hencke

Updated: May 15, 2025

It was on the night of the eighth of December, 1845, that the German astronomer Hencke discovered the fifth asteroid and named it Astræa. After a year and a half, namely, on the night of the first of July, 1847, the same observer discovered the sixth member of the group, and to this was given the name Hebe.

- Notable Events of the Nineteenth Century: Great Deeds of Men and Nations and the Progress of the World

Piazzi died in 1826, Harding in 1834, Olbers in 1840; all those who had prepared or participated in the first discoveries passed away without witnessing their resumption. In 1830, however, a certain Hencke, ex-postmaster in the Prussian town of Driessen, set himself to watch for new planets, and after fifteen long years his patience was rewarded.

Agnes M. (Agnes Mary) Clerke - A Popular History of Astronomy During the Nineteenth Century: Fourth Edition

There the case rested till 1845, when a Prussian amateur astronomer named Hencke found another asteroid, after long searching, and opened a new epoch of discovery. From then on the finding of asteroids became a commonplace.

Edward Huntington Williams - A History of Science — Volume 3