Jesse Napoleon Sewell was born February 15, 1850 in Greene County, Missouri, to William Henry and Mariah Emeline (Whittenberg) Sewell of "Whittenberg Prairie," near the present cities of Walnut Grove and Ash Grove, Missouri.  He married Louisa Marcelle Jameson March 7, 1869 in Greene County, born October 2, 1852 in Greene County to William Green and Martha Louisa (Grisham) Jameson.  William Green Jameson was in the State Militia during the Civil War. Louisa Marcelle had three brothers, Nelson Augustus (see Nelson A. Jameson); James Allen (see James Allen Jameson); and William Green, buried McKenzie Cemetery near Silver; and two sisters, Mary Paralee (see John P. Griffis) and Alice Cassadrna (Sewell).  Martha L. passed away April 7, 1865. William Green married (second) Ruth Ann Parryman and fathered other children (see John T. West).

Jesse and Marcelle and their then two children, both born in Greene County, William Oliver, February 5, 1870 and James McCord, September 30, 1871, came to Texas in 1873 in a covered wagon in a wagon train made up of friends, relatives and neighbors.  They came through the Oklahoma Indian Nation and she and a friend named Dock Barnett resembled the Indians so much that they wanted them to stop and take up land, but they kept coming and their first camping place in Texas was near Sherman.  Many of the people were sick and dying with cholera so Jesse and Marcelle moved on to Belton where Nannie Margaret, December 18, 1874, and Edward (Eddie) Riley, March 11, 1877, were born.  When Eddie was 9 months old, they were using water that had been hauled in wooden barrels and part of them took typhoid fever.  William died December 27, 1877 and Nannie Margaret February 18, 1878, both buried at Belton.  They settled in Coleman County in the early 1880’s.  Other children (including James M. and Edward R.) were:

(1) Mary Alice, August 26, 1879, married Jim Jones in Coleman County, December 20, 1914, born July 31, 1888 in Granger, the son of Wm. B. and Margaret (Keel) Jones.  They lived on a farm several years in the White Chapel community and reared three children:




(2) Perry Benton, August 29, 1882 - April 28, 1907, buried at Coleman.

(3) Anna Florence, August 29, 1882 - September 29, 1883, a twin to Perry Benton.

(4) Allen Nelson, July 18, 1885 - March 6, 1966, married May B. Farmer, March 3, 1887 - July 24, 1973, both buried Coleman.  They lived and farmed in the county over fifty years.  They had no children and lived in Novice.

(5) Ira Earnest, November 16, 1888 in Coleman County, served in France during World War I.  After the war he began working for J. I. Case Implement Company.  He was sent to New Zealand in 1923 and there he married in 1925, Mona May Wilson, born January 30, 1889.  They lost a baby girl and had two sons:  Charles Jameson, April 20, 1935 in New Zealand, married and had three children.  He is divorced.  Ira Brett, November 17, 1937 in New Zealand, was accidentally killed while hunting.  Ira E. died of a heart attack and is buried in New Zealand.

(6) Henry Berryman, June 3, 1890 in Coleman County, moved to Miles with his family where they farmed.  He married (first) August 29, 1916, Madge Kidd, born April 30, 1897.  She died shortly after her only child, Perry Horace, was born June 14, 1918.  His grandmother Sewell took care of him until he was 8 years old.  Perry married Lillian Marie Smith, December 28, 1941 and they live in Houston where they reared three sons.  Henry married (second) August 18, 1921, Doll Mays (Mayes), born April 4, 1899.  They had one son, James Howard, August 12, 1922, who married June Lovelace, October 17, 1947, and live in Houston where they reared two sons.  Henry and Doll lived several years in Coleman and San Angelo where he was a real estate salesman.  He and both wives are buried at Miles.

(7) James McCord married Francis Pearle Davis of Coleman.  They lived in Coleman where he was in business and she taught music, later moving to Dallas and are buried there.  They reared two sons: James Leslie who lives in Dallas and Fredrick who lives in Austin.

