QUINCY, Calif.—At least eight people were missing Saturday as one of the worst wildfires in the nation scorched through Northern California communities, forest, and tinder dry scrub in the Sierra Nevada mountains, destroying a historic gold rush town. Even as the calmer, less windy weather gave firefighters a break overnight with the Dixie fire, the third largest fire in California’s history, the Pulmas County Sheriff’s Office released the somber news. “We have received reports of eight unaccounted for individuals,” the sheriff’s office said in a statement, asking for the public’s help in finding them. Five of the missing belong to the old mining town of Greenville where blazes leveled most of its downtown, about 160 miles north of Sacramento. Greenville, with a population 800, was founded more than 150years ago when nearby gold mines attracted settlers and merchants to the picturesque town in the Indian Valley. Most of its downtown …