Grace Clayton was a Human female and a Starfleet officer with the rank of ensign in 2371.

When Clayton was a toddler, her non-Starfleet affiliated parents went to Cardassian-occupied Bajor to serve as teachers. After many years, her parents were eventually thrown into a labor camp and her older sister and younger brother both died while fighting with the Bajoran Resistance. Clayton was smuggled off on a cargo vessel and she traveled to Earth to stay with her father's sister. She immediately applied to Starfleet Academy, becoming the first in her family to do so. After graduation, her first assignment was the USS Voyager.

Clayton was serving aboard the USS Voyager in 2371 when it was taken to the Delta Quadrant. In 2374, Clayton served three straight duty shifts in Transporter Room 3 while she was keeping a lock on an away team currently on a massive array created by the Nacene. Clayton was able to transport Captain Kathryn Janeway to the array despite the presence of minerals which refracted the transporter beam by finding unaffected areas of the array and using them to transport her to a carefully set-up group of pattern enhancers. (VOY novel: Fusion)