Simpson County lies in the southern half' of' Mississippi about midway between the Mississippi River and the Alabama State line and about one third of the distance between the Gulf of Mexico and Tennessee. Mendenhall, now the county seat, is thirty-one miles southeast of Jackson and 125 miles north of' the Gulf of Mexico. The county covers 567 square miles and averages thirty-one miles east to west and eighteen miles north to south.
A part of the Gulf Coastal Plain, the county is cut in every direction by drainage ways that form narrow "hogback" ridges where the heads of' these small streams come together.
Except for the southeast corner, which drains into Leaf River, Simpson County is part of the Pearl River watershed. The principal streams include two rivers and fifteen creeks.
Early French settlers found pearls in mussels at the mouth of the area's most significant river, hence the name Pearl River. As it flows southward into the Gulf of Mexico, it forms the western boundary of Simpson County.
Strong River, flowing from northeast to southwest into Pearl River, drains the northwest third of the county.
Limestone Creek, also in the northwest part of the county, flows into Pearl River. It gets its name from the unusual amount of limestone on its banks.
The north central part of the county is drained by Campbell, Sanders and Dabbs Creeks, all flowing into Strong River. Campbell Creek is said to be named for Beasley Campbell, whose name on the 1824 tax roll for the county appeared as Camel, but on subsequent rolls as Campbell. Sanders Creek gets its name f'rom a pioneer tax payer, Travers Sanders. Dabbs (Dobbs) Creek is named for William Dabs, also listed on early tax rolls.
In the central part of the county two creeks flow into Strong River -- Sellers Creek, named for William Sellers, and Rials Creek, named for Gideon Ryals, both listed on early tax rolls.
Silver Creek, emptying into Pearl River, drains the south central portion of the county. Bowie Creek, draining a small area as it flows into Leaf River in the southeast part of the county, reportedly takes its name from early residents, not identified. Also in the southeast corner of the county is Okatoma Creek, poetically named by Choctaw Indians for Oka, their word for water, and Tomi meaning radiant. Bowie Creek receives these radiant waters. In the southwest corner of the county Vaughns Creek flows into Pearl River. It also was named for one of the early settlers.
The character of the region strongly influenced its early settlement, families migrating chiefly from older Southern states. Farmers were attracted by some of the region's most fertile lands near rivers and creeks and by moderate rainfall and winters mild enough to assure long seasons for a diversity of crops. Bottoms, locally called swamps but not true swamp land, supported cattle. Vast stretches of Virgin longleaf pine brought in lumbermen and sawmills. Flowing streams provided power for the sawmills as well as for grist mills and rice mills. Wonderful springs bubbling up from the hills invited homesteaders to their abundant waters.
But before the settlers, there were the traders, who came bargaining and bartering with the native Choctaw Indians. After the Treaty of Mt. Dexter with the Choctaws, in 1802, the territory was officially opened for white settlements. In 1813 surveyors found scattered white settlements. By 1820, when the Treaty of Doak's Stand was signed and the land purchased from the Indians, the only Indian encampment left was south of Weathersby, though there had been an encampment at or near what was afterwards known as Westville, one east of Mendenhall, and one near Harrisville. Although there are not the Indian lore and relics found in abundance in some parts of Mississippi, evidence remains of the Choctaws' having dwelt in numbers: chipped stone arrow-heads, spear points, some pottery, a few tomahawks, and several mounds. It is known that the settlers followed well-defined Indian trails and later developed them into roads for their wagons.
The early white settlers came largely from the "older south" -- Carolinas, Georgia, and Tennessee, fleeing unprofitable farms there and expecting to find greater opportunity in the "frontier" lands. A number, however, emigrated from Wayne County as well as the settlements on the Mississippi River, near Natchez, where they had temporarily moved.
Many settlers came before the purchase of the territory from the Indians in 1820. At the time the county was surveyed in 1813, scattered white settlements were found. In the northwest corner of Simpson County, near the eastern bank of the Pearl, lie the early settlements of Palestine and Pearl. These could have been among the early settlements. The Lewis family, Bill, L'Dora, and Betty, still reside on the 900-acre estate and in the 162-year-old house that was homesteaded and built by their great grandparents. There is evidence that another of the older settlements was on the Westville-Raleigh road, a probable old Indian trail. A tenant house in good condition still stands on the Berry Hays place, one mile south of Weathersby.
Perhaps the oldest original log house that has never been altered or renovated and has been lived in through three generations is the old Ainsworth home north of Harrisville off Rt. 469. Mrs. Gerty Ainsworth Barlow still resides there. The date of the building is uncertain.
Simpson County had one river town, Osceola, named for an Indian chief and located one mile south of the present Rockport bridge. Its first store was opened in 1830, and Osceola became the head of boat navigation. It became the largest town in the county and was similar to early frontier towns of the west, with a half dozen saloons, where gamblers from far and near joined the steamboat roustabouts. It boasted the best race track in the county.
