Sarah Pierce

During the Revolutionary War, John had a distinguished record, rising to become the Assistant Paymaster of the Continental Army, and personal friend of General George Washington.

Returning to Litchfield, Sarah Pierce brought a few students with her from New York and established her school in order to help support her family.

Also, she believed that women should be educated enough to provide their own opinions, in the confines of their own home, to their husbands to help men control their new republican duties that would benefit the republic rather than themselves.

Sarah believed the most important roles a woman had in her life was to be a wife and a mother and to do so needed to be educated as the new republic would provide new and growing responsibilities for the women in it.

She preached this to her students and pushed them to lead lives of moral, intellectual, and spiritual growth because of the importance of their role in the survival of society.

[2] Unlike most women heading female academies, Pierce was lacking in any talent for art, needlework, music and French, hiring assistant teachers for those subjects.

[8] To help herself educate her students on these subjects she sent her nephew, John Pierce Brace, to Williams College to receive training in teaching the “higher branches” of mathematics and science.

He joined the school as her assistant in 1814, teaching till 1832 when he left to take over his former student Catharine Beecher's Hartford Female Academy.

The Litchfield Enquirer newspaper published an obituary on January 22, 1852 which read: "We regret the necessity which compels us to announce the departure from this life of one who has perhaps been more extensively known for a period of sixty years than any other lady in New England.

Miss Pierce retired from the institution several years ago and has since lived in quiet enjoyment of an ample fortune, universally respected for her constant piety, systematic benevolence and cheerful hospitality."