Sallie was born into slavery in Skullyville, Choctaw Nation, within Indian Territory (present-day Oklahoma). Her younger years were spent in the Oak Lodge community.
Her father was Eastman Williams a Choctaw Indian and her mother was Amanda Perry.
Sallie was deeply immersed in her Choctaw culture and lifestyle and retained her mother tongue – Chahta Anumpa (Choctaw) throughout her life.
For many years in Skullyville and Sugar Loaf, she served as a midwife to women in the Choctaw Nation. She married Rev. Samuel Walton with whom she had two sons, and in later years moved to live with him and his family, in nearby Arkansas. In Arkansas, she became one of the church mothers of the old First Baptist Church in Fort Smith.
Her great-granddaughter, author Angela Walton-Raji, recalls the old “country ways” when Sallie would dip from a can of Garrett’s snuff from a small tin she kept nearby. She also pulled herbs and sassafras on her long walks and would prepare delicious meals including her “creamed” potatoes, and the popular wild onions and eggs. Another favorite was allowing her granddaughter to sip “kvpi” an aromatic sassafras tea gathered from bark.
She was known later in life as a master quilter, known to set up wooden “horses” in her living area, and quilt with other ladies, producing beautiful quilts that still are in use, today.
Sallie Walton and her family emerged from a humble life as an enslaved family to a place where her great-granddaughter now attends events on Capitol Hill as an advocate for Freedmen Descendants and has written four books to preserve history and culture of Freedmen families and communities.
Threads of Untold History