Gert Andries Jacobus Alberts (born 3 January 1836 in

Swellendam Swellendam is the fifth oldest town in South Africa (after Cape Town, Stellenbosch, Simon's Town, and Paarl), a town with 17,537 inhabitants situated in the Western Cape province. The town has over 50 provincial heritage sites, most of them ...

– died 29 March 1927 in

Humpata Humpata is a town and municipality in the province of Huíla, Angola. The municipality had a population of 89,144 in 2014. Humpata was the primary destination of the Trekboers on the Dorsland Trek in the 1870s. These Afrikaners formed the majo ...

) was the leader of the First Dorsland Trek. He was a member of the Gereformeerde Kerk (or 'Dopper' church) and served as a church elder (‘kerkraadslid’). Elected leader of the trekkers, he left

Pretoria Pretoria () is South Africa's administrative capital, serving as the seat of the Executive (government), executive branch of government, and as the host to all foreign embassies to South Africa. Pretoria straddles the Apies River and extends ...

on 27 May 1874. Alberts led ten families across the

Kalahari The Kalahari Desert is a large semi-arid sandy savanna in Southern Africa extending for , covering much of Botswana, and parts of Namibia and South Africa. It is not to be confused with the Angolan, Namibian, and South African Namib coastal de ...

, taking 50 oxwagons and 1,400 cattle with them. He split the trek in three groups, with a two-day interval between them, to avoid overcrowding the rare waterholes along the path. Three families turned back before they crossed the Kgalagadi Desert, where a handful of cattle were lost during the waterless journey. Reaching

Lake Ngami Lake Ngami is an endorheic lake in Botswana north of the Kalahari Desert. It is seasonally filled by the Taughe River, an effluent of the Okavango River system flowing out of the western side of the Okavango Delta. It is one of the fragmented remn ...

on 29 April 1875, they demanded

Hendrik van Zyl Hendrik Matthys van Zyl (van Zijl), the "Laird of Ghanzi" (19 October 1828 – June 1880) was the first Afrikaner settler in Ghanzi, Botswana. A former politician in Transvaal, he crossed the Kalahari several times and set up a small trading en ...

, a trader based in

Ghanzi Ghanzi is a town in the middle of the Kalahari Desert the western part of the Republic of Botswana in southern Africa. The region is the country's pride in contributing a large portion towards the beef industry. In fact, Ghanzi farmers provides ...

with a reputation for ruthlessness, access to his wells, but he initially refused. He ultimately agreed to let them have water, and the trekkers continued to

Rietfontein Rietfontein is a town in ZF Mgcawu District Municipality located in the Northern Cape province of South Africa. It functions as the Rietfontein Borderpost with Namibia during the day hours of 08:00-16:30, that gives access to and from south-east ...

, on the border with

German Southwest Africa German South West Africa (german: Deutsch-Südwestafrika) was a colony of the German Empire from 1884 until 1915, though Germany did not officially recognise its loss of this territory until the 1919 Treaty of Versailles. With a total area of ...

. The group arrived in Rietfontein in January 1876, and Andries Lambert, the

Oorlams Oorlams (also: ''Oorlands'', ''Oorlans'') is a dialect of Afrikaans spoken in the Republic of South Africa and Namibia, by the Oorlam people. It is considered to be either an Afrikaans-based creole language or a dialect of Afrikaans proper. Oo ...

captain at

Gobabis , nickname = , settlement_type = City , motto = Ex Oriente Lux , image_skyline = Gobabis Namibia aerial.jpg , imagesize = 300px , imag ...

, granted them permission to stay. They remained for a year, leaving only when they received a call for help from the second party of Dorsland Trekkers; they had attempted to cross the Kgalagadi with 500 people in 128 wagons, more than could be supported by the desert environment. Alberts and his group managed to rescue some of them, and they continued their trek, reaching Okavango, where they were struck by

malaria Malaria is a mosquito-borne infectious disease that affects humans and other animals. Malaria causes symptoms that typically include fever, tiredness, vomiting, and headaches. In severe cases, it can cause jaundice, seizures, coma, or death. S ...

. Over a period of five years, the survivors arrived in the

Highlands, in present-day

Angola , national_anthem = " Angola Avante"() , image_map = , map_caption = , capital = Luanda , religion = , religion_year = 2020 , religion_ref = , coordina ...

; where Alberts died in 1927.

References

External links

Photo and coordinates of his grave
on Panoramio {{DEFAULTSORT:Alberts, Gert 1836 births 1927 deaths Afrikaner people People from Swellendam Angolan people of Afrikaner descent