Clara Barton co-founded the American Red Cross

She traveled to Europe to unwind and recover after the Office of Correspondence closed. She learned about the International Red Cross in Switzerland, which was established in 1863 to aid those affected by humanitarian catastrophes. Soon after, she began making plans to start a comparable organization in the US. She even made an attempt to recruit Rutherford B. Hayes as its founder. She and Adolphus Solomons, a prominent local figure involved in various charities, created the American Red Cross on May 21st, 1881. The next month, she was named American Red Cross's president, a position she held for the next 23 years without being paid.

The American Red Cross intervened to aid victims of natural catastrophes in addition to those harmed by conflict. Its first test occurred in 1881 during a catastrophic forest fire in Michigan that destroyed more than a million acres in less than 24 hours while displacing thousands of people. The Red Cross helped those affected by the Johnstown flood in 1889 and the Galveston hurricane in 1900 during its first few decades.