William Asbury Christian (8 January 1866–1 May 1936), Methodist minister and writer, was born in Lynchburg and was the son of Cornelia Burton Christian and Edward Dunscomb Christian, a prominent lawyer. An elder brother, Frank Patteson Christian, served on two Special Courts of Appeals in the 1920s. After attending private schools and Lynchburg High School, Christian worked for four years in a Lynchburg railroad office. Entering Randolph-Macon College in 1886, he graduated with an A.B. in Latin in 1890. He received a B.D. from Vanderbilt University in 1892. Although most biographies note that Christian received a master's degree and an honorary doctorate of divinity, and although he was usually addressed as Doctor Christian, neither Randolph-Macon nor Vanderbilt record awarding him such higher degrees. On 18 October 1893 he married Anna Edith McMullan, of Madison County. They had two daughters.
In 1892 W. Asbury Christian joined the Virginia Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church South. He was pastor of Richmond's Washington Street Methodist Episcopal Church for three years and the city's Asbury Methodist Church for one year and then served as minister at Centenary Methodist Church in Lynchburg until 1900 and at Berkley-Memorial Methodist Church in Norfolk from then until 1904. After pastorates at High Street Methodist Church in Petersburg (1904–1906) and Trinity Methodist Church in Newport News (1906–1908), Christian became presiding elder of the Richmond District in 1908. After four years in that office, he served as minister of Richmond's Union Station and Branch Memorial Methodist Church from 1912 to 1916.
As a clergyman, Christian vigorously championed traditional morality but welcomed innovative church policies. An outspoken advocate of prohibition, he held important committee positions in the Anti-Saloon League of Virginia for more than three decades. Before World War I, Christian deplored football as dangerous, condemned new dances as immodest, and later advocated state censorship of motion pictures. Believing that a woman's place was in the home, he denounced woman suffrage. By contrast, Christian promoted social services at Richmond's Broad Street Methodist Church. He supported interdenominational cooperation among Richmond Protestants and in 1925 voted at the Virginia Conference for an unsuccessful plan to unify the two branches of the Methodist Church, which had split before the Civil War. Christian served on numerous boards and committees of the Virginia Conference (including two terms as president of the Board of Missions for 1907–1908 and 1908–1909 and as secretary of the Joint Board of Finance between 1914 and 1918). Several times he was a delegate to the quadrennial General Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church South.
Christian made his most enduring mark with two books, Lynchburg and Its People (1900) and Richmond: Her Past and Present (1912). The books shared notable strengths and weaknesses. Filling a historical void for each city, the volumes long served as standard accounts of their communities. Christian recounted major events in a chronological framework and described such occasions as parades, conventions, mass meetings, and public funerals that were common in the nineteenth century. Admittedly favoring a historical approach that identified achievements and recognized heroic deeds, he repeatedly recited episodes of business and political success yet did not ignore human foibles or institutional failures. Christian often quoted primary documents at length and also depicted such community tragedies as epidemics, floods, and fires. Largely confining his accounts to facts, he praised individual character, acts of collective generosity, technological improvements, and evidence of community progress, and he occasionally attempted to characterize the corporate mood of each city during specific historical periods.
By addressing social, economic, and political developments, Christian intended to write comprehensive histories of the two cities, but he devoted little attention to women, African Americans, ethnic groups, and industrial workers. Reflecting the racism of his time, he characterized Native Americans as savages and endorsed segregation of whites and blacks. He offered little explanation or analysis in enumerating important episodes. Though clearly based on extensive research, both of his urban histories lacked notes and bibliographies. Despite these flaws, Lynchburg and Its People and Richmond: Her Past and Present contain valuable information and remain useful resources. A similar statement cannot be made about Christian's Marah: A Story of Old Virginia, a melodramatic historical novel published in 1903. Preoccupied with celebrating Virginia's antebellum social order, Christian created a convoluted, sentimental plot to illustrate the perceived social and political horrors of the Civil War and Reconstruction.
In 1916 Christian began his career as an educator by accepting the position of Richmond commissioner for Emory University. Two years later his Anti-Saloon League ally, James Cannon, selected Christian to succeed him as president of Blackstone Female Institute, a secondary school and junior college. Christian allowed a new student council to acquire significant responsibility over student behavior and social events, and the college reached an unprecedented level of enrollment. Two devastating fires, in 1920 and 1922, requiring reconstruction of large buildings, dealt blows to the school's financial health, but it nevertheless won accreditation from the State Board of Education and in 1922 amended its charter under a new name, the Blackstone College for Girls. In 1920 Cannon began complaining of Christian's performance as president, and early in 1924 he let it be known that the president had lost his support, reportedly because he was insufficiently industrious at raising money. Later that year Christian resigned.
Resuming his ministry, Christian was pastor of Richmond's Barton Heights Methodist Church from 1924 to 1928, followed by one year at Monumental Methodist Church in Portsmouth, one year at the Martinsville Methodist Church, and one year at Berryman Methodist Church in Richmond. A conference evangelist between 1932 and 1934, he retired sometime after the Virginia Conference's annual meeting in October 1934. William Asbury Christian died in Richmond on 1 May 1936 and was buried in Spring Hill Cemetery, in Lynchburg. On 2 June 1937 his family had his body reinterred in Richmond's Hollywood Cemetery.
Sources Consulted:
Biographies in John J. Lafferty, Sketches and Portraits of the Virginia Conference, Twentieth Century Edition (1901), 391, 393 (portrait on 246), Philip Alexander Bruce, Lyon Gardiner Tyler, and Richard L. Morton, History of Virginia (1924), 5:59, and Bernard J. Henley, "W. Asbury Christian: Minister-Prohibitionist-Historian," Richmond Quarterly 4 (winter 1981): 51–52; birth date in Christian family Bible records (1842–1887), Virginia Museum of History and Culture, Richmond, Va.; Marriage Register, Madison Co., Bureau of Vital Statistics (BVS), Commonwealth of Virginia Department of Health, Record Group 36, Library of Virginia (LVA); David W. C. Bearr, Scholars for Blackstone (1992), 33–37 (portrait on 32); Bearr, Blackstone College History (1994), 28–32; BVS Death Certificate, Richmond City; obituaries in Lynchburg Daily Advance and Richmond News Leader, both 1 May 1936, Lynchburg News, New York Times, and Richmond Times-Dispatch, all 2 May 1936, and Richmond Christian Advocate, 14 May 1936; editorial tributes in Richmond Times-Dispatch, 2 May 1936, and Lynchburg Daily Advance, 4 May 1936; memorial in Virginia Methodist Conference Annual (1936), 67–68.
Photograph in Sketches and Portraits of the Virginia Conference, Twentieth Century Edition, 246.
Written for the Dictionary of Virginia Biography by Samuel C. Shepherd Jr.
How to cite this page:
Samuel C. Shepherd Jr., "William Asbury Christian (1866–1936)," Dictionary of Virginia Biography, Library of Virginia (1998– ), published 2024 (https://www.lva.virginia.gov/public/dvb/bio.asp?b=Christian_William_Asbury, accessed [today's date]).
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