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352
Mississippi, as a Province,
the western portion and opened the door for the eastern to comc in two years thereafter.
The bill authorizing the western portion of the Territory to form a State Government passed Tanuary 21st, 1817, and a convention to form a constitution assembled in the town of Washington, Adams county, on the first Monday in July of the same year, in the? old Methodist meeting-house, which had been built, mainly, by the efforts of Lorenzo Dow, the famous itinerant preacher.*
His Excellency David Holmes was elected President, and Louis Winston, Secretary. For personal respectability, moral worth and intelligence this convention was not inferior to any that ever assembled in any country, and was a fair representation of the people who had ?been so much traduced by Governor Sargeant.
Of Governor Holmes mention has been made, and this seems to be the appropriate place for some notice of a few of the most prominent members.
Josiah Simpson, a native of Pennsylvania, educated at Princeton, studied law, married Miss Stewart near Fredericksburg, Va., and iit 1812 was appointed by the President one of the Judges of the Mississippi Territory, to succeed Judge Fii;\ He resided at a place then called Green Hill, in the vicinity of Natchez, now known as Devereux Hall. Nature had given him a vigorous intellect, and being a close student, and very methodical in his habits, with great'purity of character and simplicity of manners, he was fully equal to the high station to which he had been called. The bar before which he dispensed justice was extremely able?the people were intelligent, cultivated and wealthy? they had lived under three governments, and the due administration of the laws required a very extensive range of study and of inquiry. Judge Simpson soon impressed himself on the bar and the community as a man of great ability, learning and rectitude, and no man was more beloved. In this Convention?a position he would have avoided, but was literally forced into it by a universal call?he took a very prominent part, and his conservative character is impressed on the most important features of our first constitution. He died soon after the Convention dissolved, j
iELIST OF DELEGATES.
Adams County?David Holmes, Josiah Simpson, Janies C. "Wilkins, John Taylor, Joseph Sessions, John Steele, Christopher Rankin, Edward Turner.
Jefferson County?Cowies Jic;id, II. I. Balch, Joseph E. Davis, Geo. "\\ . King, Cato West, Dr. John Shvw.
Marion County? .Tolm I'oi .l. Dougal McLaughlin. js Hancock Countv^S'ozY Jourdan, Amos Burnet.
Wayne County?James.Patton, Clinch (iray.
Green County?Laughlin McKay, John McRae.
Jackson County?John McLeod, Thos, Billbo.
Lawrince County?Harmon Runnels.
Claiborne County?Walter Leake, Thomas Barnes, David Bennett, Joshua G. Clark.
Warren County?Henry D. Downs, Andrew Glass.
Franklin County?James Knox.
Dnniel Williams, Abram M. Scott, John