Moses Marston was born in Williamstown, Vermont in 1832. He graduated from Middlebury College in 1856, and for many years was a Universalist minister. He was subsequently elected to the professorship of Latin and Greek in St. Lawrence University, New York. About 1874 he was forced to resign his position due to ill health, and he came to Minneapolis hoping that a change in climate would be beneficial. For a time he preached in the Church of the Redeemer but was soon appointed as a Professor of English at the University of Minnesota until his accidental death on July 11, 1883.