Her forefather, Miles Cary of Bristol, England, first came to America in the mid-17th century and established himself as a Virginian nobleman.

Colonel Wilson Cary, Sally's father and a member of the House of Burgesses, inherited one of Virginia's largest fortunes and the family estate, Ceelys on the James.

Although she had many suitors, George William Fairfax eventually won Sally's favor, and in records found by Wilson Miles Cary, a writer and family historian, their marriage was announced in The Virginia Gazette in December 1748.

Fairfax family members generally held the reins of social and political power in Virginia.

[2] While serving in the Forbes campaign in September 1758, George Washington wrote a famous letter to Sally, telling her that "Tis true, I profess myself a Votary to Love…I feel the force of her amiable beauties in the recollection of a thousand tender passages that I wish to obliterate, till I am bid to revive them – but experience alas!