Llewelyn Morris Humphreys was born in the United States, the third of five children. His parents, Bryan Humphreys and Ann Wigley, were from Carno, a small village near Newtown in Powys. They had married at the Methodist chapel in Llanidloes, Powys. However as the long depression at the end of the 19th century caused great hardship in many Welsh farming communities, the young couple found it difficult to make a living from their isolated hilltop farm in Carno. The family eventually emigrated to the United States from the village of Llandinam.