William Muhlenberg Hiester, Lawyer, was born at Reading, Berks county, Pennsylvania, May 15th, 1818. He is a son of the late Dr. Isaac Hiester, for many years a distinguished physician of Reading, and grandson, on the maternal side, of General Peter Muhlenberg of revolutionary renown. His mother, Hetty Muhlenberg, was the last surviving child of that eminent soldier and statesman, and died at Reading, in the autumn of 1872, in the eighty-eighth year of her age. He received his early education at West Nottingham Academy, Cecil county, Maryland, a somewhat noted institution in its day, under the charge of the Rev. James Magraw, D.D., a leading old-school divine of the Presbyterian Church. He subsequently entered Bristol College, Pennsylvania, which was founded under the auspices of the Protestant Episcopal Church, with the Rev. Chauncey Colton, D.D., as President; and graduated in the class of 1837, the second and last class of graduates from that college, which became financially involved in the crisis of 1837, and was compelled to wind up its affairs. He read law with the Hon. John Banks, President Judge of the Courts of Berks county, and completed his legal studies during the winter of 1838-9, at the law school of Harvard University, under the direction of those celebrated jurists, Justice Joseph Story and Professor Simon Greenleaf. He was admitted to the bar, January 7th, 1840, at Reading. In the year 1843, the honorary degree of A.M. was conferred upon him by the faculty of Harvard. He practised his profession for four years at Erie, Pennsylvania, and returned to Reading in 1845, where he associated himself with his relative, the late Hon. Henry A. Muhlenberg, and in that connection succeeded to an active practice at the bar of Berks county. Among his contemporaries were a number of able attorneys, who have since risen to distinction in public life. In October, 1852, he was elected to the Senate of Pennsylvania, as the successor of his colleague at the bar, Mr. Muhlenberg, who at the same election was chosen to represent the district of Berks county in the Congress of the United States. His senatorial term embraced the sessions of 1853,-'54 and '55, during which he ranked among the foremost men on the Democratic side. He served as a member of the Committee on the Judiciary for the first year, and at the next was advanced to the Chairmanship of the same important committee, which he filled with the exceptional ability for which his characteristic clear judgment and thorough education in the principles and practice of the law, so-well qualified him. At the opening of the session of 1855, after twenty-six ineffectual ballotings for Speaker of the Senate, (that body being then composed of sixteen Democrats, fifteen Americans, and one Old-Line Whig, Mr. Darsie, of Allegheny county--with one vacancy in a Philadelphia district,) he was elected to that honorable position, on the twenty-seventh ballot, by the votes of his fifteen Democratic colleagues and the vote of Mr. Darsie, who, being of foreign birth, was excluded from political association with the American party of that day. His course as Speaker was distinguished for dignity, firmness, and impartiality. Upon the accession of Governor William F. Packer to the Executive chair, in January, 1858, he was tendered the appointment of Secretary of the Commonwealth, which he accepted with some reluctance. He continued in that office as one of the Governor's most trusted confidential advisors, during the three trying years of his administration, which immediately preceded the war. He supported Stephen A. Douglas for the Presidency in the canvass of 1860, and when, by the disruption of the National Democratic party and the election of Lincoln, the rebellion of the Southern States was precipitated, he gave his hearty adhesion to the Administration in all its measures for the prosecution of the war for the maintenance of the Union. In the summer of 1863, when the soil of Pennsylvania was invaded by the Confederate army under General Lee, he was appointed by Governor Curtin one of the mustering officers, with the rank of Major, to muster in the troops that volunteered for ninety days' service in response to the Governor's proclamation of June 26th, 1863, calling for sixty thousand men for the defence of the State. He was assigned to duty at the temporary rendezvous on the Agricultural Fair Grounds at Reading, which was designated, in compliment to him, "Camp Hiester" and in the execution of his military commission, mustered into the State service eight full regiments of volunteers, comprising an aggregate force of eight thousand men. He has since acted with the Republican party, and at the election of October, 1864, was the Republican candidate for Congress in the Berks county district. Since then, he has in a great measure withdrawn from active participation in public affairs, although he continues to take a lively interest in all enterprises of a benevolent, religious, and business nature which have in view the moral and material advancement of his native city. He is a Director in the Reading Library Company, the Charles Evans Cemetery Company, and the Reading Gas Company, and a liberal supporter of the public and private charities of the place.
Source: The Biographical Encyclopedia of Pennsylvania of the Nineteenth Century. Philadelphia: Galaxy Publishing Co., 1874, pp. 367-368.
Contributed by: Nancy.