Henry Dunant was born on May 8, 1828 in Geneva, Switzerland, the son of a member of parliament. Influenced by humanitarian thoughts since childhood, I care very much about the elderly, weak, sick, disabled and poor people at the bottom of society. In June 1859, the young banker accidentally passed through the town of Sofreno in northern Italy, which coincided with the final stage of the battle between the France-Sardinian coalition forces commanded by Napoleon III and the Austrian army. He witnessed with his own eyes the battlefield littered with corpses. Countless wounded people were groaning and shouting constantly. Due to the lack of medical staff, most wounded soldiers do not receive the care they deserve. The compassionate Dunan was shocked by this tragedy. He immediately went to the town to mobilize and organize residents to rescue these wounded soldiers. In November 1862, Dunant wrote this personal experience into the book "Memories of Sofreno", which was published in Geneva. In his book, he strongly appealed to mankind not to go to war. In wartime, it is necessary to send rescue groups to both hostile sides regardless of you and me. In February 1863, he initiated the establishment of an international committee for the rescue of wounded soldiers, the International Committee of the Red Cross, in Geneva, Switzerland. In October of the same year, representatives from 16 European countries held an international conference in Geneva and decided to establish Red Cross organizations in various countries. In order to pay tribute to Dunant and his motherland, the meeting decided to use the Swiss flag pattern, the opposite color and pattern of the white cross on a red background-the Red Cross on a white background, as the common symbol of the Red Cross.

In August 1864, the Red Cross held another meeting in Geneva and signed the first "Geneva Convention for the Amelioration of the Condition of the Wounded and Sick in Armed Forces in the Field", known as the Red Cross Convention. Since then, the Red Cross has been officially recognized and protected by international conventions. Due to religious and historical reasons, similar organizations in some Islamic countries use the Red Crescent or red lion and the sun as symbols.

The Red Cross Society or the Red Crescent Society are both voluntary rescue and relief groups of the same nature. They are regarded in the world as a non-political and non-religious humanitarian group that transcends national borders, time and space. When it was first established, it was intended to take care of the wounded during wartime, and later became an organization for general disaster prevention and refugee relief. Many countries in the world have established Red Cross or Red Crescent societies. Internationally, their joint organization is the Red Cross and Red Crescent Society.

The Red Cross cause pioneered by Henry Dunant has made outstanding contributions to peace and progress of mankind. However, he exhausted his assets and became a patient in a workhouse for the elderly. When people discovered him in the workhouse in 1896 and learned about his origins as the founder of the International Red Cross, people gave this loving old man the highest honor in the world. In 1901, he received the first Nobel Peace Prize. Dunan passed away on October 30, 1910.