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Sarah Pugh (October 6, 1800 – August 1, 1884) was an American Quaker schoolteacher and abolitionist. She was an active member of abolitionist organizations in Pennsylvania including the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society and the Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society (a branch of the American Anti-Slavery Society). She was a member of the delegation excluded from the World Anti-Slavery Convention in 1840 (widely regarded as the predecessor to the Seneca Falls Convention).

Early life and education
Sarah Pugh was born in Alexandria, Virginia to Jesse and Catharine Pugh. When she was three, after her father's death, her family moved to New Garden Township, Chester County, Pennsylvania to live with her grandfather Isaac Jackson. A few years later her family moved to Philadelphia where she lived for the rest of her life. Once in Philadelphia, her mother and aunt, Phebe Jackson, started working as seamstresses mostly making cloaks and dresses. She would return to New Garden each year in the summer to see her family. At twelve, she began attending the Westtown School and stayed there for two years.

Teaching


In 1821, she began teaching at Quaker school located in the Twelfth Street Meeting House, which also served as a Quaker meeting space. She taught there until the end of the summer term of 1828 when she resigned.

In 1829, she started a school with her friend Rachel Peirce on Walnut Street. In 1831, the school was moved to Cherry Street where it was on the second floor of another school run by Jacob Peirce.

Abolitionist
In 1835, George Thompson, an English abolitionist and politician, was in the midst of a speaking tour of the US. He stopped in Philadelphia to speak at a meeting of Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society. After listening to George Thompson's speech Sarah decided to join the society.

An important aspect of membership in the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society was not consuming any products made with slave labor, especially cotton and sugar. There was an article in the organization's constitution stating that members would abstain from buying and consuming products of slave labor.

In January 1837, she was chosen to be the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society's recording secretary. She would eventually become the society's president and serve in that position for most of the organization's thirty-seven year history. In 1841, she and Lucretia Mott, one of the founders of the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society, was elected to Pennsylvania Anti-Slavery Society's executive committee. She was also one of twenty-two delegates to represent Pennsylvania at the first Anti-Slavery Convention of American Women held in New York City in 1837 and was selected to be one of the convention's secretaries.