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Horace H. Miller

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Horace H. Miller (March 15, 1826–January 26, 1877) was an American military officer, newspaperman, lawyer and diplomat. Miller was a native of Louisville, Kentucky.[1] He was the son of Anderson Miller, whose family was originally from Virginia and who had been a pioneer of both steamboating the Mississippi and producing cotton-seed oil.[2][3] Miller invested in a commercial-scale cotton-seed press built at Natchez in 1834.[4] The elder Miller, who was variously described as a "celebrated steamboat captain" and/or "land speculator and gentleman of pleasure," was appointed U.S. marshal for the Southern District of Mississippi in 1841, serving until 1845. The appointment was made by John Tyler following the death of William Henry Harrison,[2] for whom Miller had been a Whig nominating convention delegate.[5][6][7][8][9]

His brother William Trigg Miller worked for their father as a deputy marshal and married Emily Van Dorn, a grandniece of Andrew Jackson and sister of future Confederate General Earl Van Dorn.[10][11][12]

At age 21, Miller fought in the Mexican–American War, serving as a sergeant major in Captain Crump's Company, later called Company H, in the Mississippi Rifles.[1][13] He and partner Charles Buck founded the True Issue newspaper at Vicksburg in 1851.[14] The True Issue was probably a Whig paper because that was where Alexander K. McClung pushed his editorials.[5] Miller was by profession primarily an attorney.[15] He succeeded Alexander Keith McClung, fellow Mississippian and a Marshall political family scion, as charge d'Affaires to Bolivia, appointed to the post in 1852 by president Millard Fillmore.[15][16] Miller was after this law partners with his brother-in-law Thomas A. Marshall, who had married to his Miller's older sister Letitia, and who, like McClung, was a cousin of Chief Justice John Marshall.[6][17] Miller was married around 1857 to Sarah Augusta Ragan of Warren County, Mississippi.[18][19]

He was also an officer on the Confederate side of the American Civil War.[14][20] In March 1861 he was a brigadier general of the Mississippi state militia charged with "fortifying Vicksburg."[19] He went to Virginia with the 12th Mississippi in May 1861.[19] He was captured at Fort Donelson.[15] In 1863 as lieutenant colonel of the 20th Mississippi Infantry he commanded an expedition from Hammond Station and thus was one of the defenders of a Confederate position from within an abandoned shoe factory at Ponchatoula, Louisiana.[21][19] He was colonel of the 9th Mississippi Cavalry Regiment, "which was mounted during the Vicksburg campaign."[22] In 1865 he was arrested for participating in "alleged illegal cotton trading."[19] He ended his Confederate service with the title colonel which was extended to him as an honorific for the remainder of his life.[19][1][23]

Miller became law partners with R. V. Booth in 1872.[24] Booth later described him as a "convivial friend and companion."[25] Miller died of heart disease at Vicksburg in 1877.[23] He is buried at Cedar Hill Cemetery in Vicksburg.[19] He had at least four children who survived to adulthood.[26]

References

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  1. ^ a b c "Colonel Horace H. Miller". Public Ledger. January 29, 1877. p. 2. Retrieved 2025-03-02.
  2. ^ a b Kentucky (1860). Reports Communicated to Both Branches of the Legislature.
  3. ^ Biographical and Historical Memoirs of Mississippi: Embracing an Authentic and Comprehensive Account of the Chief Events in the History of the State and a Record of the Lives of Many of the Most Worthy and Illustrious Families and Individuals. Goodspeed. 1891. p. 400.
  4. ^ Wrenn, Lynette Boney (1995). Cinderella of the New South: A History of the Cottonseed Industry, 1855-1955. Univ. of Tennessee Press. p. 6. ISBN 978-0-87049-882-4.
  5. ^ a b "The New Marshals". The Yazoo City Whig and Political Register. May 14, 1841. p. 2. Retrieved 2025-03-02.
  6. ^ a b Davis, Jefferson (1975). The Papers of Jefferson Davis: June 1841–July 1846. LSU Press. p. 24. ISBN 978-0-8071-0082-0.
  7. ^ Paxton, William McClung (1885). The Marshall Family: Or A Genealogical Chart of the Descendants of John Marshall and Elizabeth Markham, His Wife, Sketches of Individuals and Notices of Families Connected with Them. R. Clarke & Company. p. 188.
  8. ^ Speeches in Congress, Delivered by Henry Clay and Others, 1833–1842. 1834.
  9. ^ Norton, Anthony Banning (1888). The Great Revolution of 1840: Reminiscences of the Log Cabin and Hard Cider Campaign. A.B. Norton & Company. p. 20.
  10. ^ "From the Port Gibson Herald". Vicksburg Daily Whig. January 25, 1843. p. 3. Retrieved 2025-03-02.
  11. ^ Fortier, Alcée (1914). Louisiana: Comprising Sketches of Parishes, Towns, Events, Institutions, and Persons, Arranged in Cyclopedic Form. Century historical association.
  12. ^ "Marshall's Sale". Port-Gibson Herald. October 31, 1844. p. 3. Retrieved 2025-03-02.
  13. ^ "Entry for Horace H Miller, 09 Jun 1846". United States, Mexican War Index and Service Records, 1846–1848. FamilySearch.
  14. ^ a b "Notes on Printing and the Press in Mississippi". Vicksburg Whig. June 20, 1860. p. 4. Retrieved 2025-03-02.
  15. ^ a b c "Vicksburg Lawyers". The Vicksburg Post. July 1, 1963. p. 125. Retrieved 2025-03-02.
  16. ^ United States Department of State (1925). Biographic Register of the Department of State. U.S. Government Printing Office. p. 219.
  17. ^ "Death of Mrs. Marshall". Memphis Avalanche. February 10, 1887. p. 4. Retrieved 2025-03-02.
  18. ^ "In memoriam". The Vicksburg Herald. July 7, 1875. p. 4. Retrieved 2025-03-02.
  19. ^ a b c d e f g "Entry for Horace H Miller, 1861–1865, film images 1505–1509 of 3256". United States, Confederate Officers Card Index, 1861–1865. FamilySearch.
  20. ^ "The Daily Dispatch: may 9, 1861., [Electronic resource], Vicksburg batteries". www.perseus.tufts.edu. Retrieved 2025-03-02.
  21. ^ "This Week". Clarion-Ledger. March 24, 1963. p. 18. Retrieved 2025-03-02.
  22. ^ "List of Mississippi cavalry regiments". Daily Mississippi Clarion and Standard. January 1, 1928. p. 3. Retrieved 2025-03-02.
  23. ^ a b "Col. Horace H. Miller". Clarion-Ledger. January 27, 1877. p. 2. Retrieved 2025-03-02.
  24. ^ "New Law Firm". The Vicksburg Herald. February 9, 1872. p. 2. Retrieved 2025-03-02.
  25. ^ "Where are they now?". The Vicksburg Herald. February 6, 1903. p. 5. Retrieved 2025-03-02.
  26. ^ "Death of E. B. Miller". The Vicksburg Post. April 23, 1900. p. 4. Retrieved 2025-03-02.
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