Promoted to Glory: Lt. Colonel Bette Salmon

Mrs. Lt. Colonel Bette Salmon was Promoted to Glory Oct. 9, 2020, from DeSoto, Texas. The funeral service was held Oct. 15 at the Camp Hoblitzelle Chapel in Midlothian, Texas. Colonel Kenneth O. Johnson, Jr. brought the message.

Bette Clara Williams was born to William and Sarah Williams in Glamorgan, South Wales, July 23, 1924. She entered Salvation Army officer training from Greensboro, North Carolina, in 1942. She was commissioned in May 1943 as a member of the Valiant Session and appointed to assist in Alexandria, Virginia. Subsequent appointments took her to Wilson, North Carolina; Hattiesburg, Mississippi; New Orleans (No. 1) and Shreveport, Louisiana, and Galveston, Dallas (DHQ), Amarillo, Harlingen and San Antonio, Texas.

At a church Christmas dinner, she met a young man who had recently completed service in the U.S. military, and in November 1947 she married Orville Salmon in Rockwell, Texas. Their first appointment together was in Littlefield, Texas, and they served in the Texas Division for the next 19 years. They went on to serve on divisional staffs in Alabama-Louisiana-Mississippi and North-South Carolina. In 1973, they were appointed as divisional leaders in the Oklahoma-Arkansas Division, and they later commanded the NSC and ALM divisions. In 1985, the Salmons were appointed to Southern Territorial Headquarters, where she served as women's auxiliary secretary and later as territorial League of Mercy secretary and Lt. Colonel Orville was territorial program secretary. The Salmons led six educational tours of the Holy Land before they entered honored retirement Oct. 31, 1991.

They were the parents of six children: Margaret Jane, Samuel John, Daniel James, Bette Jo, Debra Dorene and Paula Jean.

Lt. Colonel Bette was preceded in death by daughter Margaret Jane, sons Daniel James and Samuel John and grandson Matthew Aaron Mockabee. She will be greatly missed by her loving husband, Orville, and daughters Major Bette Jo (Michael) McDonald, Lt. Colonel Debra (Bill) Mockabee and Colonel Paula (Ken) Johnson and her six grandchildren and 12 great-grandchildren.