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Name: MACDONALD, Alexander Kemp 'Wanderobo'

Birth Date: 1 Feb 1862 Numba, New South Wales, Australia

Death Date: 18 Mar 1917 Saboti, Mt Elgon, blackwater fever

First Date: 1890 - Sudan Campaign from 1883, via Abyssinia & Somaliland

Last Date: 1918

Profession: To Australia in 1892, returned EA 1912 - Kitale & Mt Elgon. Crossed Nzoia River to start farming before 1914. North - Leader of caravan from Mombasa to Fort Smith c. 1890/1 - dep. EA 1892

Area: Trans Nzioa

Married: In Camberwarra, New South Wales 9 Dec 1885 Matilda Rebecca Gibson b. 2 Oct 1864 Numba, NSW, d. 26 May 1942 Kitale

Children: Nesta 'Nessie' (1888 Manly, NSW-1919); Ishtar (1890 Fivedock, NSW -1901); Desta (1 Nov 1893 Casaguaza, Paraguay-1939); Alexander Lynn (1896 Paraguay); Malcolm Ross (26 June 1902 Paraguay-1985); Noel (6 Jan 1904 Paraguay-1906);Dermot Noel (1906 Paraguay-1939 Saboti)

Book Reference: Gillett, KFA, Hut, North, Drumkey, Nicholls, Pioneer Spirit

General Information:

Travelled by ox-waggon. Wrote many articles for the Leader
Gillett - Previously in the Sudan Campaign from 1883, he crossed Abyssinia and Somaliland with his wife and daughter. Another daughter was called Desta after Ras Desta with whom he kept up a correspondence for many years. He conducted a caravan from Mombasa to Fort Smith and then in 1892 returned to Australia. In 1893 he led a party of settlers in a chartered ship to found the New Australian Colony in Paraguay, but left it to return to EA in 1912 with his wife, 3 sons and two daughters. He then travelled by ox-wagon from the railway at Kitale to Mt. Elgon and died there in 1918 from blackwater fever. In later years several of his family also died from the same disease. He wrote many articles for the Leader.
Nicholls - A.K. ('Wanderobo') Macdonald, who had lived in Paraguay, Australia and Abyssinia - indeed, he called one of his daughters Nesta after the Abyssinian Ras of that name - and had written 'Picturesque Paraguay', was also to suffer from blackwater fever and die in 1918. Nesta, famed for riding across the veld on a sledge made of a thorn tree in the shape of a wishbone, which was drawn by 4 oxen and slithered across the grass as smoothly as on ice, died of the same illness soon afterwards. Both father and daughter were buried near the round hill of Saboti. A few years later Macdonald's son Noel also died, of malaria. The cairns of stones over the three graves disappeared over the years. Macdonald's wife Matilda, a good woman who followed her restless husband around the world, had more than her fair share of sorrows.
Gazette - 6/6/1917 - Probate and Administration - A.K. MacDonald who died at Trans Nzoia on 18th March 1917

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