David Miller was an early settler, tavern keeper, Indian fighter, and founder of Millerstown. By 1763, he had settled in Rye Township, Perry County, on a tract at the present-day location of Donnally Mills, where he established a tavern. That year was a difficult one for settlers, who retreated to Carlisle and Shippensburg early in the summer for safety from Indian raids, then returned in July to bring in the harvest. During a skirmish with a party of Delaware Indians at the present-day Saville crossroads and two miles west of Ickesburg, Miller was one of seven surviving settlers out of twelve. In 1777, he served with Colonel Frederick Watts' Seventh Battalion, marching in August from Sherman's Valley through Carlisle and Lancaster and farther east, and on September 11, 1777, he was among the American patriots who fought the British at the Battle of Brandywine. On September 1, 1780, Miller purchased 222 acres along the Juniata River in Fermanagh Township, now Greenwood Township, from James Gallagher, and in 1790 he bought an adjoining 154-acre tract and received a patent for both properties. After 1790, he laid out the town of Millerstown and began selling lots, advertising in Carlisle newspapers in 1794 that eighty lots on the Juniata River, to be called Millers Town, would be disposed of by lottery. He maintained his farm and established a ferry at Millerstown, and in 1810 he advertised his large farm for sale, including two two-story wood houses, two barns, outbuildings, a ferry across the Juniata, and a town laid out, named Millerstown, of about one hundred lots. The last record of David Miller in Perry County was in January 1812, and by January 1838 he had died in Harrison County, Ohio, without a will.