He was the founder of the Red Cross and the first recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, in 1901.

He was born in 1828. His family was religious and engaged in charity.

In 1853 he traveled to Algeria to take over the Swiss colony of Setif.

He was present at the battle of Solferino looking for Napoleon III, to ask him to grant him land for the flour mill he built. There he watched the treatment of the wounded.

Returning to Geneva he wrote ‘A memory of Solferino’ which helped found the International Committee for Aid to the Wounded, the future International Committee of the Red Cross.

Financially, however, he went bankrupt and resigned from the Red Cross. He eventually went to Paris where he ended up homeless. There the empress invited him as her adviser.

During the Franco-Prussian War he contributed to the care of the wounded.

He then traveled to London where he worked to establish a prisoner of war program and abolish the black and slave trade.

He died in 1910.

[Source: en.wikipedia.org]