Brown settled in the mining town now called Central City, Colorado, where she worked as a laundress, cook, and midwife.

Known as "Aunt Clara" for her emotional and financial support, Brown was a founding member of a Sunday school that was held in her home.

[2][a] At a young age, Clara and her mother were sold to Ambrose Smith, a tobacco farmer in Virginia, and worked in the fields.

To settle the estate, Brown's family were sold separately at a slave auction, after which they were sent to different, distant locations.

A plantation owner from Kentucky, George Brown, sensed her intelligence and strength and placed high bids to attain her.

[5] Brown was hired as a maid and cook by a family heading to the westward departure point of Leavenworth in Kansas Territory.

It was a hot, difficult eight-week journey to Denver, made more uncomfortable by the complaints of a southern man about a black woman traveling with them.

Following the tide of miners heading into the mountains, Brown set up the first laundry in Gilpin County in Gregory Gulch, now called Central City, Colorado.

She hosted the first Methodist church services at her house and helped those in need any way she could, including newly settled Euro-Americans and Native Americans.

She was raised in old Kentucky, and with her own freedom secured after years of persistent, patient toil, when well along in life she joined the procession of gold seekers to Gregory Gulch.

"[4] At eighty years of age, Brown's funds were depleted through charitable contributions, her efforts to find her family, and having been cheated by real estate agents.

The Council Bluffs Nonpareil reported on March 4, 1882, that Brown was "still strong, vigorous, tall, her hair thickly streaked with gray, her face kind."

Colorado state dignitaries were in attendance at her funeral, including Denver mayor John Long Routt and governor James Benton Grant.