M. J. Hassell, farmer and stock dealer in District No. 8, Sumner County, was born in February, 1827, in that county. He is one of five children of Jennett and Jane (Pervine) Hassell. The father, of Scotch origin, was born in Chowan County, N.C., in 1789, and came to Sumner County when a boy and began farming. He was in the Creek war under Gen. Jackson, and died in 1868. The mother was born near Gallatin, Tenn., in 1780, and died in 1866. Besides the ordinary common-school course our subject attended Lebanon University. When twenty-one years of age he began farming in Sumner County. In 1848 he married Ann E., daughter of Bright B and Sallie Harris, and born in Sumner County in August, 1828. Their six children are: Eliza M.; Mattie J., wife of William K. Walton, Gallatin, Tenn.; Jennett B., farming; Isaac W., lawyer in Springfield, Mo.; Charles G., farmer, and Tyry H., merchant and physician. Mr. Hassell is a Democrat; since 1882, justice of the peace, and since 1880, poorhouse commissioner. He is a member of the F. & A.M. order, and he, his wife, Isaac, Eliza and Mattie are members of the Methodist Episcopal Church South. He is a member of the church in which the first Methodist Episcopal conference there was held, under Bishop Asbury. The deserted old church is now a barn on his farm.