Among the many names endeared to the friends of missions, is that of Sarah L. Smith, a native of Norwich, Connecticut. Her maiden name was Huntington. She was born in 1802; made a profession of religion in youth; became the wife of the Rev. Eli Smith in July, 1833; embarked with him for Palestine the September following; and died at Boojah, near Smyrna, the last day of September, 1836.

Her work as a foreign missionary was quickly finished. She labored longer as a home missionary among the Moheagans, who live in the neighborhood of Norwich, and there displayed most conspicuously the moral heroism of her nature. In conjunction with Sarah Breed, she commenced her philanthropic operations in the year 1827. "The first object that drew them from the sphere of their own church, was the project of opening a Sabbath school for the poor Indian children of Moheagan. Satisfied that this was a work which Heaven would approve, they marked out their plans, and pursued them with untiring energy. Boldly they went forth, and, guided by the rising smoke or sounding axe, visited the Moheagans from field to field, and from hut to hut, till they had thoroughly informed themselves of their numbers, condition, and prospects. The opposition they encountered, the ridicule and opprobrium showered upon them from some quarters, the sullenness of the natives, the bluster of the white tenants, the brush wood and dry branches thrown across their pathway, could not discourage them. They saw no 'lions in the way,' while mercy, with pleading looks, beckoned them forward."

The Moheagans then numbered a little more than one hundred, only one of whom was a professor of religion. She was ninety-seven years of age. In her hut the first prayer meeting and the first Sabbath school gathered by these young ladies, were held.

Miss Breed soon removed from that part of the country, and Miss Huntington continued her labors for awhile alone. She was at that time very active in securing the formation of a society and the circulation of a subscription, having for their object the erection of a chapel. She found, ere long, a faithful co-worker in Miss Elizabeth Raymond. They taught a school in conjunction, and aside from their duties as teachers, were, at times, "advisers, counsellors, lawgivers, milliners, mantuamakers, tailoresses and almoners."[84]"The school was kept in a house on Fort Hill, leased to a respectable farmer in whose family the young teachers boarded by alternate weeks, each going to the scene of labor every other Sabbath morning and remaining till the evening of the succeeding Sabbath, so that both were present in the Sabbath school, which was twice as large as the other. A single incident will serve to show the dauntless resolution which Miss Huntington carried into her pursuits. Just at the expiration of one of her terms of service during the winter, a heavy and tempestuous fall of snow blocked up the roads with such high drifts, that a friend who had been accustomed to go for her and convey her home in bad weather, and had started for this purpose in his sleigh, turned back, discouraged. No path had been broken, and the undertaking was so hazardous that he conceived no female would venture forth at such a time. He therefore called at her father's house to say that he should delay going for her till the morrow. What was his surprise to be met at the door by the young lady herself, who had reached home just before, having walked the whole distance on the hard crust of snow, alone, and some of the way over banks of snow that entirely obliterated the walls and fences by the roadside."

While at Moheagan, Miss Huntington corresponded with the Hon. Lewis Cass, then Secretary of War, and secured his influence and the aid of that department. In 1832, a grant of nine hundred dollars was made from the fund devoted to the Indian department, five hundred being appropriated towards the erection of missionary buildings and four for the support of a teacher. Before leaving the Moheagan, for a wider field, this devoted and heroic missionary had the happiness of seeing a chapel, parsonage and school house, standing on "the sequestered land"[85] of her forest friends, and had thus partially repaid the debt of social and moral obligation to a tribe who fed the first and famishing settlers in Connecticut, and strove to protect them against the tomahawk of inimical tribes, and whose whoop was friendly to freedom when British aggressors were overriding American rights.