Federal Writers' Project
of the W.P.A.
District #6
Marion County
Anna Pritchett
1200 Kentucky Avenue
FOLKLORE
RICHARD MILLER—AN OLD SOLDIER
1109 North West Street
Richard Miller was born January 12, 1843 in Danville, Kentucky. His mother was an English subject, born in Bombay, India and was brought into America by a group of people who did not want to be under the English government. They landed in Canada, came on to Detroit, stayed there a short time, then went to Danville, Kentucky. There she married a slave named Miller. They were the parents of five children.
After slavery was abolished, they bought a little farm a few miles from Danville, Kentucky.
The mother was very ambitious for her children, and sent them to the country school.
One day, when the children came home from school, their mother was gone; they knew not where.
It was learned, she was sending her children to school, and that was not wanted. She was taken to Texas, and nothing, was heard from her until 1871.
She wrote her brother she was comming to see them, and try to find her children, if any of them were left.
The boy, Richard, was in the army. He was so anxious to see his mother, to see what she would look like. The last time he saw her, she was washing clothes at the branch, and was wearing a blue cotton dress. All he could remember about her was her beautiful black hair, and the cotton dress. When he saw her, he didnot recognize her, but she told him of things he could remember that had happened, and that made him think she was his mother.