Determined to make a lasting difference, he wrote a slim book, Un Souvenir de Solferino, about the battle, its aftermath and his idea of creating a society of qualified volunteers to provide care in wartime. Dunant paid for the 1600-copy print run, which these days might be called vanity publishing, and sent it to the great and good (and royalty and politicians) across Europe. It was an instant success. Apart from being lionised by Charles Dickens, Victor Hugo, the Queen of Prussia and the Empress of Russia, Dunant initially saw few concrete results.