Osceola received her death blow after the Civil War, because the trees were cut and felled into the river to prevent Federal gunboats from navigating up the pearl.
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Another early town that might have been was begun at the source of the health-giving waters of the springs at Saratoga, located about 5 miles south of Magee toward Mt. Olive. The Gulf and Ship Island Railroad envisioned a health resort, built a fine hotel, with its own system of water works, and spring-fed pool. A bottling manufacturing plant was built on the Okatoma creek and bottles manufactured for the shipping of the mineral water. unfortunately a rough and tumble element of society, with drunkenness, gun shooting, and general lawbreaking, aborted the entire plan of the promoters.
In 1824 Simpson County officially came into being, seven years after statehood. The population was 2,329 whites and 829 slaves. 'I'he 186() Federal Census records a population of 6,080. Although the War Between the Slates and the reconstruction period slows this rapid growth, the pattern has been steady through the years.
'I'he County was named for Josiah Simpson, a former Pennsylvanian, educated at Princeton. He later lived at Green Hill, near Natchez, and became a territorial judge of Mississippi and served as a member of the Constitutional Convention of 1917.
Shortly after the county was organized an act of the legislature designated Daniel McCaskell, James B. Satterfield, William Herring, James Boggan, Peter Stubbs and Jacob Carr as a committee to locate a county seat within three miles of the center of the county. The act provided for a courthouse and a jail. (Peter Stubbs later became Associate Justice for the County.)
The site selected was called Westville. in honor of Colonel Cato West. The first courthouse, a small log building, was used for only a short time, for offices. Court was held at the residence of William Gibson until a frame courthouse building was erected about 1827. There was no jail until 1830, when a log jail was built. There were no cages in the jail and the prisoners were chained at night to the logs of the floor.
In 1844 the courthouse and the jail were burned at night. These were replaced with much larger buildings. Another fire, on May 9, 1872, destroyed this third courthouse and jail, together with all public records of the county. This was a loss that is still felt by the many families who would treasure information concerning their ancestors. The next courthouse was built of brick, at a cost of eleven thousand dollars, which was considered a very large sum for that time. This building continued in use until 1907, when the county seat, after much litigation, was permanently moved to Mendenhall. The old courthouse and jail were torn down and the bricks sold.
In 1839 there were 3 post offices in the county -- Westville-Mill Haven (later D'Lo), Fayette Hill (near Martinville), and White Oak Spring (Smith County line near White Oak, and the place of Judge McLaurin, (near Jaynesville). In 1847, only Westville was designated as a post office. By 1849 Mt. Zion and Old Hickory were added, and by 1859 post offices were opened in Harrisville, New Dublin, and Sander's Creek.
The coming of the railroad in 1900 wrought drastic changes in population areas. Rapidly centers began to develop toward the east and the old settlements, like Westville and some of those on the water, as Bridgeport and Rockport were gradually abandoned.
From the time of the settlement of Simpson County until 1845 there were no records of public schools having been established. At this time, out of 912 adults over 20 years of age, there were only 178 illiterates.
On January 27, 1827, there was an act approved that provided for the establishment of the Westville Academy "within two miles of the county seat." Trustees were appointed and authorized to have an "academical edifice" built and to employ a "Preceptor and other professors." However, no real progress seems to have been made at this time. An amendatory act was approved in 1836 to carry out the provisions of the act of 1827 and "establish a seminary of learning in the county of Simpson."
Thomas Mendenhall in his reminiscences tells us, however, that although schools were taught in and around, no building was erected in Westville until 1850. Then he says, "a very cammodious one was built and a first class school established." The Westville Academy became a reality. Henry L. Whitfield, later to become Governor of Mississippi, served as Principal of the Westville Academy at one time.
In 1845, 13 one-teacher schools were in existence. The cost had to be met by private contributions or tuition fees. The schoolhouses were mostly built of logs with rough plank benches as the only furniture. These schools "rarely embraced more than the rudiments," spelling, reading, writing, and arithmetic, and were seldom taught more than three months at a time by some itinerant pedagogue.
Education in the local communities is included in the respective sections to follow.
For the first two decades after the establishment of Simpson County there were no churches or any mission work recorded. In fact in 1845 a committee report to the Pearl River Baptist Association referred to Westville as one of the "unoccupied fields of labor."
Itinerant preachers visited neighborhoods and meetings were held in homes and at the courthouse until the Masonic Lodge was built in 1850. D. L. Sinclair also built a Methodist Church this same year.
In 1853 the Strong River Baptist Association was formed and 8 of the 17 charter churches were in Simpson County. The older ones follow in the order of their establishment:
There were 569 white members and 104 Negro. Dunbar Howland writes concerning these earlier days, that "The religious life of the county was if anything more marked and characteristic than any other feature of it's social progress The simpler rituals of the Methodist and Baptist Churches were best suited for the use of a pioneer people of varied religious creeds. The people of no section of the union more sincerely evinced a dependence on divine Providence than the people of whom we write, nor expressed in their daily lives more reverence for the scriptures."
