[1] He began working as a slave trader by 1847, as the E. L. McGlashan Collection of Documents Concerning Slavery in the United States at the Beinecke Rare Book & Manuscript Library at Yale has a receipt for Simmons' purchase of Zena on May 25, 1847, from William Perry at Richmond,[2] and the purchase of an enslaved man named Moses for $500 from D. M. Miller, "commission" salesman, somewhere in one of the Richmond, Virginia slave markets on June 5, 1847.

[6] In 2023, an auction house offered a slave receipt for the sale by G. W. Williams of Richmond of an enslaved man named Ryal to Simmons for $525, on November 19, 1851.

[1] The head of the household, Henry H. Lowe, listed his occupation as farmer, and told the enumerator that he owned real estate valued at US$250,000 (equivalent to $9,156,000 in 2023).

[1] Lowe had previously served as a Georgia state legislator and militia officer,[11] and his slaves had built a landmark plantation house called Ossahatchie at Waverly Hall in the 1830s.

[13] In December 1852, Lowe sought letters of administration in Harris County for the estate of Elmore H. Simmons, deceased, notice of which was published in a Columbus, Georgia, newspaper.