St. Martin's Lutheran Church, Austin, Texas

Lutheran Church in Austin, Texas. On March 4, 1883 a group of families of German descent met for their first bimonthly worship in Austin’s First Presbyterian Church. They were led by Reverend Henry Merz, a Swiss missionary who came to Texas after the Civil War and was called to Austin to lead the German mission church by the First German Evangelical Lutheran Synod of Texas and the German Home Mission Committee of the Lutheran General Council of North America. Three months later, the congregation of twenty founding families was given its name: Deutshe Evangelische Lutherische St. Martin’s Kirche.