Whether directly heeding this advice or acting on her own strong impulses, Barton excelled in capturing not only the respect but the love of her pupils. She had a ready wit, and an absence of condescension which pleased them, and her sense of fairness destroyed the jealousies of favoritism. “She had such a happy way with her that she won everybody over to her side,” recalled one admirer.17 Poor children received the same care as the others, with a personalized attention that sometimes changed their lives. (One such boy was rescued from the drudgery of factory work to develop his exceptional mathematical skills, a favor he never forgot.18) She was, moreover, unabashedly loyal, even possessive of her pupils. “They were all mine,” she recalled in an autobiographical sketch, “second only to the claims and interests of the real mother…. And so they have remained.”19
Her pupils returned the favor. They fulfilled beyond Clara's wildest expectations her self-expressed need for “approval, encouragement, trust, confidence,” without which she felt her soul might “go awreck.”20 In the shining faces of her students, the boys filled with regard for her fairness and sportsmanship, she felt the acceptance and admiration that had so long eluded her. One pupil liked to think of “the days we spent together at the old no 9 school at Oxford and how proud I was if I could take hold of your dress as you had but too [sic] hands, and walk a little ways with you, how we all loved you then.” For the rest of her life Barton received letters such as this, and the loyalty of her pupils was a continual source of pleasure. “Their life-long loyal allegiance to me is beyond my comprehension,” she wrote at the age of eighty. “Little as many of them were, trifling as the days must have seemed among a whole life of scholarship, which so many of them followed, it is a most remarkable thing that all have remembered those few months and cherished them with a loyalty that the most ambitious teacher could but prize.”21
Self-respect and a sense of place in the community increased Barton's social confidence. As L. N. Fowler had predicted, the experience diminished her chronic introspection; through successful interaction with people she lost some of her shyness, or at least learned to effectively hide it. The social growth was also at least partly due to a conscious effort on her part to face the world with poise, and to please her brother David.
Soon after Clara began teaching, David had become engaged to Julia Ann Porter, the same cousin who had lived with the Barton's during their mutual grandmother's illness. One day David gave his younger sister an invitation that, she later wrote, “took my breath away”: he wished her to join the wedding party by accompanying him to Maine to serve as bridesmaid. Fearful that she would appear awkward or embarrass her brother, she at first demurred but at his insistence was finally persuaded to go. The thought of standing beside the lovely Julia, whose charms could only serve as a contrast to her plain, dumpy figure, and of being called on to graciously introduce cousins and friends, filled her with dread. Yet once it was decided that she would go, she silently determined to act in the most obliging manner possible. Clara cared less what the citizens of Winsor, Maine, thought of her than that she might disappoint her brother and lose his love and support. “I was not distressed about what might be thought of me…,” she reminisced, “but how it might reflect upon my brother, and the mortification that my awkwardness could not fail to inflict on him.” Thus Clara's “tearful resolution” conquered her debilitating shyness. It was yet another turning point during the important years of her teaching career, and she was keenly aware of it at the time. The desire to take responsibility for her actions and to prevail over personal qualities that she herself found unacceptable, she noted, “seemed to throw the whole wide world open to me.”22
For Clara, David Barton's wedding proved to be a memorable experience, not only because of the personal growth she experienced during the time but because it was her earliest adventure away from home. The party traveled up the New England coast by boat, and she felt the thrill of seeing the ocean in its vastness and mystery.23 With wide eyes she encountered “a whole townful of uncles and cousins,” and came to know a place and part of her family that had heretofore been merely characters in stories or names penned on envelopes.24 On the eve of her departure Vester Vassall, her brother-in-law, gave her a Morocco-covered autograph album. At socials and teas she asked her new friends to write a few lines, and they filled the book with their good wishes. Evidently she had conquered not only her own social malaise but the hearts of her relations in Maine. The little green album was carefully preserved with her treasures as a tangible piece of the pride she felt in overcoming her fears.25
As the boundaries of her known world had expanded on the trip, so had her emotional horizons broadened. Barton continued to feel the disadvantage of her homely face and round figure. Yet her quick wit and adventurous and sporting manner were appealing, and several young men in the vicinity of Oxford came to call on her. One swain let her know that whenever he saw her he “made up my face for a really good time,” and another praised both her intelligence and her capacity for laughter.26 Clara's romances remain elusive, however, for they were, to her, intensely private, and she rarely spoke or wrote about them. The few people in whom she confided were rewarded with conflicting or cryptic allusions to gentlemen who were impossible to identify.
According to family tradition Barton formed an early and strong attachment to Jerry Learned, the cousin with whom she had grown up. She was fond of his high spirits and merry ways and felt comfortable in his familiar company. The boyhood recklessness of the Learned cousins, however, was still in evidence in their maturity. Some dubious ventures, and their financial dealings seemed always to have a shadowy edge to them. Jerry in particular appeared wedded to the life of a speculator. A nephew close to Clara believed she realized with sad reluctance that Jerry Learned lacked the strength of character she thought necessary for a close relationship. A girlhood chum, however, had a different explanation. “Jerry Learned was real good-looking,” confided Fanny Childs Vassall, “and Clara once said to me that she shouldn’t want the man to have all the good looks in the family.”27
While Clara was still in her teens she enjoyed the company of another young man, L. T. Bacon (his first name has unfortunately escaped record). He evidently did not live in Oxford, but he and Clara still managed to meet, ride horseback, crack hickory nuts, or roam the hills in search of blackberries. Mr. Bacon evidently took the romance seriously, since he noted that it pleased him to hear that she had been learning some household arts, “for it is not entirely impossible that such accomplishments may be some practical use.”28 Close-mouthed Clara does not tell us what became of this relationship, but the tenor of their light-hearted romance has not been entirely lost. It shines through the semi-poetic ramblings Bacon sent to Clara soon after one of their meetings, in which he praises her as “much more a sister so dear as you are to me,” and remembers “a fine walk home which place we reached soon enough (being favored with a moon and thoug[h] near noon) for a nap which we enjoyed first rate and no mistake.”29
Still another suitor during her teaching days was Oliver Williams. Barton had boarded with his family during one school term. After the session ended they corresponded, and diary entries for 1849 show that she spent considerable time in his company. During one week she visited every day with him, save one, and on that day' she noted in her journal that it was “a lonesome day.”30 It is difficult to tell, however, whether Barton's interest in Williams was based on simple friendship or bespoke a deeper affection. Williams was the illegitimate son of a woman with whom Barton was familiar, and she had befriended and helped to educate him. He had responded to her teaching with a steadfast