Russell is a common patronymic surname derived from the given name Rousel, old French for someone with red hair or a red face.Russell is the 93rd most popular surname in the United States and England, and the 47th most common surname in Scotland.USSEL, RUSELL. Famous People with the Surname RUSSELL: 1  Robert C. Russell-inventor of the Soundex system for indexing names by the way they sound. 2  James Russell-invented the compact disk (CD) in 1965.