessed task we know will one day wipe every tear from every eye.
CLARA BARTON.

ACHIEVEMENT—WORLD RECOGNITION

Clara Barton was the recipient of twenty-seven decorations, medals of
honor, diplomas of honor, badges, jewels, flags, resolutions, votes of
thanks, and commendations from rulers of nations, legislative bodies,
Red Cross decorations, relief committees, and distinguished, or
titled, personages,—as testimonials of her great work for humanity.
THE AUTHOR.

Some day the full and complete history of Clara Barton and her
unparalleled achievements will be given to the world, and no library
on the face of the earth will be complete without a set of the volumes
of that history.

W. H. SEARS,
J. B. HUBBELL,
Ex-Secretaries to Clara Barton.

CHRONOLOGY OF THE LEADING ACHIEVEMENTS IN THE LIFE OF MISS CLARA BARTON

(Especially prepared for this volume by her ex-secretary, W. H. Sears)

ACHIEVEMENTS

1. Organized, conducted and popularized Free School System, Bordentown, N. J., at her own expense. Commenced her school with six pupils, all boys, and in one year had six hundred; secured five teachers to assist and had promises of a new building, if she would continue. It was built for her and is still in use. “Pauper Schools,” that is, Public Schools at public expense, were ridiculed by the people. The six boys were renegades from private schools. Third week, room filled and assistant required. Such was the success that the private schools were discontinued and a four thousand dollar school house, three stories of brick, was built and Miss Barton inaugurated the _Free Public School of Bordentown, N. J._ With six hundred pupils and eight teachers, impetus was given to the cause of free education over the State, 1852–4.

2. First Woman Clerk in Government Office, Washington, D. C. A place of trust at $1,400 per year, in charge of caveats, Patent Office, which position she gave up at the opening of the Civil War to work in the field. 1854–’61, under Mr. Charles Mason, Commissioner of Patents. Discharged when Buchanan came in; but recalled under Lincoln; resigned when war came on.

THE AMERICAN CIVIL WAR

3. Met and furnished relief at “Old Infirmary,” where Judiciary Square Hospital now stands; first day and next day at Capitol, in Senate Chamber (Senate not in session) to wounded soldiers of the 6th Mass. Volunteers in Washington, on arrival from the Baltimore attack by mob, April 19, 1861. _First Civil War Field._

4. Met and furnished relief to sick and wounded soldiers, brought from the front on trains and boats to Washington, D. C., May 1, 1861 to July, 1862.

Afterwards she was on the following fields of battle and relief:

5. James Island, battlefield, July 7, 1862.

6. Cedar Mountain, battlefield, August 9, 1862, 3,700 killed and wounded.

7. Second Bull Run, battlefield, August 30 to September 1, 1862. Found seven of her old pupils, Massachusetts schools, in this field and each had lost an arm or leg.

8. Chantilly, battlefield, August 31 to September 1, 1862.

9. Point of Rocks, Md., battlefield, September 4, 1862.

10. Point of Rocks, Md., battlefield, September, 1862.

11. Antietam, battlefield, September 16 and 17, 1862.

12. Falmouth battlefield, December 11 and 12, 1862.

13. Fredericksburg, battlefield, December 12 and 13, 1862. 18,000 killed and wounded.

14. Folly Island, battlefield, April 10, 1863.

15. Morris Island, battlefield, July 10 to September 7, 1863.

16. Fort Wagner, battlefield, September 7, 1863.

17. Charleston, S. C., battlefield, September 8, 1863.

18. The Wilderness, battlefield, May 6–7, 1864.

19. Spotsylvania, battlefield, May 8 to 21, 1864.

20. Petersburg, battlefield, June 15 to 18, 1864.

21. Petersburg Mine, battlefield, July 30 to August 5, 1864.

22. Deep Bottom, battlefield, August and September, 1864.

23. Richmond Campaign, battlefield, January 1 to April 3, 1865.

24. Annapolis Hospital, 1865, met starving, sick and wounded returning Federal prisoners and furnished relief.

Lieutenant-General Nelson A. Miles, the chairman of the ceremonies,
with
the first shovel of dirt.

(The Chairman of the National Advisory Board, National First Aid
Association
of America)
]

THE MEMORIAL TREE PLANTING TO THE MEMORY OF CLARA BARTON

by the American Forestry Association at Glen Echo, Md., 3 P. M., Easter Sunday, April 16, 1922. The occasion—to commemorate the tenth anniversary of the passing of Clara Barton.

Mrs. John A. Logan, with second shovel of dirt. Author of the
Congressional
measure creating May 30th a national holiday, known as Decoration
Day; and sponsored in Congress by U. S. Senator John A. Logan.
]

He who plants an oak looks forward to future ages, and plants for posterity.

WASHINGTON IRVING.

THE CLARA BARTON OAK
Registered in the Hall of Fame for Trees, Washington, D. C.
]

The American Flag
The Glen Echo Service Flag
The Red Cross Flag
The Clara Barton Red Cross Home

Pin Oak (Quercus Palustris), 8½ feet high, 5½ inches in circumference
at the base; 3½ inches in circumference, 4½ feet from the ground.

