Samuel Tredwell Sawyer (1800 – November 29, 1865) was a
Congressional Representative from the
U.S. state of
North Carolina.
Sawyer was born in
Edenton, North Carolina, in 1800. He attended Edenton Academy and the
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Sawyer studied law, was admitted to the bar, and commenced practice in Edenton. Sawyer was a member of the
North Carolina State house of representatives 1829-1832. He had two children with
Harriet Jacobs, author of
Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl. Sawyer served in the state senate in 1834. He was elected as a
Whig to the
Twenty-fifth Congress (March 4, 1837 - March 3, 1839) and was chairman of the Committee on Expenditures on Public Buildings. Sawyer was an unsuccessful candidate for reelection to the
Twenty-sixth Congress, moved to
Norfolk,
Virginia, and resumed the practice of law. He was editor of the
Norfolk Argus for several years. He was appointed collector of customs at Norfolk on May 16, 1853, serving until April 6, 1858. Sawyer then moved to
Washington, D.C.. During the
Civil War, he was appointed on September 17, 1861, as commissary with the rank of
major in the
Confederate service and served until August 2, 1862. Sawyer died in
Bloomfield, New Jersey in 1865.
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