University of Mississippi - Ole Miss Yearbook (Oxford, MS)

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HON. J. S. SEXTON

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To the Mun. ll. S. Swxtnn Ghz .ilfrienh of the youth nf the irate Ehiz QPU illllizuf' S15 Hlffzctinnatelp ibebicateh.

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Sketch of Hon. S. Sexionis Lie Q The Sexton family is of Irish extraction, and Maurice Lenihan, who compiled and edited the history of Limerick. Ireland, in 1886, says of this family that it constituted one of the chief historic families of Limerick. Hon. J. S. Sexton was born in Copiah County, Miss., November 2, 1854. In speaking of his parents. he says: I remember very little about my father, who died when I was quite young, but my mother was a woman of remarkable intellect and great force of character. lYhen his father died, the family was living in Crystal Springs, Miss.. and l1is mother concluded that it would be better for the children. of whom there were five in number. all boys. to move to a small farm, which had been left them by their father. where they would be freed from the temptations of town life and have a better opportunity to make a livelihood. It was on this farm that Mr. Sexton was reared. He attended a number of old-field schools of the country when he was a child, but they were so utterly inefficient that he made but little progress in them, and but for his mother's assistance at home. he would not have accomplished anything. At that time the opportunity to obtain educational advantages in Copiah County amounted to almost nothing. but it was Mr. Sexton's rare good fortune, a little later on in life, to attend a country school taught by one George Morrison, an Irishman, who though a very peculiar and erratic individual, was by far the most scholarly man in that section of the country. He attended this school for several years, during part of which time he walked four miles to school, and it was here that he obtained his first real educational advantages. Of this teacher Mr. Sexton has written: He was a profound scholar and a prodigious worker, and I learned from him the advantages to be obtained from self-reliance and earnest effort. He was not only my teacher, but he was my companion and friend. XVhen little less than eighteen years of age. Mr. Sexton entered the University of Mississippi, but his purse and health both failed, and he was never graduated. His standing here was of the highest character, as the records of this institution show. After leaving the University he taught a country school for three years, during which time he studied law under the direction of Hon. Tim E. Cooper, then living at Hazlehurst, but now of Jackson, Miss., and was admitted to the bar of Copiah County in 1880, since which time he has been most actively and earnestly engaged in his profession, and has enjoyed almost as varied and extensive practice as any 8