Around 1774 he settled on the Catawba River in Rowan County, later Burke County and married there, Priscilla Brank, daughter of Robert Brank.
In the South he was at the battles of Musgrove Mill and Kings Mountain.
He, and General Joseph McDowell and Mussendine Matthews as North Carolina commissioners superintended in 1799 the running of the line between North Carolina and Tennessee from the southern border of Virginia southwardly across Big Pigeon River.
In consequence of some conversation when engaged in that work he wrote recollections of the Battle of Kings Mountain published many years after his death.
[2][3] The Daughters of the American Revolution purchased a stone to mark David Vance's grave, which reads: "Soldier of the Revolution, Lieut 2nd N.C. Continental Rect, Brandy Wine, Germantown, Monmouth, Valley Forge, Kings Mountain.