CLARA BARTON AND THE OAK

_The Memorial Address_

The tree is the longest lived of all the lives of earth. Trees are in existence whose birth antedates that of our Christian civilization. The Cedar of Lebanon of the Old World is a part of the religious sentiment of the human race. The General Sherman Sequoia of the New World had battled against the warring elements of Nature for thousands of years before existed the warring forces of the Anglo-Saxons, on this continent. If there “be tongues in trees” every historic tree might say: “What I have seen and known is identified with the human race.”

Every country has its trees, historic, sacred through association with an individual or with some great national event. Of the tree, historic, the historian writes, the poet sings, and in delineating its beauties the painter exhausts his art. He who plants an historic tree transmits history and poetry and art to posterity. The tree becomes a part of a country’s history.

England has her Parliament Oak, under whose branches King John held his parliament; her Pilgrim Oak, associated with Lord Byron, her Falstaff Tree, her Shakespeare Tree. The United States has her Penn Treaty Elm, under whose possible inspiration, for once at least, faith was kept with the North American Indian; her Charter Oak that became the guardian of the parchment that held the liberties of the Puritans; her Cambridge Elm within whose cooling shades George Washington took command of the Colonial forces in the struggle for human liberty; her Liberty Tree, whose very soil wherein it grew, said Lafayette, should be cherished forever by the American people.

At the nation’s capital there are trees historic. On Capitol Hill there is the great elm, said to have been planted by George Washington in 1794. On the grounds of the Woman’s National Foundation, near Dupont Circle, is the tree known as the Treaty Oak. Its history is of pathos, possibly in part of fiction, but whether of fact or of fiction, like the wanderings of Ulysses the tree is of never-ceasing interest. In the Botanic Gardens is the Peace Oak, said to have been planted by a Southerner who tried desperately to prevent the Civil War, and died broken-hearted over his failure. And near by this historic tree is the picturesque oak that came from an acorn picked up by the grave of Confucius, in far away Shantung.

Of all the trees of ancient and modern times the oak is the most historic. The Ancient Greeks and Romans thought that the oak was Jupiter’s own tree; the Ancient Britons, that it belonged to the God of Thunder—groves of oaks were their temples. Among the Celts the oak was an object of worship; the Yule log was invariably of oak.

We plant an oak to commemorate a career, sacred, sacred to one who loved the world—to one whom all the world loves. As in Japan a certain tree is sacred, in America every tree is sacred that is love-planted. Our act, and sentiment, is in consonance with hers whose almost last wish was that an oak sapling be planted at the shrine of her beloved horse; that it might be his monument, and with the hope that the children would love and protect it as Baba’s Tree.

“Sing low, green oak, thy summer rune,
Sing valor, love, and truth.”

In no other atmosphere of her native land as here is a place so appropriate to plant this historic tree. Through this atmosphere, into yonder edifice, came the cry “Come and Help Us”;—from Cuba that cruelty, pestilence and starvation were the portions of thousands; from Galveston that still other thousands of men, women and children had become victims of disaster, on her storm-swept coast. In every instance to the cry for help was there response, and on wings of love the Angel of Mercy sped forth to minister with her own hands to suffering humanity.

It was here that she basked in the sunset rays, as they dipped gently towards the west. Yonder are the trees which she planted with her own hands; yonder the soil wherein grew her beautiful flowers; yonder humanity’s centre from which flowed her charities to almost every part of the known world; yonder the chamber from whose bed of sorrow she cried: “Let me go; let me go”; yonder the window through whose casement on Easter Morn, in 1912, her spirit flew to the Great Unknown.

Nature that springs from the soil decays and dies; deeds that spring from the soul never die. Nature’s foliage that ornaments is destroyed by the frosts of winter; the spiritual foliage that ornaments is perennial. The American Red Cross whose bud, in 1881, opened to the sunlight in the forests of Michigan is now the sheltering tree for the world’s millions; the woman that planted the seed and nourished it with her tears, as later she planted that other tree known as THE NATIONAL FIRST AID, is now the spirit that stands sponsor for certain charities, charities the most widely known of all the charities of earth.

Neither marble nor canvas is so venerated as the tree, from out of GOD’S FIRST TEMPLES—a tree to commemorate the individual is the most venerated memorial in the world. The world will little care, or note not at all, what we say and do here and yet the spirit of these environments may become the inspiration of future ages. The mound that soon must shut out from view our mortality will be leveled and covered with earth’s foliage, only to be forgotten or marked “UNKNOWN.” But let us pray that the tree, whose sentiment is world-humanity, may take highest rank among the world’s other historic trees; that through the centuries the children of successive generations will love and protect THE CLARA BARTON OAK, NATURE’S EASTER-TRIBUTE TO IMMORTALITY.

Planting the “Clara Barton Rose”—Miss Carrie Harrison, Chairman Clara
Barton Centennial Committee of the National Woman’s Party.
]

MEMORIAL TREE PLANTING TO THE MEMORY OF CLARA BARTON

Charles Sumner Young, while delivering the memorial address.
]

25. Summer of 1865 at Andersonville identifying the dead, and laying out the first National Cemetery, by request of the Government. Raised the first United States flag over Andersonville.

26. 1865–67 Searching for the 80,000 missing men of the army. Found 19,920 of them at an expense to herself without pay of $17,000. The Government reimbursed $15,000 of this sum.