Representative Samuel Wilds Trotti

Samuel Wilds Trotti (July 18, 1810 – June 24, 1856) was a United States Representative from South Carolina and a state legislator during the antebellum period. Born in Barnwell, Barnwell District, South Carolina, he spent his early years in that rural, plantation-centered region of the state. He attended the local common schools, receiving the basic classical and preparatory education typical for young men of his background in the early nineteenth century.

Trotti pursued higher education at South Carolina College in Columbia, the principal institution of higher learning in the state and the forerunner of the University of South Carolina. He graduated there in 1832. After completing his collegiate studies, he read law, following the customary apprenticeship model of legal training of the era, and was admitted to the bar. He commenced the practice of law in South Carolina. In addition to his legal work, he served in the Seminole War, participating in the military campaigns waged by the United States in Florida during the 1830s, which involved many volunteer and militia units from Southern states.

Building on his legal and military experience, Trotti entered public life in South Carolina. He was elected to the South Carolina House of Representatives, serving his first term from 1840 to 1841. His legislative service placed him within the state’s Democratic political establishment at a time when South Carolina politics were dominated by issues of states’ rights, slavery, and the evolving sectional tensions within the Union. He combined his legislative responsibilities with the continued practice of law.

Trotti advanced to national office when he was elected as a Democrat to the Twenty-seventh Congress to fill the vacancy caused by the resignation of Representative Sampson H. Butler. He took his seat in the U.S. House of Representatives on December 17, 1842, and served until March 3, 1843. His brief tenure in Congress occurred during a period marked by debates over economic policy, including the national bank and tariff questions, as well as ongoing disputes over federal authority and the expansion of slavery, though the record of his specific contributions in Congress is limited.

After the conclusion of his service in the House of Representatives, Trotti returned to South Carolina and resumed the practice of law. He remained active in state politics and was again elected to the South Carolina House of Representatives, serving a second period in that body from 1852 to 1855. During these later legislative years, he participated in state governance in the tense decade leading up to the Civil War, when South Carolina leaders increasingly discussed the possibility of secession.

In his later life, Trotti continued his legal career and public service until his health and circumstances brought his work to a close. He died in Buckhead, Fairfield District (now Fairfield County), South Carolina, on June 24, 1856. His career reflected the trajectory of many Southern Democratic politicians of his generation, moving from local education and militia service to the bar, the state legislature, and a brief term in the national Congress before returning to state and local affairs.