Sarah Jane Grimes was born around 1846 in Indiana to John Grimes and Mary Burkhart. Her father was a farmer who owned $1,800 of real estate and $780 of personal property by 1860. They lived in Johnson, Indiana, and her mother died there of typhoid fever in 1850. Her father married Eliza Brummet (Barlow) on September 26, 1850. The family moved to Whitebreast, Iowa, in the 1850s, and Sarah attended school there.
She married George W. Newell on September 5, 1867, and they had at least ten children: Mary, born around 1869; John, born around 1871; Elizabeth, born around 1872; Charles, born around 1873; Walter, born around 1876; Laura, born around 1877; Marion, born around 1880; Blanche, born around 1884; Josie, born around 1888; and May, born around 1890. They lived in Liberty, Iowa, and her husband worked as a farmer. By 1870, they owned $250 of personal property.
They moved to Grasshopper, Kansas, in the late 1870s, and by 1900, they were living in McKinley, Oklahoma. Her husband died sometime in the 1910s, and by 1920, she was living with her daughter Blanche in Pineville, Missouri. She died there of pneumonia on April 16, 1921.