Staggs Family History

My ancestors in the United States

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    Sarah Hueston (1794-1872)

    BIRTH: Nov 1794, Ireland
    DEATH: 24 Sep 1872, Antioch, Lake, Illinois, USA
    FATHER: Unknown
    MOTHER: Unknown
    SPOUSE: Frederick Sammons (1789–1848)

    Sarah Hueston was born in November 1794 in Ireland. She married Frederick Sammons on April 5, 1814, in Salina, New York. They had seven children in 20 years. She died on September 24, 1872, in Antioch, Illinois, having lived a long life of 77 years, and was buried in Chicago, Illinois.

    The Life of Sarah Hueston

    Sarah Hueston began her life in November 1794, somewhere in Ireland, at a time when the island was marked by political unrest, agrarian hardship, and waves of emigration. Her parents’ names are lost to history, but the circumstances of her birth era suggest a childhood shaped by uncertainty — one that likely propelled her across the Atlantic as a young woman seeking stability, opportunity, or simply survival.

    By the early 1810s, Sarah had reached the United States, part of the steady Irish migration that predated the Great Famine by decades. She settled in New York, where she met Frederick Sammons (1789–1848), a man from a long‑established New York family with Dutch and English roots. Their marriage joined two very different backgrounds: Frederick, the son of generations rooted in the Mohawk and Hudson Valleys; Sarah, the newcomer whose past was carried only in memory.

    A Young Family in Onondaga County

    The earliest clear record of Sarah appears in the 1820 U.S. Federal Census, which places her in Salina, Onondaga County, New York, living with Frederick and their growing household. By then she was already the mother of several children, and over the next two decades she would bring seven into the world: Edmund, Nancy, John, Joseph, Benjamin, Maria, and Laura.

    The Sammons family lived in a region undergoing rapid transformation. The Erie Canal, completed in 1825, turned Onondaga County into a bustling corridor of trade and migration. Salt works, mills, and small manufactories dotted the landscape. Sarah’s daily life would have been shaped by this environment — a mix of rural labor, canal‑town commerce, and the constant movement of people.

    By 1840, the family appears again in census records, this time in Onondaga Township, still in Onondaga County. Their household was large, with children ranging from young adults to the very young. Sarah, now in her mid‑forties, had spent two decades raising a family in a region that was both familiar and constantly changing.

    Loss and Upheaval

    Sometime around 1848, Sarah’s life changed dramatically. Frederick died — the exact circumstances unrecorded — leaving her a widow in her early fifties with several children still at home. Widows in mid‑19th‑century America often relied on adult children for support, and Sarah was no exception.

    Over the next decade, her family dispersed westward, following the same migration currents that carried thousands from New York into the Midwest. Chicago, in particular, was booming — a city of opportunity, industry, and reinvention.

    A New Life in Chicago

    By 1860, Sarah had resettled in Chicago, Cook County, Illinois, living in Ward 5 in the household of her daughter Laura and son‑in‑law Peter Taylor. The census lists two additional individuals in the home, likely extended family or boarders — a common arrangement in a rapidly growing city where housing was scarce and expensive.

    Chicago in 1860 was a place of noise, construction, and ambition. Railroads converged there; immigrants poured in; fortunes were made and lost. For Sarah, it must have been a startling contrast to the rural landscapes of Onondaga County. Yet she adapted, as immigrant women so often did, finding her place within her children’s households and the rhythms of urban life.

    The 1870 census places her again with Laura and Peter Taylor, now in Chicago’s Ward 10, along with five others in the household.

    Final Years and Resting Place

    On 24 September 1872, Sarah Hueston died in Antioch, Lake County, Illinois, a rural community north of Chicago. Whether she had moved there for care, to live with family, or simply to escape the city’s post‑fire chaos is not recorded. What is certain is that her body was brought back to Chicago for burial.

    She rests in Rosehill Cemetery, one of the city’s grand Victorian burial grounds — a place of winding paths, ornate monuments, and the graves of many early Chicago families. Her burial there reflects her children’s established presence in the city and their desire to honor her with a dignified resting place.

    Legacy of Sarah Hueston

    Though the records of her early life are sparse, Sarah’s story emerges clearly through the traces she left in her children’s lives and the places she lived. Her life mirrors the experience of countless immigrant women whose names appear only in census lines, yet whose labor and resilience shaped the generations that followed. In the Sammons family history, Sarah stands as a bridge — from Ireland to New York, from the canal era to the rise of Chicago, from the old world to the new.

    Parents

    FATHER: Unknown
    MOTHER: Unknown

    Married

    Frederick Sammons (1789–1848) in Geddes, New York

    Children

    • Edmund Sammons (1814–1885) married Harriett C Connor (1824–1872)
    • Nancy A Sammons (1815–1877) married William Stebbins Winchell (1814–?)
    • John Sammons (1817–1876) married Jane Wheaton (1822–1896)
    • Joseph Huston Sammons (1822–1893) married 1st Alma Wright, 2nd Clara C. Davis, 3rd Betsy S. Eaton
    • Benjamin J Sammons (1828–1903) married Ann Stephens (1827-1848)
    • Maria Louise Sammons (1832–1891) married Albert C Ellithorpe (1834–1907)
    • Laura Sammons (1834–1887) married Peter Taylor (1826–1879)

    Documents

    • Death records
    • Marriage records
    • Census Records
      • 1820 United States Federal Census > New York > Onondaga > Salina
        • Male age brackets present
          • 1 male 50–59 → Frederick
          • 2 males 20–29 → Edmund + John
          • 1 male 15–19 → Joseph
          • 1 male 10–14 → Benjamin
        • Female age brackets present
          • 1 female 40–49 → Sarah
          • 1 female 20–29 → Nancy
          • 2 females 5–9 → Maria + Laura
      • 1840 United States Federal Census > New York > Onondaga > Onondaga
        • Male age brackets present
          • 1 male 50–59 → Frederick
          • 2 males 20–29 → Edmund + John
          • 1 male 15–19 → Joseph
          • 1 male 10–14 → Benjamin
        • Female age brackets present
          • 1 female 40–49 → Sarah
          • 1 female 20–29 → Nancy
          • 2 females 5–9 → Maria + Laura
      • 1860 United States Federal Census > Illinois > Cook > Chicago Ward 5 > Sarah Simons (age 65, birthplace: Ireland), living with daughter Laura Taylor, sun-in-law Peter Taylor and two others.
      • 1870 United States Federal Census > Illinois > Cook > Chicago Ward 10 > Sarah Samons (age 75, birthplace: Ireland), living with daughter Laura Taylor, sun-in-law Peter Taylor and five others.

    Relation of Sarah Hueston to Steven Barry Staggs: 3rd great-grandmother

    Page last updated May 1, 2026

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