Editor of the Daily News:

     In response to your Oct. 2 ar-
ticle on Martha McGee Bell's
role in the Revolution and of
her having been the only North
Carolina Revolutionary heroine
singled out in the current Na-
tional Geographic Magazine's
article entitled "Patriots in Pet-
ticoats", I wish to say that it is
disappointing that other brave
women were overlooked. There
was Elizabeth, the wife of Sion
Harrington of Pittsboro who
with her infant in arms rode
horseback to Elizabethtown 80
miles down the Cape Fear to
plead successfully for the re-
lease of her husband (Sion was
the great-grandfather of Charles
Duncan McIver, founder and
president of what is now U.N.C.
at Greensboro).

     In Bladen County, where I
was born, there is a historical
marker to Harmony Hall, home
of Col. James Richardson,
which tells of his wife's over-
hearing the plans of Gen. Corn-
wallis, quartered in her home,
and dispatching a slave with the
information to her husband with
Greene's army in South
Carolina--thus aiding in the de-
feat of the British and eventual-
ly the retreat of Cornwallis.

     In the same county another
patriot named Sally Saltar (sic.)
crossed the Cape Fear River un-
der the guise of an egg peddler
and spied out the strength and
position of the Tories which en-
abled the small forces of Colo-
nels Robeson and Brown to
overwhelm and put to flight the
much larger army of the Tories;
thereby breaking Tory power on
the Cape Fear and returning
Elizabethtown, the county seat,
to the Whigs.

     Sally Salter was born Sarah
Lloyd, sister of David Lloyd,
one of the early settlers in the
county. Her husband, William
Salter, was in the General As-
embly of 1774-75 and a member
of the First Provincial Congress
which met at New Bern Aug.
24-27, 1774. It is recognized as
the first such action in defiance
of British authority in the colonies.

     In 1775 William was appoint-
ted (sic.) to the Safety Committee to
the Wilmington District. Gary
E. Tradwick accounted for Sally
Salter's heroism in an article
published in The State Magazine
of Oct. 14, 1969. Lawrence Scott
Barringer, founder and former
president of the Barringer Hotel
Chain, was a Salter descendent
and he describes the part played
by Sally Salter in the Battle of
Elizabethtown, however he was
wrong in thinking that William
Salter took part in that battle.
See "Family Facts for Future
Generations" in Charlotte Li-
brary.

     James Iver McKay, member
of Congress and Chairman of
the Ways and Means Committee
from 1843 to 1849, was a grand-
son of Sally Salter. He left a his-
tory of the Salter and McKay
families, which record now rests
in the State Archives at Raleigh.
Added to this record is the story
of Sally Salter as was handed
down in the family. On the
Bladen County Court House
Square a monument was erect-
ed to the memory of this brave
lady by descendents and mem-
bers of the Elizabethtown Chap-
ter of the Daughters of The
American Revolutions. (sic.)
         LIONEL MELVIN
Pleasant Garden.