After his education he entered a banking house as a clerk, and in 1808 was taken into partnership, continuing as a member of the firm of Prime, Ward & King until his death.

He was a patron of many charities and the giver of large sums in aid of Protestant Episcopal Churches and colleges in the west.

[1] In October 1812, he married Julia Rush Cutler, and, through her mother, a grandniece of Francis Marion.

After Emily's death, Sam married again and had two more children with his second wife, Medora Grymes, who both died in the 1860s.

Julia was likewise an aunt of novelist Francis Marion Crawford.