Dr. Walter Sabiston

Dr. Walter Sabiston passed away at home in Newport, North Carolina, on July 7, 2024. Born in Kinston, North Carolina in 1941, he was the son of Dr. Frank Sabiston and Ethel Roberts Sabiston. He graduated from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the University of Alabama Medical School. After a tour of duty in Vietnam, he returned to Alabama where he received his degree in otorhinolaryngology and remained there for several years as a teaching instructor to incoming residents.

In 1975 he returned to Kinston, North Carolina where he started Kinston Head and Neck Physicians and practiced medicine there for the next thirty-five years. He was also an active leader in the community helping to develop the city’s downtown area, the farmers market, and other civic organizations and charities.

Upon retiring in 2020 he moved to Newport, NC where he has lived on his ancestral farmland developed in the early 1700s by his great-grandfather John Roberts. He continued his practice of medicine by working at the Broad Street Clinic in Morehead City, NC, a charity clinic that opens its doors to those without insurance or financial means.

He is survived by his wife Joan Rush Sabiston; his children Bob Sabiston of Austin, Texas; Rush Sabiston Frank of Raleigh, NC; William Sabiston of Los Angeles, California; and Susan Sabiston of New York; and his brother Frank of Greenville, NC. He is known lovingly as “Doc” to his four beautiful grandchildren: Slater and Maddox Frank, Cylah Spondike, and Joni Dee Sabiston.

He was a compassionate physician who lived and worked with all humility, gentleness, and patience. He will be dearly missed by the many people he has helped throughout his life and long career.

A service will be held to commemorate his life at 2 p.m., Saturday, July 13th at Munden Funeral Home.

In lieu of flowers, please send contributions to the Broad Street Clinic, 534 N 35th St., Suite K, Morehead City, NC 28557.

Family and friends are welcome to submit online condolences.

Arrangements by Munden Funeral Home & Crematory, Inc., Morehead City, NC.