As the war drew to a close, Clara was flooded with letters from families of missing soldiers. Grieving relatives pleaded to know if Clara had nursed their sons, husbands, or brothers. President Lincoln, recognizing the depth of her commitment, appointed Clara Barton to lead the search for 67,000 soldiers listed as missing.

To promote the work to locate thousands of missing men, shy Clara summoned her courage once again and embarked on an extensive lecture tour throughout the Northeast and parts of the Midwest. She captivated audiences with vivid tales of her wartime experiences, giving some 300 lectures before losing her voice during a speech in 1868.

Clara submitted a report including the numbers of inquiries received, circulars printed, and letters written and sent, along with a list of her direct expenditures. On March 10, 1866 the U. S. Congress approved $15,000 to reimburse her expenses for the work. Her search concluded at the end of 1866 with over 22,100 men identified. The 1869 Senate Memorial of Clara Barton contains text from her final report describing methods she used to search for the missing men.

40th Congress, Senate. MIS. DOC. 3d. Session. No. 57.

To the honorable the Senate and House of Representatives in Congress assembled:

Congress having, by a resolution approved March 10, 1866, appropriated the sum of $15,000 for the reimbursement of certain expenditures made by me in endeavoring to discover missing soldiers of the armies of the United States, and to aid in the further prosecution of the search for such soldiers, I feel it my duty to make a brief report of the manner in which I have endeavored to accomplish that object.

During the last year of the war I became aware, from letters received from various parts of the country, that a very large number of our soldiers had disappeared from view without leaving behind them any visible trace or record. Whether they had fallen in battle, were lingering in rebel prisons, or perished in some other way, was only to be conjectured.

In the then painfully excited state of the public mind, any information respecting them would have afforded the most grateful relief to their families.

These considerations induced me in the spring of 1865 to endeavor to gather from our returning armies such information as individual soldiers could furnish of the fate of their missing comrades. I assumed that where official records existed, the officers of the government would willingly furnish all the information required, and I therefore sought only to glean those barren fields which would be overlooked, from the scantiness of the return which they would yield.

The fresh memory of each surviving veteran, and of every citizen who had watched the last hours of a dying soldier, were the records I sought to consult. But as army after army, and one regiment after another, returned to their homes and were disbanded, it became impossible any longer to hold communication with them, except by an extended and complex system of correspondence.

In conducting this, I caused printed lists of all missing soldiers who had come to my knowledge to be posted in conspicuous places in all the towns and considerable villages in the country, requesting information from all who might be able to furnish any.

The number of persons about whom intelligence was solicited in this manner was something over 7,500; and I have reason to believe that valuable information was obtained by this method alone, and communicated to the families of nearly 5,000.

I shall not attempt to detail the various other methods by which I endeavored to gain intelligence of the lost, or to assist anxious inquirers by indicating the official sources to which they should apply; but it will afford some idea of the magnitude of the work undertaken to state that the letters of inquiry, and those giving information received up to the end of the year 1868, amounted to 63,182. The printed circulars of advice issued in reply, to 58,693. The letters written, to 41,855. The printed rolls distributed, to 99,057.

According to the best estimate that can be formed, information which had been in no other way obtained has been gained by this search and transmitted to the families of over 22,000 men borne upon the rolls of the United States service as missing.

It is proper that I should acknowledge the important aid and encouragement which I received from the late lamented President Lincoln, from the present President of the United States, the general of the armies and from your honorable bodies.

In regard to the funds appropriated by the resolution above quoted I would remark that the vouchers exhibited by me to members of the Senate and House of Representatives, of expenditures made by me prior to the passage of that resolution, amounted to 7,533.00 Since that time I have expended for clerk hire 6,883.00; Office rent 600.00; Office furniture and stationery, 1,743.00; Amounting in all to $16,759.00. My own time and services have been cheerfully given.

It is now nearly four years since the cessation of active hostilities, and from the best information accessible to me I am led to believe that a large number, perhaps 40,000, once enlisted in our armies remain to this day unaccounted for. As there can be no motive for prolonged concealment, it is a reasonable presumption that those of whom no trace has yet been found have perished through the casualties and hardships of war. In most instances pay or bounty in some form must have been due their families at the time of their disappearance. It is well known that until recently the accounting officers of the treasury refused to settle with such families without evidence of the date of death. And if more favorable construction has been adopted, the question is still understood to be embarassed by some degree of legal difficulty, and the impression has been widely disseminated that the heirs of a deceased soldier can recover nothing of the government until the time and manner of his death are fully shown.

With a view, therefore, of remedying any defect in the existing laws upon the subject, and of removing any uncertainty or misapprehension in the public mind, I would respectfully suggest the propriety of adopting a resolution similiar in substance to the following:

Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives in Congress assembled, That hereafter all persons who served in the army or navy during the war for the suppression of the rebellion, and who are now borne upon the rolls of their respective commands as missing or unknown, and of whom no traces have yet been found, shall be considered as having died in the line of duty, and their legal heirs and representatives, upon proper proof of their being so recorded, shall be entitled to the bounties, back pay, and pension the same as if they had been other wise accounted for.

I have the honor to be, very respectfully, CLARA BARTON.

Quote: "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 be expected to preside at a public meeting." - Clara Barton