HistoricSiteMarkers
Early Republic

Henniger Family Cemetery

Industry, Austin County, Texas

Marker Inscription

(1 mi. west of this site) Nicholaus Henniger (1794-1853) came to Texas from Germany in 1847 with his wife Fredericke and children Christian, Hermann, August, Caroline and Pauline. On his farm he built a log house, kept peace with passing Indians, and prospered as a cattleraiser. With neighbors, he helped build a gristmill, establish a school, and preserve German traditions. At death of an infant son, Carl, he set aside a family cemetery (one mile west). Nicholaus Henniger and nine other family members also are buried in the plot. The farm is still owned by descendants, the Vogelpohl family. (1975)

Erected by Texas Historical Commission

The Story

Nicholaus Henniger (1794–1853) emigrated from Germany in 1847 with his wife Fredericke and their children, building a log house and prospering as a cattle raiser on the Texas frontier. Alongside his neighbors he helped raise a gristmill, establish a school, and keep German traditions alive. When an infant son died, he set aside this family cemetery, where he and nine relatives are buried; the farm remains in the hands of his Vogelpohl descendants.

Why it matters

The Hennigers were part of the great wave of German immigration that shaped the culture, farms, and towns of 19th-century Texas.

Own a business near here? Add it to the map.

Related people

  • · Nicholaus Henniger

Themes & tags

ImmigrationWestward ExpansionFrontier HistoryLandmark

Nearby & related markers

Bednar Family Homestead

Burton, TX

Czech immigrants Joseph and Anna Bednar arrived in Texas in 1876 with their six children, part of the wave of Central European families who settled the farmlands of Austin County. After Joseph's death that same year, Anna and the children worked as tenant farmers until she bought 195 acres in 1883, and much of that land has stayed in the family under continuous cultivation. Over generations the Bednars helped build a thriving Czech community, founding Sacred Heart Catholic Church and cemetery, the County Line School, and the roads and mail routes that knit the area together.

Pagel Cemetery

Fayetteville, TX

Gottfried and Friedrike Pagel came to Texas from Pomerania in 1850 with eight children, buying land in this vicinity in 1852; Friedrike died the next year after the birth of her ninth child. Their son Wilhelm built a stone house, ran a store, and served as first postmaster of the community then called Rock House, and his 1873 burial on the family land became the first marked grave in what grew into Pagel Cemetery. Many neighbors of German heritage joined the Pagels here, and their descendants still maintain the grounds.

McGregor Cemetery (Scottish Presbyterian Cemetery)

Nelsonville, TX

In the early 1850s a close-knit band of Scottish immigrants—McGregors, Carmichaels, McLeans and more, many from the isle of Lismore in Argyllshire—settled western Austin County by way of North Carolina. They founded Galatia Presbyterian Church and, in 1868, opened this graveyard with the burial of Mary McGregor. When the last interment came in 1900, the cemetery remained as the community's final trace.

Charles Fordtran

Industry, TX

Charles Fordtran, a German of Huguenot descent, joined Stephen F. Austin's colony in January 1831 and earned a league of land surveying for Austin's partner Samuel May Williams. He fought in frontier clashes, rode with the "Spy Rangers" protecting fleeing families during the Texas Revolution, and raised fourteen children on his land near Industry. Arriving well before the great wave of German immigration, he was among the first Teutonic settlers in Texas.