Mingo County, West Virginia Biography of RUSSELL A. SALTON, M. D. This biography was submitted by Valerie Crook, E-mail address: ********************************************** ***The submitter does not have a connection*** ********to the subject of this sketch.******** ********************************************** This file may be freely copied by individuals and non-profit organizations for their private use. All other rights reserved. Any other use, including publication, storage in a retrieval system, or transmission by electronic, mechanical, or other means requires the written approval of the file's author. This file is part of the WVGenWeb Archives. If you arrived here inside a frame or from a link from somewhere else, our front door is at http://www.usgwarchives.net/wv/wvfiles.htm The History of West Virginia, Old and New Published 1923, The American Historical Society, Inc., Chicago and New York, Volume II, pg. 590-591 Mingo RUSSELL A. SALTON, M. D., who is engaged in the gen- eral practice of his profession at Williamson, Mingo County, has demonstrated in ability and effective service the con- sistency of his choice of profession. The doctor was born at Walton, New York, August 12, 1887, a son of Robert E. and Margaret (Henderson) Salton, the former of whom was born in the State of New York and the latter in North Carolina. Robert E. Salton gained much of success in the raising of and dealing in live stock, especially horses, and became a leading representative of these lines of enterprise in his section of the old Empire State. He served a num- ber of years as county superintendent of roads. The public schools of his native place afforded to Dr. Salton his preliminary education, and after his graduation from high school in 1905 he was for one year a student in the University of Syracuse, New York. During the ensu- ing year he was employed, and he then began preparing himself for his chosen profession. In 1911 he was gradu- ated from the Baltimore Medical College, Baltimore, Mary- land, and after thus receiving his degree of Doctor of Medi- cine he became house surgeon in the West Virginia State Hospital at Welch, McDowell County, this being Miners Hospital No. 1. After an effective service of eighteen months at this institution Dr. Salton established his resi- dence at Williamson, judicial center of Mingo County, and here he has developed a successful and representative gen- eral practice, the while he has gained specially high repu- tation as a skilled surgeon. His private practice was inter- rupted when in June, 1917, shortly after the nation became involved in the World war, he became a member of the Medical Reserve Corps of the United States Army. On the 4th of January, 1918, Dr. Salton was called into active serv- ice and assigned to duty at the base hospital at Camp Stu- art, Newport News, Virginia, where he remained, with the rank of first lieutenant, until the 18th of the following Oc- tober, when he was assigned to duty with the Forty-eighth Infantry, Twentieth Division, at Camp Sevier, Greenville, South Carolina. His command had orders to sail for France, but the outbreak of the great epidemic of influ- enza caused the entire command to be quarantined, and be- fore this quarantine was lifted the armistice was signed and the war came to a close. Dr. Salton remained at Camp Sevier until January 23, 1919, when he received his hon- orable discharge. He was commissioned captain in the Med- ical Reserve Corps, and is still an active member of this or- ganization. Soon after his return to Williamson Dr. Salton initiated the vigorous and well. ordered campaign that resulted in the establishing of the Williamson Hospital, and though he encountered many obstacles and difficulties he has the satisfaction of knowing that the county seat of Mingo County can now claim one of the best equipped and most effectively conducted hospitals in this section of the state, an institution whose benignant service stands to his en- during credit and honor. In the conducting of the hospi- tal he has as his able and valued coadjutor Doctor Hatfield, who is engaged in practice in the City of Huntington. Doe- tor Salton is a member of the Mingo County Medical Soci- ety, West Virginia State Medical Society and the American Medical Association. He is affiliated with the American Legion, is a Knight Templar Mason and affiliated also with the Mystic Shrine, and he holds membership in the Presbyterian Church in his home city. The doctor is a wide-awake and progressive citizen, and is essentially one of the leading physicians and surgeons of Mingo County. On both the paternal and maternal sides the ancestry of Doc- tor Salton traces back to staunch Scotch origin. His pa- ternal great-grandfather came from Scotland in 1837, with wife and seven children, and established his residence in the State of New York. On the maternal side the doctor is a scion of the Henderson and McDonald families, which were early established in North Carolina. In his native town of Walton, New York, in the year 1912, Doctor Salton wedded Miss Ella Robertson, daugh- ter of Alfred and Mary (King) Robertson, both natives of the State of New York, whence they eventually removed to California, where Mr. Robertson engaged in ranch en- terprise. Doctor and Mrs. Salton became the parents of three children: Virginia, Robert (deceased), and Russell A., Jr.