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Helene von Falkenhausen was a German farmer, author, and teacher in German Southwest Africa. She was born in Gniezno on June 17, 1873. Her father, Albert Nitze, emigrated the family to German Southwest Africa in 1894. Helene worked as a teacher in Windhoek.
Helene married a merchant named Friedrich Ernst Alexander Konrad Freiherr von Falkenhausen on January 24, 1899. She had three children before Friedrich was killed by insurgents on their farm on January 13, 1904. After his death, she found herself threatened into returning to Germany. Her younger son died during her journey, but she successfully gave birth to a daughter several months afterward.
Helene processed her experiences in autobiographical works. In April 1908, she taught in a colonial school where she instructed young women on necessary practical and theoretical knowledge and training. Year later she returned to German Southwest Africa and leased a farm for the purpose of teaching and training others in the same skills. The school was not profitable and failed in 1914. In 1928, she returned to Germany, but spent a few years in South Africa before her death in Fürstenberg, Mecklenburg on December 10, 1945.
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