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Notable Family Members
Notable Phelps Anson Green Phelps, Merchant and philanthropist Austin Phelps, Congregational clergyman, theologian and author Charles Edward Phelps, Congressman, Judge, Author Delos Porter Phelps, Lawyer and U.S. Assistant Treasurer Edward John Phelps, Lawyer, educator Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward Dr. Francis Phelps, Representative and Senator George M. Phelps, Master telegraph instrument maker and inventor Dr. Guy Rowland Phelps, Founder, Connecticut Mutual Life Insurance John Phelps, Clerk of the Court at the trial of King Charles I Judge James Phelps, Judge and Congressman Judge John Jay Phelps Judge, merchant, and entrepreneur. Judge John Phelps, Constitutional Convention Signatory from Connecticut John Wolcott Phelps, Brigadier General, United States Volunteers Mary Ann Phelps Rich, Latter-day Saints Pioneer Mary Phelps Jacob, Inventor of the Brassiere Noah Phelps, A Patriot of 1776 and Revolutionary War Spy Oliver Phelps Merchant, Revolutionary War veteran, Representative, Senator land promoter Rev. Philip Phelps First President, Western Theological Seminary Richard Phelps, Bell-founder for Churches Throughout England John Smith Phelps Lawyer, Repesentative, Governor Samuel Shethar Phelps, Jurist, Congressman, and Senator Stephen Sumner Phelps, Illinois Pioneer and Origin of the Hawk Eye State Name Thomas Stowell Phelps, Rear Admiral and Civil War Veteran William Walter Phelps, Congressman, Ambassador, and Judge William Wines Phelps, Judge, Latter-day Saint, Publisher and Writer William Lyon Phelps, American educator, author and critic
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Samuel Shethar Phelps

Jurist, Congressman, and Senator

Samuel S. Phelps
Samuel Shethar Phelps

Samuel Shethar Phelps (13 May 1793 – 25 March 1855) was a United States Senator from Vermont and a member of the Whig Party. He was the son of American lawyer and diplomat Edward John Phelps.

Phelps was born in Litchfield, Connecticut. He studied at Yale University and served as a military paymaster during the War of 1812. He then settled in Middlebury, Vermont and became a lawyer, soon entering politics. He served in the Vermont State House from 1821 to 1832, as a judge on the Vermont Supreme Court from 1832 to 1838, and as a member of the Vermont Senate from 1838 to 1839.

In 1839 he was elected as a Whig to a seat in the U.S. Senate from Vermont and served there until 1851. During that time(1) he was chairman, Committee on the Militia (Twenty-seventh Congress), Committee on Revolutionary Claims (Twenty-seventh Congress), Committee on Pensions (Twenty-seventy Congress), Committee on Patents and the Patent Office (Twenty-eighth Congress), Committee on Territories (Twenty-eighth Congress).

He returned to the United States Senate in 1853, having been appointed to fill the unexpired term of Senator William Upham, who had died. However, this was disputed by some, and in 1854 he was forced to resign when a senate committee ruled that he was not entitled to the seat. He died the following year in Middlebury, Addison County, Vt., on March 25, 1855; interment in West Cemetery.

^ 1 Biographical Guide to the United States Congress (accessed June 18, 2008)