DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about the Hector Family Cemetery in Hays County. Now, when Scottish immigrants settle in Virginia and name their children after characters out of Homer's Iliad, you know you're dealing with a family that takes the old stories seriously. And this story — well, it's got enough in it to fill a few campfire nights all on its own.
Astyanax Troy Hector was born in 1823, the son of those Scottish immigrants, right there in Virginia. Astyanax Troy. Named for a prince of Troy.
Though somewhere along the way, folks started calling him Stine, and I suspect that tells you something about the gap between the name you're given and the life you actually live. The family pulled up stakes and relocated to Texas sometime between 1838 and 1846. Astyanax Troy made himself useful in about every way a man could — farmer, hatmaker, land surveyor.
A man who could read the land and shape it, whether he was measuring an acre or growing something on it. In 1851, he married Sarah Jane Hocker. Together they built a family, and together they built a life on that farm.
But in 1864, Sarah Jane died giving birth to their seventh child. Seven children, and the youngest one cost her everything. The family cemetery, the marker tells us, was probably established by their firstborn — who buried Sarah Jane right there on the family farm, near the house.
That firstborn child dug a grave for their mother, and in doing so, set the ground apart. That's how a cemetery begins, sometimes. Not with plans or proclamations, but with grief and a patch of earth close to home.
Now, Astyanax Troy was away during all of this. The Civil War had him gone. And when he came home, what he found was his thirteen-year-old son, Valerus Gordon Hector, holding the whole thing together — the farm, the family, all of it — on the shoulders of a boy who wasn't quite yet a man.
In 1865, Astyanax Troy married Susan Nancy Hocker, the youngest sister of his first wife Sarah Jane. And together they had eleven children. Eleven.
The Hector family farm must have been a lively place. Astyanax Troy Hector died in 1905. And the marker notes that he was the last family member to be buried at this site — the man who had carried that family through war and loss and two marriages and a life measured out in fields and survey lines, laid to rest in the same ground where his first wife had been placed decades before.
The cemetery he likely never planned, started by a grief-stricken firstborn in 1864, ended with him. Sometimes the old stories have a shape to them that Homer himself might've appreciated.
What the marker says
Astyanax Troy Hector was born to Scottish immigrants in Virginia in 1823. Though the Hector children were named for Homer's Iliad, Astyanax Troy was later nicknamed "Stine." The family relocated to Texas between 1838 and 1846. Astyanax Troy Hector was a farmer, hatmaker and land surveyor. He married Sarah Jane Hocker in 1851. She died giving birth to their seventh child in 1864. The family cemetery was probably established by their firstborn when he buried her on the family farm near the house. When Hector returned home from the Civil War, he found his thirteen-year-old son, Valerus Gordon Hector, caring for the farm and family. Hector married his wife's youngest sister, Susan Nancy Hocker, in 1865 and they had eleven children. Astyanax Troy Hector died in 1905 and was the last family member to be buried at this site. (1999) Historic Texas Cemetery medallion (added to post)