Richard Pius Miles was the son of Nicholas and Ann (Blackloc) Miles, both descendants of old Maryland planter families. He was born in Prince George's County, Maryland. His parents moved to Nelson County, Kentucky, in 1796, and Richard was reared in pioneer surroundings and inured to frontier privations.
At the age of fifteen, Miles entered the Dominican school connected with the priory of St. Rose of Lima near Springfield, Kentucky, where he came under the influence of Fathers Samuel Wilson, W. R. Tuite, and E. D. Fenwick. Upon the completion of a collegiate course in which French, Italian, and music were not neglected, he took final vows in the Order of St. Dominic on May 13, 1810. He then studied theology at St. Thomas' College and in September 1816 was ordained a priest. The young friar was retained as a teacher at the academy, where Jefferson Davis studied two years, as a master of novices, and as an assistant on the missionary circuit.
In 1828, Miles was sent to Zanesville, Ohio, where he built a new church and one of the first parochial schools in the state and from which he ministered to a parish which comprised several counties. An agreeable person and a gentle controversialist, he found little difficulty in obtaining courtrooms and Protestant meeting-houses in which he preached to Catholics and curious visitors. In 1833 he was named superior at St. Rose's Priory, Springfield, Kentucky, and in this capacity, he established the Convent of St. Catherine nearby, the sisters of which soon founded an academy for girls. Three years later, he was selected as prior of St. Joseph's Priory in Somerset County, Ohio, remaining there until elected provincial by a chapter of his order. A council of the Catholic hierarchy at Baltimore urged Rome to erect the diocese of Nashville and honored Miles as its nominee for bishop. Gregory XVI made the appointment, July 28, 1837, which Miles accepted only under obedience; for both he and his religious brethren believed that as provincial he could perform a greater service than as bishop of a destitute see. Frontier and missionary work on horseback had no terrors for him, however, and as soon as he was consecrated at Bardstown, Kentucky, by Bishop Joseph Rosati, he rode to Nashville, Tennessee, on a horse donated by the Dominicans. Well received by the 300 Catholics in the state and by the Protestant people also, he found a boarding house, repaired a dilapidated church for his cathedral, and commenced an arduous visitation of his diocese, during which he attended Irish laborers on public works, drew isolated Catholics together, established mass stations, and preached everywhere. Soon Joseph Stokes, rector of the seminary at Cincinnati, volunteered as an aide; and in time Miles attracted a group of able, self-sacrificing priests of various nationalities, willing to serve in a primitive diocese where ease was unknown. In 1840, as one of the bishops who brought the decrees of the Council of Baltimore to Rome, he had an opportunity to seek aid in Vienna from the Leopoldine Association and in Paris and Lyons from the Society for the Propagation of the Faith. Toward the end of his life, he could point to the Seven Dolors Cathedral (1847), a Dominican church at Memphis, other churches and chapels, several thousand Catholics, a small seminary, St. John's Hospital and Orphanage in Nashville (1849), Catholic colonies of German and Irish immigrants which he founded in Morgan and Humphreys counties, several girls' academies, and a negro school. Even in the trying Know-Nothing days, he retained the general goodwill of the community. Somewhat broken in health, he sought to have Father N. R. Young, O. P. , as coadjutor bishop, but in 1858, James Whelan, Archbishop Purcell's candidate was named. Miles's death occurred two years later.
There is no information about his personal life.
