W.A.C Mueller, circa 1898.
William Albert Christian Mueller (his preferred spelling) was born on April 15, 1855 in Charleston, South Carolina, the sixth child of Louis and Caroline Müller. Like his father, William (later referred to more familiarly as "WAC") was religiously inclined and was the only one of the Müller children to be educated outside the United States, at the Gymnasium of Zweibrücken, where his father had also been educated. WAC graduated with honors in 1874 and returned to the States.
He furthered his religious education at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and was ordained as a minister on June 18, 1878 by the Pittsburg Synod in Holy Trinity Church. While in Philadelphia he met his future wife, Emma Clara Plender Braun. The couple were married on January 9, 1879.
WAC spent three years in Armstrong County, Pennsylvania at several congregations before agreeing to join his father at St. Matthew's back in Charleston in 1892, where an English-speaking pastor was desperately needed for the younger congregants. WAC had been popular for his sermons in Pennsylvania and this was equally true in Charleston, where they were admired for their eloquence and published regularly in the city newspapers. WAC became a full pastor at St. Matthews when his father Louis died in 1898.
WAC and Emma had six children. One of their granddaughters, Claire Reenstjerna, has written a warm memoir of the time she spent with her grandfather, recalling the ease with which he could converse with other local clergy in English, German, Latin and Greek. She cites WAC as an inspiration for her own spiritual growth.
Emma died in 1915, leaving WAC a widower. In 1918, after forty years in the clergy, St. Matthews asked WAC to accept a pastor-emeritus post, but WAC was more inclined to travel and do missionary work. His sister, Jennie Müller Jatho, left her own family in Chicago to accompany him and handle housekeeping chores until ill health sent her back to her family. WAC himself returned to Charleston and died while at prayer in 1925 at age seventy. He was buried next to Emma at West Laurel Hill Cemetery at Mt. Airy, Pennsylvania.
Thanks to Nancy Kruger and Mary Ivester of St. Matthews Archives of Charleston, Phillip F. Thomas of Cartersville, Virginia, Franz Cone of Winston-Salem, North Carolina, and Claire Reenstjerna for their materials and thoughts.