[1] Around the turn of the century, an older resident of Montgomery told historian Frederic Bancroft, author of Slave-Trading in the Old South, that Harwell was "a man of respectable standing.

[9] The Alabama state census of 1850 listed Harwell as the head of a household of nine free whites and five enslaved people.

Traders would bring their slaves through from North Carolina and Virginia and stop here in Montgomery, selling as many as they could and then take the remainder on to some other market where they would be disposed of.

[14] He was listed on the 1860 slave schedules as the legal enslaver of 34 people, ranging in age from 55 years to seven months old.

[17] On July 24, 1865, Mason Harwell swore allegiance to the United States, completing the Confederate pardon-amnesty process, and was readmitted to the Union.

[21][6] The Montgomery Advertiser remarked in the death announcement, "Mr. Harwell enjoyed an enviable character for honesty, integrity and fair dealing, and possessed rare business qualifications.

[22] A 1921 biography of one of Harwell's sons-in-law noted that Confederate veteran Charles A. Allen had served as clerk of revenue for Montgomery County for almost 20 years and was "a Democrat, a Mason, a Ku Klux, and Baptist.