Copyright Cheri Mello. All rights reserved.

*** The OFFICIAL Sallie Damron Bio***

I am the 3G granddaughter of Sallie Damron. I have spent many years working on her and her husband, John Shultz Damron.

Sallie was probably born about June 1, 1828 in IN to Nathaniel Daugherty and Nancy Sim(p)kins. On the 1900 census, her birth is stated as June 1828 and the death certificate gives the date as the first, therefore the date of birth is a creation of the two documents.

Sallie Daugherty married John Shultz Damron (son of John Damron, Jr. and Sarah Elizabeth Shultz) on June 6, 1847 by Squire Wilson, in Henderson Co, TX. (from the handwritten notes of Mrs. Fredericka L. (Bedford) Blackburn, granddaughter of John Shultz, written c. 1950s; originals in the possession of Nancy J. Kelly, copies in my possession). They became the parents of 10 children, 8 of which survived to adulthood.

The following story was written by John's granddaughter, Mrs. Fredericka L. (Bedford) Blackburn in the 1950s and edited by Helen Foster Snow for the book, the "Dameron-Damron Genealogy: "John S. Damron and his wife Sally, lost all the had (due to the Civil War). Together with their 7 surviving children left Trinidad, Kaufman Co, TX for Sonora, Mexico. In San Antonio, Texas, they met up with a wagon train headed by Mr. Copeland, which was bound for California. After spending one night in San Antonio, they changed their minds and decided to join Mr. Copeland's wagon train. They sold their oxen and bought four mules and a wagon and started out, coming over the route known as the Butterfield Stage Route. They left with $300, lost many possessions in the Pegos River, including the drum played by Capt. John Damron in the Revolutionary War. On December 17, 1865, after being nine months on the road, they arrived in San Bernardino, CA. Annie Stockton, John Shultz Damron's sister, met them about 20 miles out. Later John and Sally moved to Dr. Barton's place on Cottonwood Road, buying a pig and putting in a crop. Later they took up a claim at Temescal, Riverside Co. Sally and the daughters knit socks for the miners for $1 per pair."

By 1880, John and Sallie moved their family to Santa Ana, in the southern area of Los Angeles County. Later this area broke off to form Orange County. Sallie remained in Santa Ana until the last couple of years of her life, when she moved to Los Angeles, with her daughter Mrs. Laura Louise "Lou" Bedford. It was here that Sallie died of carcinoma of the eye. She is interred beside her husband.

NOTE: Sallie signed her name as Sallie, so I suppose that was her preferred spelling.