Sarah Hildreth Butler (born Sarah Jones Hildreth, August 17, 1816 – April 8, 1876) was an American stage actress. She was the wife of

Benjamin Franklin Butler Benjamin Franklin Butler (November 5, 1818 – January 11, 1893) was an American major general of the Union Army, politician, lawyer, and businessman from Massachusetts. Born in New Hampshire and raised in Lowell, Massachusetts, Butler is best ...

, a Massachusetts lawyer, controversial Union general in the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states th ...

, and a United States

Congressman A Member of Congress (MOC) is a person who has been appointed or elected and inducted into an official body called a congress, typically to represent a particular constituency in a legislature. The term member of parliament (MP) is an equivalen ...

representing Massachusetts from 1867 to 1875 and again from 1877 to 1879.

Life

Sarah Hildreth was born in

Dracut, Massachusetts Dracut is a town in Middlesex County. At the 2020 census, the town's population was 32,617, making it the second most populous town in Massachusetts with an open town meeting system of governance. The town covers a total area of 21.36 square m ...

, the daughter of Dr. Israel Hildreth, a noted physician of the Lowell area, and Dolly Jones. At sixteen, she went to Boston for formal training in dramatics, performing all over the country. On May 16, 1844, she married Benjamin Butler, then a rising lawyer, at Saint Anne's Episcopal Church in Lowell; she was 27, he 25. The Butlers would have four children, three surviving to adulthood: Blanche (1847–1939), who would marry

Adelbert Ames Adelbert Ames (October 31, 1835 – April 13, 1933) was an American sailor, soldier, and politician who served with distinction as a Union Army general during the American Civil War. A Radical Republican, he was military governor, U.S. Senato ...

; Paul (1852–1918; their first son, also named Paul, had died in 1850 at the age of five); and Ben-Israel (1855–1881). She retired from stage performance after her marriage. Sarah Butler, urged her husband Benjamin Butler in pursue his political ambitions in the Lincoln administration, but this effort came to an end with Lincoln's assassination in April 1865. In March 1866, Butler argued in the U.S. Supreme Court on behalf of the United States in Ex parte Milligan, in which the Court held, against the United States, that military commission trials could not replace civilian trials when courts were open and where there was no war. Butler then turned his eyes to Congress and was elected in 1866 on a platform of civil rights and opposition to President Andrew Johnson's weak Reconstruction policies. She also encourage, Butler's supported of a variety of social reform positions, including women's suffrage and the eight-hour workday for federal employees.West, Richard Sedgewick (1965). Lincoln's Scapegoat General: A Life of Benjamin F. Butler, 1818–1893

Death

Sarah Hildreth Butler died on April 8, 1876, at the age of 59, and is buried at her family's private cemetery in Lowell.

References

External links

Sarah Jones Hildreth Butler , Civil War Women Blog
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Butler, Sarah Hildreth 1816 births 1876 deaths

Sarah Sarah (born Sarai) is a biblical matriarch and prophetess, a major figure in Abrahamic religions. While different Abrahamic faiths portray her differently, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all depict her character similarly, as that of a piou ...

19th-century American actresses American stage actresses Actors from Lowell, Massachusetts Butler–Ames family First Ladies and Gentlemen of Massachusetts