Born: April 29, 1841, Windsor, Connecticut.
Died: February 27, 1887, Cleveland, Ohio.
Buried: Oakwood Cemetery, Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio.
Sill was educated at Yale University (graduated 1861), where he was the class poet, and member of the Skull and Bones society.
He worked in business for a while in California, then entered the Harvard Divinity School in 1867. However, he soon left to work at the New York Evening Mail.
After teaching in Wadsworth and Cuyahoga Falls, Ohio (1868–71), he became principal of Oakland High School in Oakland, California.
Later, he was professor of English literature at the University of California (1874–82).