John Helm
John Thomas Helm was a medical missionary and one of the first translators of the Bible into languages native to Zimbabwe.
Helm was born on June 2 1861, Bredasdorp, Cape Colony, Southern Africa. He qualified as a doctor in Glasgow, Scotland and was ordained as the first Missionary Doctor of the NG Kerk.
He returned to South Africa and later left for Morgenster Mission near Great Zimbabwe ruins in 1894. At Morgenster he settled to work and concentrated on translations of the Bible into local Zimbabwean languages like Shona, Ndebele, Kalanga etc becoming one of the first known people to carry out such work.
On the 1st of October John married Susanna Elizabeth Myburgh a native of Graaff Reinet, Cape Colony, Southern Africa.
Helm died on November 30, 1916 in Robertson, Cape Colony, Southern Africa aged 55.
