Salter trained for the priesthood at Cuddesdon College and was ordained Deacon at Cuddesdon Church on 27 June 1888.Jackson’s Oxford Journal, 2 June 1888, p. 5. He then served as Curate at Sandhurst, and was ordained Priest at Oxford in 1889.The Times, 19 June 1889, p. 6 In 1891, he left that office to be vice-principal of Leeds Clergy School. He was then vicar of Mattingley (1893–99) and Shirburn, Oxfordshire (1899–1909). During his incumbency of the latter parish he began to gather material for its history, which eventually led to him editing documents for publication by the Oxford Historical Society (OHS). He devoted the rest of his life to studying the history of Oxford, the city's university and the county; he edited 34 volumes for the OHS alone, but also wrote historical works. As The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography notes, "Salter came to be recognised as the leading authority on Oxford history since Anthony Wood".
