Louis Appia

Life & Legacy

Louis Paul Amédée Appia (13 October 1818 – 1 May 1898) was a Swiss surgeon with special merit in the area of military medicine. In 1863 he became a member of the Geneva "Committee of Five", which was the precursor to the International Committee of the Red Cross. Six years later he met Clara Barton, an encounter which had significant influence on Clara Barton's subsequent endeavours to found a Red Cross society in the United States and her campaign for an accession of the US to the Geneva Convention of 1864.