Cincinnatus Heine Miller
Cincinnatus Heine Miller, known in the literary world as Joaquin Miller, "the poet of the Sierras," was born at Cincinnati, Ohio, in 1841. When only about thirteen years of age he ran away from home and went to the mining regions in California and along the Pacific coast. Some time afterward he was taken prisoner by the Modoc Indians and lived with them for five years. He learned their language and gained great influence with them, fighting in their wars, and in all modes of living became as one of them. In 1858 he left the Indians and went to San Francisco, where he studied law, and in 1860 was admitted to the bar in Oregon. In 1866 he was elected a county judge in Oregon and served four years. Early in the seventies he began devoting a good deal of time to literary pursuits, and about 1874 he settled in Washington, D. C. He wrote many poems and dramas that attracted considerable attention and won him an extended reputation. Among his productions may be mentioned "Pacific Poems," "Songs of the Sierras," "Songs of the Sun Lands," "Ships in the Desert," "Adrianne, a Dream of Italy," "Danites," "Unwritten History," " First Families of the Sierras" (a novel), "One Fair Woman" (a novel), "Songs of Italy," "Shadows of Shasta," "The Gold- Seekers of the Sierras," and a number of others.
From A Biographical History of Darke County Ohio, Lewis Publishing Co, Chicago, 1900