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Name: VISSER family
Book Reference: Willie Joubert
General Information:
Willie Joubert Jan Visser died at Chunya in 1943. His wife, Ellie, and the children and grandchildren later moved to Kenya where they settled. The firstborn, Nicolaas Hendrik (Nick), was named after Great-grandpa Visser. In Kenya he married Sophie Joubert in 1938. Her one brother, Jan Joubert was tragically killed by an elephant. The animals were destroying the corn and he took a gun to scare them off without realizing that the gun was defective. An enraged bull charged him and, in the rush to escape, he stepped in an aardvark hole and fell and the elephant killed him. Nick and Sophie had the following children: Rita – Magdalena Maria Magrieta, born April 23, 1940, Elsie Josina, Hester Sophia and Willem Petrus, born March 8, 1939. Another boy died at age 3 when he had measles and wandered outside while his mother was also sick. He got sunstroke and died. My guess is that he was the oldest boy and named after his grandpa Johannes Stephanus Visser, as the other boy was named after his grandpa Joubert.
In Kenya Nick caught rhinoceroses for export overseas. They were kept in big enclosures and put in cages for export. Hester recalled how she climbed on the cages when she was a little girl before she went to school at Eldoret Hill. She also helped to make ‘hoodjie’ – runny sweet cornmeal porridge – that her dad gave the big animals and they could not get enough. They literally ate out of Nick’s hands.
Jan and Ellie’s oldest daughter, Ellie (Elsie Josina) was widowed in Chunya when her husband Lewies de Jager had contracted malaria on safari and died. Ellie and her three children, Louis, Elsie and Francis, moved to Kenya. She then married Thomas (Tommie) Pienaar. He was the brother of the Andries Albertus Pienaar, better known by his pen-name Sangiro, a very well-known Afrikaans author. Their parents with nine kids had settled in German East Africa in 1907 and most of them later moved to Kenya. Tommie worked for the municipality in Nairobi. Ellie and Tommie had one son, Abraham, better known as Awie. From Kenya they moved to Pretoria.
Ellie’s sister, Maggie, was also married at the Lupa and she and her husband, Lang Gert van der Merwe, with their two girls, Elsie Josina and Elizabeth Helena moved to Kenya. In Kenya the family grew as three more girls were born: On May 31, 1944 Margaretha Maria was born; on May 7, 1948 Dorothea Jacoba and on March 30, 1952 Christina Susanna (Kate). Years later when they joined the many that had left Kenya, Gert and Maggie bought a little farm near Brits.
Jan and Ellie’s fourth child was the son named after him, Johannes Stephanus Visser. He was born in 1921 and married Maria Jankowitch. They had two boys, Jannie and Hannes. The family also lived in Kenya, before moving to South Africa.
Jan and Ellie’s next child was a little girl, Annie, but she died at 9 months old. Next, they had a boy, Jacobus Cilliers (born Feb. 24, 1914). He was known as Koos and married Hendrina Cecilia Joubert (born June 4, 1918). She was the sister of Sophie Joubert who was married to his brother Nick. This family also stayed in Kenya and later moved to South Africa. Koos and Hendrina had six boys: Willie, Koos (Jacobus Cilliers, born April 6, 1941), Joof (Josua born June 4, 1944), Johannes Hendrik (Jan, born Oct. 18, 1946), Philippus Johannes and Johannes George (born March 6, 1955) and a daughter Lenie (Magdalena Elizabeth Smits, born Jan 10, 1946).
Philippus Jacobus Visser was the youngest boy of Jan and Elsie Visser and known as Flip. He was born in April, 1927. He married Margaretha van Rooyen, the daughter of Gert and Anna van Rooyen from Eldoret. This couple had two boys, Gert (Gerhardus Johannes) and Flippie (Phillippus Jacobus) and two girls, Anna (Anna Elsie) and Magriet (Magrietha). Before he married Margaretha van Rooyen, Flip had a relationship with Poppie Joubert. She got pregnant, but her father was angry and Flip was not allowed to visit. She gave birth to a girl, Cathy. His other children were not aware of their half-sister and only found out years later. They had brief contact with her, before she passed away. Flip served as Policeman and was called up to serve during the Emergency with the Mau-Mau. He also worked with the Locust control. His health suffered due to the insecticide used to spray the locusts. They moved to South Africa in the 60s.
Jan and Ellie Visser’s youngest, born on November 6, 1929, was Christina Susanna. She was known as Kittie or Kate. She married Johannes Marthinus Prinsloo at the courthouse in Nairobi in 1947. Johannes’ brother was a very colorful character, known as Groot Koos (Big Jack). They lived in Kenya. Kittie and Johannes had three children: Louisa Susanna born in 1949, Edward Charles born in 1951 and Maria Magdalena born in 1953. Kittie later settled in Barberton when they moved to South Africa.