Clyde had typed an accounting of his father from his birth on May 13, 1843 in Greene County, Arkansas in the geographic region known as Crowley’s Ridge. Clyde’s parents were of moderate circumstances and his father, Thomas Lafayette, was the fourth of twelve children of Thomas Patton Simpson (1811 - 1889) and Nancy Lindsey Simpson (1814 - 1891). Thomas Lafayette Simpson was a Civil War Veteran and served in Co. K 6^th Arkansas infantry of the Confederate States of America. He is buried at Belew Cemetery.

Clyde’s father was married twice. On February 7, 1869, at the age of twenty-five, he married Elizabeth Virginia Deets (1849 - 1883), age twenty, daughter of Alfred Hoover Deets (1826 - 1904) and Amanda Sims Turner (1827 - 1893). They had three children; Bascom Dewitt Simpson, Leslie Theresa Simpson, and Sylvester Jewell Simpson. After Elizabeth’s death, July 29, 1883, he married his late wife’s younger sister, Mary Josephine (Josie) Deets Webb on September 27, 1885 in Denton County, Texas.

Josie had been recently widowed and had three children of her own to care for. The hardships and the loss of each family’s mother and father left a void in the family that was supplemented by other family members.

The Civil War veteran made provisions for the combined families in 1885. Josie and Thomas Simpson had a son, Elmer Cecil Simpson who was born in 1886. Horace Vernon Simpson was born in 1889, and Willie Clyde Simpson was born in 1893.

It was Willie Clyde Simpson who documented his father’s accounting of the many hard times of the Civil War and the battle scars that were experienced. These reflections are shared with us by Wayne, Willie Clyde Simpson’s grandson.

The following comes from Wayne, a great-grandson:

On many occasions in my youth his eyes stared out from the old photograph that graced the study in my aunt’s home in Richardson, Texas. The eyes of the man in that picture seemed to speak to me, his great-grandson, almost asking me to search for an understanding of what he had endured in his early manhood. His flowing salt and pepper beard, much more salt than pepper at the time the picture was taken, pointed to a small type written sheet indicating the battles in which he had participated: Shiloh, Chattanooga, Chickamauga, Resaca, Ringgold Gap, Tunnel Hill, New Hope, Atlanta, Jonesboro where he was captured, and Lspring Hill where he was wounded. In his eighty-two years of life, most of which was spent as a farmer, Thomas Lafayette Simpson witnessed and participated in the greatest social convulsion ever to shake this county, the American Civil War.

In further comments, the nephew says: In search of information that could help me understand the man, his granddaughter, my maternal aunt, Edith Perle Simpson Johnson, became my guide and storyteller. In later years and on subsequent visits with my aunt and research that never seemed to come to a close the life and times of Thomas Lafayette Simpson became clearer. The search for information that would help unlock the sacrifices was difficult, but not unrewarding. Despite the knowledge gained, Simpson is not completely understood. Hopefully, after reading this you will have an appreciation of him a little greater that you otherwise would. I do. This is an examination of his life and participation in some of the war’s greatest battles along with it’s attendant privations and struggles through first hand accounts and historical scholarship.

The AFTERWARD comments by Edith Perle’s nephew, Wayne, that Edith Perle so beautifully stated that she would be honored any time to have him referred to as her grandson that I had mistakenly done. I think these few comments are so necessary to share with the reader now in this limited column space as we are going to pay tribute to Thomas Lafayette Simpson, the father of Willie Clyde Simpson, and veteran of the Civil War. The inscription on the marker on his grave is "Confederate States of America" Thank you Edith Perle for such nice letters, and I know that it will be a great honor for you to come to Aubrey to decorate the grave of your grandfather, Thomas Lafayette Simpson.

The photo is of Clyde Simpson’s father at the age of 18, when he was active in the Civil War. The photo was made on his wedding day to Virginia Elizabeth Deets during 1869.