(8) Edward Riley (Eddie) married Lottie Belle Davis (not related to Pearle) born November 7, 1879 in Coleman County - March 20, 1961 (see William M. Johnson).  Eddie helped Jimmie and farmed near Coleman for several years, then moved to Waco.  He died October 17, 1946 in Waco, both buried there.  Their children: Willie Grace, June 1, 1900, married W. C. Brown; William Amos, October 12, 1901; Perry Harrison, August 19, 1903; Ennis Aston, June 23, 1906; Ray Bennett, August 12, 1908; Alton Edward, February 12, 1910; and Albert Clayton, November 16, 1917 - February 3, 1972, married Marilyn Miller of Fisk, daughter of the John Millers.

(9) Effie Mae, May 5, 1894 at White Chapel.  Jesse, Marcelle and family lived on a Rough Creek place near Novice; on Indian Greek north of Coleman; in Coleman where they ran a wagon yard and boarding house; then on the Live Oak place west of Coleman.  Effie Mae attended school at these different places and took piano lessons from Aunt Pearle.  They attended church faithfully and the boys, relatives and neighbors enjoyed getting together to play their musical instruments.  About 1910 or 1912 the Santa Fe Railroad started building a new railroad from Coleman to near White Chapel, Silver Valley, and northward.  A large rock crusher was built a few miles west of Coleman for the purpose of furnishing ballast for the rail bed and there was a boarding house built for some of the workers.  A young man, Clarence Yates Douglas, born August 16, 1894 near Garden City, Kansas, working for Hanlan Supply Company, a part of the Santa Fe, was transferred here.  Most of the time he lived in a small portion of a big boxcar and the larger portion of it contained groceries, clothes and other commodities that he sold to the men who worked with the section crews building the railroad.  Jesse always had good horses to farm with and a fine mare to pull the buggy.  Effie and her sister, Mary, took milk, butter and eggs in the buggy to this boarding house at the rock crusher to sell.  While on these trips Effie met and became friends with Clarence Douglas.  This friendship became love and they were soon engaged.  As the railroad progressed northward Clarence had to go with it, but he continued to court her with letters, poems and gifts.  About 1915, Jesse, Marcelle, Henry and Effie moved to Miles and it was to this home that Clarence returned and married Effie on August 1, 1916.  After the wedding, Uncle Henry took them to Coleman where they caught the train to Lubbock and on to Clovis where they were let off at their new boxcar home on a railroad siding named Mill, between Littlefield and Amherst.  Jesse suffered a severe stroke and died at Miles, February 1, 1917, buried in Coleman.  Besides farming, he remodeled and improved every place they lived and helped build some of the beautiful homes in Coleman.  Grandmother returned to Colorado with Mother and lived for a while.


Grandmother’s health was failing so we moved to her house in the summer of 1926 in Coleman.  Work was very scarce and Daddy did whatever he could until Ted Cox hired him to work at the Magnolia Gasoline Plant, located three miles into the Morris Ranch.  We moved out there in November 1926.


Daddy was transferred to a gasoline plant about a mile west of Lefors and we moved to a camp house in 1930.  The dust bowl days of the 1930’s were terrible in the Panhandle so that summer Mother and we children moved to our place near Brentwood, Arkansas.



Grandmother Sewell died March 23, 1939 while visiting in Brentwood, Arkansas, buried in Coleman.  Daddy retired from Mobil after 32 years in 1958 and they moved to Fairplay, Colorado, where he died December 10, 1964 and Mother died September 25, 1982 in Levelland, Texas, both are buried in Coleman. 


Brothers of Jesse N. Sewell who came to Texas and Coleman County were:



(Images to be added)

Lottie Belle (Davis) and Eddie Sewell, holding Harrison, William Amos (their son), Marcelle (Jameson), Effie, Jesse and Henry Sewell - 1904

Albert Milton Sewell

Perry Benton Sewell

Clarence and Effie Douglas and Doll and Henry Sewell - 1960

Billie Jones, Ray Melvin and Ronald Douglas, Eleanor Ellyson and Maggie Lou Jones - 1946

Jim and Mary (Sewell) Jones - 1954

Ray, Marcella, Eleanor and Effie Douglas - 1972