Johanna Gertze

Johanna Uerieta Gertze (née Kazahendike) (c. 1840 – c. 1930) was a Namibian Herero and Christian convert.

Gertze worked in the household Carl Hugo Hahn and his wife at Otjikango. She initially came to the school at the mission to learn sewing, and soon became so proficient that she was teaching the art to others. She appears to have been fluent in English, Dutch, and German, and she assisted in translating a variety of materials into Herero. etween 1860 and 1862 Hahn published nine Herero publications in Germany, and there is evidence that Gertze assisted considerably in ensuring their success. She traveled with Hahn and his wife to Germany, participating in mission work as a convert and working on the books on Herero. In 1862 she came back to Cape Town, and in 1864 she returned to Otjikango. The following year she married the Herero-German Samuel Gertze. He was a widowed father of eight; the couple had nine more children in the ensuing fifteen years, ending with Samuel's death in 1880. Johanna worked as a midwife and pharmacist for the remainder of her life.[1] She was featured on a Namibian postage stamp in 1999.[2]

References

  1. ↑ Kathleen E. Sheldon (2005). Historical Dictionary of Women in Sub-Saharan Africa. Scarecrow Press. ISBN 978-0-8108-5331-7.
  2. ↑ "Stamp: Johanna Gertze (Namibia 1999) – TouchStamps". touchstamps.com. Retrieved 26 September 2017.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.