In the Simpson County Baptist Association bulletin of 1973 there were listed 43 white Baptist Churches with 10,385 members. There are 26 Negro Baptist Churches. There is no similar report available on other denominations. The following other churches are listed for Simpson County:
Methodist -- Magee, Mendenhall, Harrisville, and D'Lo.
Methodist Congregational -- Magee Pentecostal Holiness -- Magee Presbyterian -- Magee and Sharon Catholic -- Rilagee
Jehovah's Witness -- Mendenhall Church of God -- Magee and Mendenhall
Strong River Farm Alliance was organized February 24, 1888, near Pinola. S. M. Wilson was president and D. D. Berry, secretary. It was still in operation December 21, 1889. This was a county-wide organization, the forerunner of the present Farm Bureau.
Simpson County Farm Bureau was organized in the spring of 1922 and was chartered September 30, 1929. Charter members were:
S. V. Jones, J. W. Garrett, J. Hilton, R. L. Berry, J. E. Boggan,
W. T. Hemphill, G. M. Phillips, R. G. Prescott, R. I. Tullos, A. H. Little, Rice Ainsworth, W. M. Durr, O. E. Berry, and H. W. Mangum, secretary.
Today the Farm Bureau owns a modern brick building in Mendenhall, valued at $5,000. Their service is extended to 16,000 farm families. The 1974 Board of Directors includes:
Thee Boggan, President, T. J. May, Wiley Ainsworth, Chester Walker, C. W. Boss, G. R. Sherman, Walter H. McCallum, L. C. McAlpin, Joe Alien Benton, George M. Turner, Tommy Sullivan,' Truett Benton, John W. Hughes, K. C. Welch, Jack A. Warren, Jr., Waiter H. McCallum, Jr., and Ricky Baldwin.
H. Wilkin Mangum has been serving as agent since 1954. W. George Mangum since 1962.
In 1973 the ladies of the Farm Bureau made a Campaign of a clean up and restoration of the Westville Cemetery.
The Voice of Calvary is an organization dedicated to developing black Christians in community and county leadership for blacks.-Dolphous Weary is the director.
The Simpson County Historical Society organized on March 25, 1974. Officers were installed on April 22, 1974, in the D'Lo Community Center. Charter officers were:
President -- Miss Sarah Lee Ball, Harrisville;
Vice President -- Tom Dickson, Magee;
Secretary -- Mrs. Lilla Warren, D'Lo;
Treasurer -- Archie Magee, Mendenhall.
The Simpson County Little Theatre was organized in a meeting held in the unused Sanitorium Auditorium at Magee on June 3, 1974. Charter members were:
President -- Douglas Magee, Attorney, Mendenhall;
Vice President -- Mrs. Margaret Tedford, MaRee; Secretary -- Mrs. Doris Cook, Magee;
Treasurer -- Mrs. Pauline Magee, Braxton;
Production Managers -- Ray Sullivan, Magee and Larry Cockrell, Magee.
A local chapter of the Red Cross was organized in Magee in 1918. Mr. and Mrs. Mims Mitchell went to Washington and got it chartered. It later became a county unit.
The Simpson County Health Department was organized in July of 1941. Dr. J. W. Dugger was the M. D. at this time. The staff of 1974 includes Dr. Shelby W. Mitchell; Mrs. Margaret Neal Lee, P. H. Nurse; Mrs. Geneva Bell Williamson; Mrs. Rose Anna Welsh; Mrs. Edna Guynes; Joe Hasty.
The county Welfare Agency was initiated in 1936, with a staff of two. L. H. May was the first agent and Mrs. Caroline Teunnison the first clerk. Today eighteen are employed. Mrs. Jewel Ates is the present director. The Welfare Department offers A. B. D. Medicade, aid to dependent children, (alimony payment, service, and Medicade), a social service department, a food stamp division, and a homemaker service.
The first industry in Simpson County was a tannery in Westville in early 1820. The industrial census of 1850 recorded five sawmills, four grist mills, three cotton gins, two tanneries and finishing shops. Others were shoemaking, blacksmithing, and two sadlary shops . $37,850 was the budget with 31 employees. Today Simpson has 17 industries. Together with other payrolls in all branches of county employment the annual budget is $25,000,000 County agent Sam Dyer gives the figures on agricultural income for 1973 as in excess of $28,000,000. Simpson County ranks second in all 82 counties in Mississippi in farm income per family. Mr. Dyer gives credit to poultry for putting us in this bracket, with timber second in income, cattle third and crops fourth. The evaluation of worth of oil and gas resources for 1972 was in excess of $17,000,000.
REPRINTED FROM "SIMPSON COUNTY SESQUICENTENNIAL HISTORICAL BOOKLET" 1974