diff --git a/gettext.c b/gettext.c
index d4021d690c..3f2aca5c3b 100644
--- a/gettext.c
+++ b/gettext.c
@@ -12,7 +12,25 @@
 #ifndef NO_GETTEXT
 #	include <locale.h>
 #	include <libintl.h>
-#	ifdef HAVE_LIBCHARSET_H
+#	ifdef GIT_WINDOWS_NATIVE
+
+static const char *locale_charset(void)
+{
+	const char *env = getenv("LC_ALL"), *dot;
+
+	if (!env || !*env)
+		env = getenv("LC_CTYPE");
+	if (!env || !*env)
+		env = getenv("LANG");
+
+	if (!env)
+		return "UTF-8";
+
+	dot = strchr(env, '.');
+	return !dot ? env : dot + 1;
+}
+
+#	elif defined HAVE_LIBCHARSET_H
 #		include <libcharset.h>
 #	else
 #		include <langinfo.h>