Fauset was born on the 20th of January in 1899 and was the middle child of three children in an interracial family in Flemington, New Jersey. His father, Redmon Fauset, was African American and likely of mixed race. He was a minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Church, and his white wife, Bella, was born into a Jewish family. Bringing three children from her first marriage, she converted to Christianity to marry Fauset. Redmon Fauset had seven children from his first marriage, before his wife Annie (née Seamon) died.