A Look Back at Life 150 Years Ago

Have you ever wondered about who your ancestors were and what their lives were like? For my Beyond the Grave class, my assignment was to research one of my ancestors and write about his or her life. I chose my great-great-great-grandmother, Sallie Robinson from my mom's side of the family. For this blog post, I will be getting information from my grandma, ancestry.com, and a Lancaster newspaper article that was written about Sallie Robinson in 1946. 

Sallie Robinson with one of her sons, John Robinson

Sallie Robinson, known as "Granny" or "Granny Robinson" to most, had a fascinating life. She was born in 1852 and died in1950 at 98 years old. Living to 98 years old was a huge deal back then. The life expectancy for females born in the 1850s was 40 years old and for males 38 years old, according to Infoplease.

Sallie was born in Kershaw, South Carolina and according to the newspaper article written about her, she moved to Lancaster, South Carolina so her husband could work in the Lancaster Cotton Mill. The article says that "Lancaster wasn't anything but a village then, no electric lights, no sewerage, no waterworks, and no paved streets."

Sallie gave birth to eight kids, however, one died at childbirth. She also adopted her niece a little later. The newspaper article also mentions that Sallie said that she used to walk 7 miles to church and take three children.

The picture of Sallie from the Lancaster News article

My grandma described Sallie (her great-grandma) as "tiny, fiery, and stubborn, but she loved to help people." She also said that Sallie was like a doctor and she could cure people of many different illnesses. Because there weren't many doctors back then, people went to Sallie's house and she could heal them by "talking things away" as my grandma described it. She would read Bible verses out loud and use natural herbs and somehow cure people of diseases or even minor things like warts. "Sometimes her living room would be filled with people like a waiting room in a doctor's office," my grandma said. She also said that Sallie helped deliver babies too.

The Lancaster newspaper wrote about Sallie in 1946, meaning she was 94 at the time. Someone that was her age was not very common and they wrote a lot about things she had seen happen throughout her life.

In the article, it says that Sallie said she remembered very distinctly the first bicycle she ever saw. She also talks about being scared to ride in automobiles when they first came out and when she is asked if she would ever ride in an airplane she said no.

Sallie also remembered the Civil War, which the article referred to as the Confederate War. Sallie said, "I well remember when the Yankees came into the state during the war. They camped near my home and they made my mother cook all night long."

The newspaper article ends by saying, "Mrs. Robinson, who is probably one of the oldest people in the state now, is the most interesting conversationalist."

Family tree showing how I am related to Sallie Robinson

Sallie died from pneumonia and is buried in the Buffalo Baptist Church Cemetery in Kershaw County, South Carolina. The type of grave marker she has is a lawn marker. Picture from Ancestry.com

Behind the scenes of this post