Sarah Anne Morewood was born in 1824.
Sarah Anne Morewood came to Pittfield in 1850 and bought broadhall, which is now the County Club of Pittsfield, in 1851. She inspired writers such as Nathaniel Hawthorne and Oliver Wedell Holmes but most of all she had a lasting influence on Pittsfield renowned author, Herman Melville.
In 1861, Sarah found a public purpose of her life by valiantly and willingly helping the Union cause of the Civil War.She led the local women’s help troops that streamed in and out of the town on training missions and recruitment drives and organized efforts to give medical supplies and food to the eserice men.
Sarah served refreshments, made flags and various keepsakes for the soldiers in regiments on the march and welcomed the soldiers home when they returned from the battlefront.
Many times Sarah hosted dances and parties at the Broadhall for the military officers. She played host, sparing no expense, to honor Pittsfield Colonel William F. Bartlett, Whose bravery in the face of intense fire had left him severely wounded.
She also gave generous and praiseworthy volunteer contributions to the 31st, 37th, and 49th Massachusetts Regiments and donated to the poor and deed, sick and wounded.
She died on October 16, 1863 at the age of almost forty from tuberculosis.
At her death, the Pittsfield Sun, where some of her poems were published in the 1850s and early 1860s, praised her as “a lady of superior literary accomplishments”.
Sarah Ann Morewood and Oliver Wendell Holmes were invited to contribute dedicatory poems from the new Pittsfield Cemetery. Saa now rests in the same Pittsfield Cemetery where she presented her “Ode”, which was played to music at the dedication ceremony on September 12, 1850.
Information provided by the Berkshire County Historical Society.