Answering a Call for Help

Answering a Call for Help. . Disease, death, the practice of separating slave families, all left children with no one to care for them. Scores of orphaned black children in Civil War Helena suffered from neglect and exposure. General Napoleon Buford asked for help. In response, charitable organizations in the North sent doctors, nurses, teachers, food, clothing and medical supplies. , Helena's Quaker Orphanage and School , In April 1864, Alida and Calvin Clark left their Indiana farm to come to Helena. The Clarks were Quakers, members of the Indiana Yearly Meeting of Friends. Upon arriving they opened the Freedmen's Asylum for Orphans. , The Clarks did more than provide food and shelter. They provided an education. Imagine a child's face as he reads words printed on a page for the first time. The schools established by northern organizations helped give children a future., In 1866, donations of money and labor from the 56th United States Colored Infantry made it possible for the Friends' school to move to a thirty-acre site outside of Helena. The humble school eventually became Southland College, a high school and teacher training school. , [Photo caption] , Calvin and Alida Clark