William Miller

William Miller writes that he lived at Hampton, New York, from the age of four, moved to Poultney in Vermont at twenty-two, and there took up the opinions of the Deists (Miller, Apology and Defence, p. 3). After service as an army captain he settled at Low Hampton (Miller, Apology and Defence, p. 4). His study of the Bible led him to reckon that the 2300 days of Daniel 8 would end about 1843 (Miller, Apology and Defence, pp. 10–11). He weighed objections to his conclusion from 1818 to 1823 (Miller, Apology and Defence, p. 15) and says that he struggled on for nine years longer and “was then fifty years old” (Miller, Apology and Defence, p. 16), which puts his birth about 1782. In 1834 his Baptist brethren granted him a licence to preach (Miller, Apology and Defence, p. 19).

He gave two periods for the return of Christ, the year ending 21 March 1844 and then 22 October 1844, and was disappointed in both (Miller, Apology and Defence, pp. 24–25). In 1845 he wrote that to contend that he and his friends had not been mistaken was dishonest (Miller, Apology and Defence, p. 28). See the Millerites and the Great Disappointment.