Edward D. Newell

Who was Edward D. Newell?

Edward Drumgould Newell, I, was a pioneer planter in Tensas Parish, Louisiana. The town of Newellton in northern Tensas Parish was named in his honor by son, John David Stokes Newell.

Newell was born in North Carolina and educated at La Grange College in Alabama. With his brother, Thomas M. Newell, he entered business at what is now the ghost town of Grand Gulf in Mississippi. In 1834, the Newell brothers relocated to Tensas Parish. He married the former Celia Ann Dorsey, and the couple had six children.

Edward and Thomas Newell opened up and settled the area of northern Tensas Parish known as Newell's Ridge. The brothers invented the Newell Cotton Press. He purchased some 30,000 acres of public lands, a part of his Cypress Plantation.

Newell was active in the Democratic Party. He was a member and president of the Tensas Parish Police Jury. He was a member of the Louisiana State Senate from 1857 to 1861. He was elected to the secession convention of 1861 and supported the removal of Louisiana from the union of states.

With other investors, Newell in 1852 purchased a printing press to establish the weekly newspaper Tensas Gazette, published in St. Joseph, the seat of Tensas Parish.