MADISON COUNTY TN - OBITUARIES - William C. Russell  1878
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Tribune Sun, Jackson, Tennessee, November 1, 1878, page 3, column 4:

About Heroic Men.

A private letter to Chief Jas. Marks from Brownsville, announces the death of
his uncle, William C. Russell, a Memphis refugee.  Mr. Russell went to
Brownsville with his family, where he had a brother living when the yellow fever
was declared epidemic in Memphis, and when the pestilence struck Brownsville, he
determined to remain with his people and share their fortune.  During the
darkest days of the pestilence, he acted a hero's part and died at the post of
self-imposed duty.  We learn from the same letter, and from many other sources
that Capt. Robert S. Russell, who is well known to many of our readers in this
city, and who was born in Jackson, has been to the suffering people of
Brownsville in this great pestilence, a most precious helper and hero in the
strife of sickness and death.  His gray horse, and brave Mike McGrath's black
mare, were seen day and night in the direst hours of the plague, bearing their
masters to the houses of stricken ones.  Capt. Russell spent days and nights
without taking off his boots, going from bedside to bedside administering to the
sick and dying.  He and Mike McGrath helped to bury every corpse, and visited
every sick person, white and black, during the reign of the pestilence.
History, song and story, tells not of men more heroic than these two.  It is a
matter of especial pride to us that Jackson is honored by being the birthplace
and early home of stout hearted, kind Bob Russell.  He evidently has in him a
liberal share of the brave blood of his fearless grand-father, Col. Charles
Sevier, whose fame as a daring and kindly man is a proud memory that is yet
cherished in this county.  When the people of Brownsville erect monuments to
their bravest and noblest, the ones to Bob Russell and Mike McGrath, should be
of the whitest and tallest.  Their names should be forever enshrined in the
hearts of that people, and no monuments of stone should be needed to keep their
names and deeds alive forever.

[William and Robert Russell are sons of Jesse Russell Sr. and Nancy D. Sevier
Russell.  Jesse and Nancy Russell had eight children: Robert S., William C.,
John S., Jesse Russell Jr., Margaret Russell Marks, Sarah Russell Barr, Mary
Russell Allen, and Elizabeth Russell Prewitt.]