Frederick David Schaeffer

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Frederick David Schaeffer (1760–1836) was a German-American Lutheran clergyman.

Biography
Frederick David Schaeffer was born in Frankfurt am Main, in Hesse, Germany. He spent time at a gymnasium in Hanau, but after both parents died he left school. In 1776 he emigrated to the United States with an uncle, but the uncle soon died and Schaeffer found himself in need. He taught in York County, Pennsylvania, and studied theology with Rev. Jacob Goering. He was licensed as a Lutheran minister in 1786 and ordained in 1788.

Schaeffer served as pastor in Carlisle, Pennsylvania (1786–1790); Germantown (now Mt. Airy, Philadelphia) from 1790 to 1812; and from 1812 to 1834 as a colleague of Rev. Dr. Justus Henry Christian Helmuth in Philadelphia. He earned a Doctor of Divinity degree from the University of Pennsylvania in 1813. In 1834, due to age and infirmities, he stepped back from ministry and moved to Frederick, Maryland.

Works
- Antworten auf eine Vertheidigung der Methodisten (1806) — a response to the evangelists of the Second Great Awakening.
- Eine herzliche Anrede (1806) — A Heartfelt Address.

Family
In 1786 he married Rosina Rosenmiller, who died a year before he did. They had eight children, four of whom became Lutheran ministers: David Frederick Schaeffer, Frederick Christian Schaeffer, Charles Frederick Schaeffer, and Frederick Solomon Schaeffer. Frederick Solomon died at 25, but his son Charles William Schaeffer also became a Lutheran clergyman.

See also
David Frederick Schaeffer (son), Frederick Christian Schaeffer (son), Charles Frederick Schaeffer (son), Charles William Schaeffer (grandson).