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Name: DREYER, Adrianna Johanna, Mrs

Birth Date: 30 Oct 1882 Harrismith, Orange Free State, S. Africa

Death Date: 28 Jan 1956 near Eldoret

First Date: 1911

Last Date: 1956

Profession: Midwife. Travelled all over the countryside as a District Nurse on a mule in all weathers. There was only one doctor, Dr. Heard. Mrs Johnson built the first maternity home.

Area: Eldoret

Married: 1. Garnet Dreyer (1874-1939); 2. Johannes Jan De Waal (1882-1961)

Children: Albert Napier (21 Feb 1901 Pietermaritzburg-7 Feb 1983 Victoria, Australia); Ivan Garnet (15 Oct 1915 Eldoret-18 Apr 1973 Toronto) ; Joseph Edwin Lythgoe Cureden (1 Sep 1904); Michael (1905-1932 Eldoret)

Book Reference: KFA, Eldoret, Nicholson Memoirs, Hut, Red 22, Pioneers, Habari 2009, Gazette, Red 19, Barnes

General Information:

KFA - In 1912 Mrs Dreyer, who had trained in midwifery, settled on the Plateau with her husband and for many years, until the building of the hospital, she, like Dr Heard, answered all the calls made upon her and brought, it is said, 298 babies into the world, many of them in the most difficult of circumstances; many, also, without payment and nearly all without medical aid. Her only memorial is the affection in which her memory is held by all those who knew her. She died near Eldoret in 1956, having by then lost her first husband and married Mr John de Waal.
Eldoret - Mrs Dreyer as she was then, delivered nine of Mrs A. Cloete's thirteen children. She was the first to have light from the power station in her Nursing Home. She was very fond of children and used to mind them while parents went on safari.
Gazette - 29/10/1919 - Register of Voters - Plateau South - Adriana Johanna Dreyer, Nurse
Red Book 1919 - Education Dept. - Uasin Gishu - Matron - Mrs Dreyer
Nicholson - had a maternity home in Eldoret
Gazette 6 Dec 1938 Uasin Gishu Voters Roll
Barnes Eldoret cem. (gives full dates)

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