Henry Melchior Muhlenberg

MUHLENBERG, Henry Melchior (‘Melchior Heinrich Mühlenberg’ was his given name which he reversed, and the anglicized versions of ‘Henry’ and ‘Muhlenberg’ with no umlaut on the ‘u’ are normally used today). b. Einbeck, (southern Lower Saxony), Germany, 6 September 1711; d. Trappe, Pennsylvania, 7 October 1787.  Known as ‘the Patriarch of the Lutheran Church in America’, Muhlenberg was the seventh child in a poor family of nine. His parents were Nicolaus Melchior Muhlenberg (1660/66-1723/29) and Anna Maria Kleinschmid (1676-1747). He graduated from the University of Göttingen in 1738, taught in the orphanage at Halle in 1739, was ordained in 1739 in Leipzig, where Johann Sebastian Bach* was...