Kelly's Block

Clarissa Harlowe Barton founded the American Red Cross at the age of sixty and led it for the next 23 years. Clara, as she preferred to be called, was one of the first women to be employed by the federal government. She risked her life to bring supplies and support to soldiers in the field during the Civil War. Later she ran the Office of Missing Soldiers in Washington, D.C.  Clara and her assistants wrote 41,855 replies to inquiries and helped locate more than 22,000 missing men. In 1869 the office was closed and Clara moved. The third floor of her boardinghouse was boarded up in 1913, and the site forgotten until 1997 when the building was slated for demolition. A treasure trove was discovered in the attic: signs, clothing, soldiers’ socks, an army tent, newspapers, and documents relating to the Office of Missing Soldiers. The building was not destroyed, but became a museum in 2015.