Barry der Menschenretter is regarded as one of the most well-known of all search and rescue dogs of all time. He was reportedly born in 1800 at the hospice of the Great St. Bernard Pass on the border between Switzerland and Italy, built by and named after the monk Bernard of Menthon, an Italian monk.
The hospice first began breeding dogs to rescue people lost in the snow in the late seventeenth century, often from the Sennenhund breeds that were frequently employed as farm dogs in the area. The dogs were referred to by many names, including Saint Dogs, Noble Steeds, and Alpinemastiffs, even Barry dogs in some circles, but the breed name of Saint Bernard wasn’t commonly used until the nineteenth century. The hospice rescue dogs were considerably smaller than Saint Bernards that we are familiar with today and measurements of Barry’s remains indicate that he would have weighed around eighty-five to a hundred pounds, compared to the average weight for the breed today of one hundred and forty to two hundred and sixty pounds.
Some of the dogs employed by the hospice, unlike modern search and rescue dogs, often traversed the snowy pass on their own, searching for those trapped or freezing; they would guide or carry them back to the hospice if they were able to, or they would return to get the assistance of one of the Monks if they were unable to rouse the person, or if they were too heavy to carry. Barry saved at least forty individuals throughout his career, with his most famous rescue being that of a young boy who had been trapped in an ice cave; he is credited with rousing the boy from sleep by licking his hands and face then carrying the lad back to his family at the hospice. Some legends tell the tale of Barry’s demise at the hands of a soldier who believed him to be a wolf, however, these legends are not based in truth. Barry continued rescuing individuals in need until he retired at twelve years of age when he was brought to Bern in Switzerland to live out the remainder of his life until he died at the ripe old age of fourteen.
The heroic canine’s skin was taxidermied and is on is on display at the National History Museum of Bern, a monument was erected in his honor at Paris’s Cimetière des Chiens in 1900, and many books and movies have been written about his heroics throughout the years. Until 2004, the hospice continued to use dogs to help locate those lost in the snow and ensured that at least one was named Barry, in his honor. When helicopters took over rescue efforts in the pass, The Foundation Barry du Grand Saint Bernard was established in Martigny, where around twenty new Saint Bernards are born each year.
