SCHMIDT, Frederick Augustus, clergyman, born in Leutenberg, Germany, 3 January, 1837. In 1841 he came to the United States with his widowed mother to settle in Missouri with relatives that had emigrated in 1839 with the Saxon colony under the leadership of Martin Stephan. He was graduated at Concordia college in 1853, and at the theological seminary at St. Louis in 1857. In the same year he was ordained to the ministry at Eden, Erie County, New York He served as pastor there and in Baltimore, Maryland; was professor in the Norwegian Luther college, at Decorah, Iowa, in 1861-'71: in Concordia theological seminary, St. Louis, No., in 1871-'6 ; in the Norwegian Luther seminary, Madison, Wisconsin, in 1876-'86 ; and in Norwegian Lutheran divinity-school, Northfield, Minnesota, since 1886. He received the degree of D.D. in 1884 from Capitol university, Columbus, Ohio. He has for years been a leader among the Norwegian Lutherans. In 1873 he was sent as delegate from the Norwegian synod to the general assembly of the Norwegian mission society at Christiana, Norway. He was editor of the "Lutheran Watchman" in Decorah, Iowa, in 1864-'5 ; "Aldes und Neues " in Madison, Wisconsin, in 1880-'6 ; and "Lutherske Vidnesbyrd " in Madison, Wisconsin (now Northfield, Minnesota), in 1882-'7 ; and co-editor of " Kirketidende," at Decorah, Iowa, in 1865-'71, and "Lehre und Wehre " in St. Louis, No., in 1872-'6. He has published " Intuitu Fidei," a collection of testimonies from Lutheran authors on the question of predestination, the controversy on which point among Lutherans in America and Europe was started by the publication of "Altes und Neues " in 1880.