Edward Howard Miller in his World War I uniform

Edward Howard Miller, the second child and first son of Charles Edward Miller and Annie Bayley, was born in a log cabin in the small settlement of Birtle, Manitoba, Canada, on 15 May 1883. His family had emigrated from Liverpool, England, to Canada about 1882. His father, Charles, was not cut out to be a pioneer farmer in the wilderness. So, after several years, the family moved to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, where Annie’s brother Neville was doing well in the hotel business.

About 1895 his younger sister, Ethel, caught herself on fire while playing with matches. She spent several months in the hospital in Pittsburgh before her father took her to England where she might receive more treatment. The rest of the family followed not long afterwards.

Edward by then was a teenager and a few years later he signed up to fight on the side of the British in the Boer War in South Africa. When his family returned to the United States about 1907, Edward remained in South Africa, living in Transvaal. He married Annie Mary Hazelhurst and they had eight children: Constance Beryl, Edward Howard, Reginald Ernest, Charles Frederick, Nina Annie, Gwendolyn Ethel, Robert Douglas, Richard Neville, and Joyce Helen.

He reenlisted in the British Armed Services for WWI and was returned to England, wounded and hospitalized for some time. Later he returned to South Africa where he later died from Miner's consumption, also known as silicosis, which he developed from working in the gold mines.

In a letter to his father dated 15 Aug 1927, a month or so after his mother died, he apologized for not keeping in touch: "I received your letter telling me the awful sad news about my dearest mother. Oh, Father, you cannot know what I feel and your letter did not soften the blow. I know I deserved it and a lot more for not writing, but I will let you know what I never wanted my poor mother to know, and that is I am not at all well, I was put out of the mines in 1923 with what is called miner's phthisis [silicosis], and have stedly got worse and have only been able to do light work and it is not always easy to get. I have been out of employment for over four months now and my family is very large." The return address was Post Office, Noord Kaap [North Cape], Barberton Dist., Transvaal.

Edward Howard Miller in his Boer War uniform