The son of Edward Russell and Sarah Jane Kelly, he was born in Coley's Point, Conception Bay, Colony of Newfoundland.
After teaching in several small Newfoundland communities during the 1920s and 1930s, interspersed with stints at Memorial University College, he became a magistrate.
For several years he worked as an insurance salesman, later returning to teaching at the high school and then at Memorial University of Newfoundland.
Despite having done little previous creative writing, from 1954 to 1961, Russell wrote and narrated (on CBC Radio) stories set in a fictional Newfoundland outport, Pigeon Inlet, using the persona of "Uncle Mose".
These stories featured a colourful cast of characters and were told from a generally positive and optimistic, yet realistic, point of view.