Frederick Adolphus Sawyer (December 12, 1822 – July 31, 1891) was a United States senator from South Carolina. Born in Bolton, Massachusetts, he attended the public schools, graduated from Harvard University in 1844, taught school in New England from 1844–59, and took charge of the State normal school at Charleston, South Carolina in 1859. He returned to the North during the Civil War, and returned to Charleston in February 1865 where he was active in advancing Reconstruction measures. On the night of April 14, 1865, Sawyer was at Ford's Theater in Washington D.C. and witnessed the assassination of President Lincoln. He was appointed collector of internal revenue in the second South Carolina district in 1865, and upon the readmission of the State of South Carolina to representation, Sawyer