MILLER, FREDERIC ADOLPHUS

Frederic Adolphus Miller (July 2, 1862-October 1, 1943) was a civil servant who took an active part in West African politics in later life. A fervent believer in encouraging the young, he befriended and supported the radical political activist Wallace-Johnson in the teeth of conservative disapproval.

He was born in Freetown. His formal education ‘began and ended at the first Model School conducted by the Sierra Leone government.’ Yet by persistent application, he became a well-known public figure, remembered for his prodigious knowledge of English classics and a wealth of apt quotations.

His career had modest beginnings. He worked first as a grocer’s assistant, an office boy in a bookshop, and a junior clerk in a lawyer’s chambers. After this, he became a minor functionary in the colonial civil service, where through hard work and determination he was eventually appointed clerk of the Executive and Legislative Councils, the last black man to hold this appointment during the colonial period.

His work was commended more than once, and he received extra compensation. He retired from the civil service in 1922 and ended his career as a laboratory assistant at the Prince of Wales School from 1925 to 1929. As custodian of official minutes, memoranda, and general correspondence between the Colonial Office in London and the local administration, as well as between local and regional administrations within Sierra Leone, he was well placed to know the inner workings of a colonial government. Not surprisingly, he was credited with an encyclopaedic knowledge of civil service matters and was one of the founders of the African Civil Service Association and became its first president. His signature was to be found on several petitions and memoranda, notably one on the high cost of living in 1918.

In later life, Miller became actively involved in politics. He was a foundation member of the local branch of the National Congress of British West Africa (N.C.B.W.A.) and became one of the vice presidents. He was also made vice-president of a short-lived association of Colony-born and Protectorate-born Sierra Leoneans—the Sierra Leone Aborigines Society. He did not enter the Legislative Council but played an important and active role as an adviser and elder statesman to young and aspiring politicians.

He gave respectability to Wallace-Johnson’s West African Youth League (W.A.Y.L.), founded in 1938 when he agreed to become the chairman of its central committee. This was a significant step to take, for at that period of Sierra Leone’s history, the rabid emotionalism and radicalism of Wallace-Johnson’s political propaganda was too much for the moderately conservative Krio (Creole) elite. Many of the respectable figures who later adorned the W.A.Y.L.’s platform would have shied away if the elderly and highly respected Miller had not taken Wallace-Johnson under his wing.

By embracing Wallace-Johnson’s cause, Miller inevitably incurred the displeasure of his more conservative peers. But he was a man of principle. He believed in what Wallace-Johnson was fighting for, and being himself a tenacious and unyielding fighter, despite his physical disabilities in later life (he became deaf in one ear and partly blind), and he refused to be blackmailed by his detractors.

Kind, helpful, and generous, especially towards the young, Miller did all he could to help young people. As well as his political activities he took part in church affairs, representing the Methodist Church on the council of Fourah Bay College. He was also the secretary of the Sierra Leone Chamber of Commerce for some years.

After a full, varied, and successful life, he died on October 1, 1943, and the people of Freetown agreed that Sierra Leone had lost a true and loyal friend “who was a thriving example to ambitious youth of the possibilities of achievement in the way of persevering.” His name rarely figures in history books on Sierra Leone. Yet it was people like Miller, unknown, self-effacing, and unsung, whose efforts laid a firm foundation for later political developments in Sierra Leone.

AKINTOLA J.G. WYSE