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Joseph Sandiford Atwell was born on July 1, 1831, in Barbados. After completing his education at Codrington College, an Anglican school on that island, he moved to the United States in 1863 and attended Divinity Hall, forerunner of the Philadelphia Divinity School, from which he graduated in 1866. He also raised funds to help residents of Barbados immigrate to Liberia.
The emancipation of four million people from slavery drew Atwell to the southern states to participate in the Episcopal Church’s efforts to evangelize the freedpeople. The church’s American Missionary Society sent him first to Louisville, Kentucky, to serve a newly organized church and school for African Americans. While there, he met and married Cordelia A. Jennings, a graduate of the Institute for Colored Youth in Philadelphia and one of the school’s teachers. They had three sons. Bishop Benjamin Smith ordained Atwell as the first black deacon in the Diocese of Kentucky and in 1867 received Atwell’s parish o