Caroline Sawyer Dewey, 67 of Tiverton, Rhode Island passed away on September 12th, 2026, in her home in Tiverton surrounded by her family. She was born June 26th, 1959, to the late Zella Thomas Dewey and Edward Dewey in Boston, Massachusetts.

She graduated from The Middlesex School in 1978 and received her undergraduate degree in early childhood education from Concordia University in Montreal, Canada in 1984. She later went on to earn her master's degree in education from Wheelock College. Caroline's passion for early childhood education became her vocation as she launched her life-long career as a teacher, spanning several schools including Friends Academy, Lincoln School, The Pennfield School, and the New Bedford school system. In the course of her time in education, she fostered and nurtured thousands of young children through the process of learning to read, to socialize and make friends, and to experience the joy and fascination of the wider world around them. To her students, she was always the beloved "Ms. D" who would care for and guide them through their young lives, setting so many on a path to success they might never have achieved without her.

Besides teaching, Caroline had many interests which she pursued with enthusiasm. The common theme of all her pursuits was to inhabit the world of joy and wonder that only children experience, and to share that joy with the ones she loved, especially her own children.

She was an avid gardener with quite a green thumb. She loved to grow her own veggies or buy them from her local farmers' markets so she could provide the freshest and healthiest food for her children. She was an excellent cook too, spending many joyful hours in her kitchen making popular dishes for her girls, like her famously delicious Cowgirl Stew. She had a life-long love for animals, wild and domestic, which she instilled in her children too. She loved them all - from Guinea pigs to the many family dogs and cats, and even a stray racoon she nurtured one summer in high school. She especially loved her dog Lucca, who was her constant companion and protector for the last years of her life (and who happily benefited from Caroline's expert cooking).

One need look no further than the walls in every room of her house, adorned with pictures of water scenes, to see that the ocean, the shore, and boats were an inspiration and a joy to her. She learned to sail as a young girl during family vacations at her grandparents' summer home on Buzzards Bay. As an adult living in Bristol RI, she garnered a reputation as an expert crewperson and helped steer many a friend to racing victory. As a mom, she regularly took her girls out on kayaks in the Sapowet estuary or other rivers and bays where they could experience the magical sights, sounds, and smells of the marine plants and animals that live there.

Caroline's life was tragically cut short by a long and arduous fight with breast cancer. First diagnosed in 2013 and returning in 2021, she endured endless surgeries, radiation and chemotherapy with courage.

Caroline is survived by her children Charlotte and Mirelle Hadley, her sister Mary Lou Fitzgerald and Kevin Fitzgerald of Vermont, and brother Thomas Dewey and Teresa Quan of California.

No memorial service is planned at this time, and in lieu of flowers, donations may be made to: Amicable Church, https://amicablechurch.org, 3736 Main Rd, Tiverton, RI 02878 or the Audubon Society of Rhode Island, https://asri.org 1401 Hope Street, Bristol, RI 02809