Sarah Laurie Borthwick Findlater

Sarah Laurie Borthwick Findlater was a Scottish writer and translator born in Edinburgh in 1823. She was the younger sister of Jane Laurie Borthwick, with whom she shared a sustained interest in German devotional poetry. Sarah married the Reverend Eric John Findlater, a minister of the Free Church of Scotland at Lochearnhead in Perthshire, and continued literary work alongside family and parish life.

The sisters became important mediators of German hymnody for English-speaking Protestants through Hymns from the Land of Luther, issued in successive series during the 1850s and early 1860s. Their work brought texts by German Lutheran and Pietist writers into British and North American hymnals at a time when interest in translated German hymnody was expanding. Sarah's translation of Spitta's O selig Haus appeared in the Third Series in 1858. The earliest form began with O happy house rather than the later, more familiar O happy home wording.

Sarah also translated other German devotional texts and wrote fiction and works for younger readers. Her contribution is sometimes confused with Jane's because the sisters collaborated closely and early editions did not always make individual responsibility obvious. Hymnological authorities, however, normally credit Sarah with the English version of O Happy Home.