In 1659 Russell led the dissenting Connecticut that founded the town of Hadley on the east bank at a bend of the Connecticut River. Beginning in 1664, he sheltered the regicides Edward Whalley and William Goffe in his home. He secreted the two wanted men under the roof of his home for more than a decade at great peril to himself and his family, as King Charles II had numerous men searching the colonies for Whalley and Goffe. Whalley died about 1675. Goffe was still alive during King Philip's War when, according to the Angel of Hadley legend, he allegedly came out of hiding to rally the townspeople during an attack before disappearing again. George Sheldon in his introduction to Sylvester Judd's "The History of Hadley" dubbed John Russell the "Guardian Angel of Hadley" because of his lengthy and perilous watch over the two regicides. Sheldon eloquently wrote of Hadley's minister: