Rare Kentucky Pioneer document 1798, approx. 7-7/8 x 5". Written and signed by MORRIS [Maurice] MILES [d. 1799] having been appointed Clerk of the Hardin Co. Court. ADS, 1798, summons for Peter Clacome.David May, the clerk, having departed this life, the court appointed John Helm to fill the vacancy, and he gave bond, with William McClung and George Helm as his securities, in the penalty of $3,000. On motion of John Helm, clerk, Maurice Miles was admitted as his deputy. Court adjourned 2nd day of the term. John Helm, who was appointed clerk on yesterday, resigned his office. Maurice Miles was appointed clerk and gave bond, with Felix Grundy and John Rowen as securities ; penalty, $3,000. Maurice Miles was a business man of fine promise, wrote a beautiful business hand, and would have made an excellent clerk, but he lived but a short time. Signed on the verso by Morris Miles, Nicholas Miller. The signature of Christopher Bush [Sr] was signed by Morris Miles.COL. Nicholas MILLER - Kentucky Pioneer from the Elizabethtown area. Remembered as an Indian fighter. Sam. Haycraft, the Ky. historian, gives the following account: "Dan Vertrees was a stalwart young man of daring. He, with the late Colonel Nicholas Miller and others, were pursuing a band of Indians; Miller, then young, was tall, slenderly built, as active as a cat, and as fleet as hind, and as brave as Julius Caesar. This company coming upon the Indians, suddenly, a desperate fight ensued. Vertrees was killed at the first fire. A stout warrior seized a white man, wrestled his gun from him and was about to cleve his head with an axe. Miller at that moment, with a celerity of action which few men could equal, and with a power that few possessed ..... snatched the white man from the Indian as he would a chicken from a hawk, and, with an equal rapid motion, killed the Indian. This turned the tide, and the remaining Indians fled, leaving several dead on the ground."In 1793 William McCIung was sworn and admitted to the bar as attorney. William McClung, Esq., was appointed Commonwealth's Attorney for this court. Commonwealth's Attorneys were not then commissioned by the Governor, each county appointed their own prosecuting attorney, and were paid out of the county levy.

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