The International Red Cross was established in 1863, after a book by Swiss businessman Jean Henry Dunant, A Memory of Solferino, raised awareness about the lack of medical services on the battlefield of Solferino in northern Italy. The book appealed for the establishment of peacetime volunteer societies with people preferably nurses who could care for the wounded in wartime and for those societies to be recognized and protected through an international agreement. Dunant's ideas led to the formation of the International Committee for Relief of the Wounded. This committee convinced the Swiss government to convene a diplomatic conference in Geneva in 1864 to adopt the first international humanitarian law: the Geneva Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded in Armies in the Field. The International Committee for Relief of the Wounded later became the International Committee of the Red Cross.
Since Americans needed the help in the U.S one brave woman stepped up and started the program in Washington D.C. The American Red Cross, headquartered in Washington, D.C., was established by Clara Barton. After performing humanitarian work during and after the conflict, on advice of her doctors, in 1869, she went to Europe for a restful vacation. There, she saw and became involved in the work of the International Red Cross during the Franco-Prussian War, and determined to bring the