P a g e 4 G h o s t T o w n s a n d H i s t o r y o f M o n t a n a N e w s l e t t e r Hugh J. Miller giana Cole of Cedar Falls, Iowa, who was a graduate of the Iowa State Normal. Mr. Miller graduated from Ann Arbor in the class of 1891 with the honor of L. L. B. While at this school he also took literary work and a two years’ course in oratory under Professor Trueblood. Previous to his graduation, Allan R. Joy, attorney of Park county, Montana, had written to the faculty of that institution, requesting their recommendation of a student who had made a record. Out of a class of three hundred, Mr. Miller received the recommendation and accordingly accepted the proposal of locating at Livingston. Immediately after arriving, Mr. Joy put him to work on some of his most important cases, and after two months’ work showed his appreciation by doubling his salary. In the November election of 1892 he was given the office of county attorney, and November 8, 1898, was re-elected to the same office. During his first term, Mr. Miller came to the office with one of the largest criminal calendars that had ever been before the court, securing a large number of convictions during his first term of office, one being the murder case of Fields (Anderson) which was so extensively copied throughout the East, and by which the reputation of our subject as a criminal lawyer was at once established, this being the only conviction of murder in the first degree ever secured in Park county. During his law practice here he has been employed on sixteen different murder cases, among them being the famous cases of Bloom and Ladhoff, and John Burns, the slayer of Daniel O’Connell, by the eloquence of Mr. Miller, succeeded in impressing the jury that there was no malice in his heart, resulting in acquittal. In representing the defense for the highway robbers of the National Park stages he was complimented throughout the press on the talent shown as an able criminal lawyer. Since 1894 Attorney Miller has assisted, or been, the leading attorney in nearly every prominent criminal case in Park county, his greatest success being in the October, 1898, term of court, in which, of the seven criminal cases, he secured six convictions and one hung jury. It was claimed by those best informed on the subject that it was the greatest term of court in the county’s history in percentage of convictions secured, and that Mr. Miller was unexcelled in the complete preparation of his cases. While it is true that as a criminal lawyer he has been eminently successful, it is equally true that in his civil practice he has met with great success. Of the older residents of the county, it can be said that none have taken a more active part in trying to secure Eastern capitalists to assist in building up the county’s enterprises than its present attorney, having spent much time, gratis, in his correspondence on this theme—he having written over
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