I had believed Glenn S. McBrayer (and possibly Simeon A. Smith) to be the first African-American attorney in Wilson, but the 1908 city directory lists another — Henry Simms. Was this correct?

Simms is not listed under the heading “Attorneys at Law” in the business directory at the end of the regular edition. Nor have I found a Henry Simms in census records described as an attorney, though there were several men by that name in Wilson County in the early 1900s.

City directories were rife with errors, but I’ll reserve judgment about Simms’ status pending additional research.