Botshabelo ("place of refuge" in the Northern Sotho language) in the district of Middelburg, in Mpumalanga Province, South Africa, originated as a mission station established by Alexander Merensky of the Berlin Missionary Society (BMS), in February 1865 in what was then the Transvaal Republic (ZAR).

[1][2] Merensky had fled with a small number of parishioners following the attacks on his previous mission station, Ga-Ratau, by the soldiers of Sekhukhune, the king of the baPedi.

In 1873 Merensky was joined by BMS missionary Johannes Winter, who went on to found the mission station at Thaba Mosego and also played an instrumental role in the establishment of the Lutheran Bapedi Church, when they seceded from the BMS in 1889.

Hence the Society's missionaries were often at the forefront of publishing Bible translations, dictionaries and grammars in indigenous languages.

It was as part of this process that Africans, duly trained and sometimes salaried, were accepted into the Society as teachers, catechists and lay-preachers, the so-called Nationalhelferen or national helpers.