William Simpson, the first ancestor of the Simpson family of whom anything is known, was born in Belfast, Ireland, in 1729. He married Miss Mary Simpson, the eldest child of the other Simpson family, and rearing a large family emigrated to Laurens County, South Carolina, about the year 1770, and settled near the place afterwards called Belfast, in the southeastern part of the County; and died in 1806, aged 77 years.
During the Revolutionary War, which commenced in 1776, he removed his family for safety to one of the forts near Charleston, and it was owing to exposure and fatigue connected with their surroundings that Mrs. Simpson contracted a disease which shortly terminated her life. But whether she died before leaving the fort, or after her return to Laurens County does not appear. ...
