Page 71 - The Diary of A. H. W. Behrens

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1873 – 1874
In 1873 my parents came to Natal with other wagons to buy goods and because I was sickly they took me along. So, my school time that had started in 1863 came to an envd.
In those ten years I had only been home once for a few months, in 1869/70.
The journey with the ox wagon took very long because the oxen got redwater disease, some of them died and we had to buy new oxen at ₤ 15 each. For a couple of weeks we stayed
at Empangweni with Missionary Hansen, then travelled up the van Reenen’s Pass through Harrysmith back home. There was much game.
From 1873 to March 1875 I stayed with my parents in Bethanie and helped them in the house and in the school. During this time, I learnt Setswana and helped my father with this and that. I painted the old church, doors and windows, cut thatch grass with many people in the veld and then sewed on the sheet metal at the top on the ridge. I did a lot of horseriding and hunted quite a bit.
When I was 20 years old my father expressed the wish that I should become a missionary and since I also wanted this, and Director Harms accepted me for June 1875, everything was prepared for my journey to Germany in 1875. I travelled with Hermann Hohls by ox wagon to Natal and from Durban by ship to Europe.