Bertha Telfer

Role: Adopted daughter of John & Caroline Telfer — missionary, "first white woman" in remote NW-Australian postings
Born: ~1872 (aged 93 at death in 1965)
Died: 10 August 1965 — Serene Nursing Home, Lockleys, South Australia
Buried: West Terrace Cemetery, Adelaide (Portion Road 5 Ext)
Spouse: James Alcorn (official, Broome pearl fisheries); one son Frank

Life Summary

Bertha was the adopted daughter of John and Caroline Telfer. As a child her mother died and her father — a Swiss immigrant named Moelling — could not care for his four children, so Bertha was taken in and raised by the Telfer family. She studied at Rev Lockhart Morton's College in Adelaide preparing for missionary service and was accepted by the United Aborigines Mission in December 1908. At the Burnt Bridge Mission on the Macleay River in 1906, she gave addresses alongside Mrs Rudder and Mrs Ingram. She was a tiny woman with enormous courage — the book Amongst Australian Aborigines describes her going to many places where a white woman had never been before, full of fun, with a simple faith. She would "just say a little prayer and the dear Lord will look after me." She later worked at La Grange Bay mission station in northwestern Australia (near Broome), a particularly remote posting. Around 1915–17 while at Sunday Island in the Buccaneer Archipelago near Broome, she met and married James Alcorn, an official with the Broome pearl fisheries. They had one son, Frank. After returning to South Australia and spending time at Willow Plains and Warcowie, they moved to New Guinea where Jim had a government job. They later lived at Clare and then Norwood, where they ran a small shop. After Jim's death, Bertha lived at Edwardstown in a granny flat built onto Frank's property until she became too feeble. She spent her remaining years at the Serene Nursing Home at Lockleys and died on 10 August 1965, aged 93. (From the Borders to the Bush, pp.127–129; Amongst Australian Aborigines, OCR ref line 16719: "Miss Bertha Telfer" at La Grange Bay, NW Australia)

Family Stories

🖊️ Anecdote — as told in From the Borders to the Bush (book pp. 127–129): Bertha was a tiny thing by anybody's measure — not the sort you'd picture knocking about the roughest end of the country. But when the call went out for a woman to take God's word into the far north-west, where no white woman had ever set foot, it was Bertha who crossed the sand. She didn't just preach; she swung a hammer and put up mission buildings with her own hands, one after another, out where there was nothing but heat and distance. And at La Grange Bay they found the most unlikely duty for her — she'd play her little organ for the prisoners, gentle music in a place that had never had any. Her faith was the plain, trusting sort, and it carried her through when stronger-looking folk wouldn't have lasted a month. She married James Alcorn toward the end of the Great War and settled into a quieter life, but she was the first white woman in that country, and nobody could take that from her.

(Anecdote only — family colour, told as the elders tell it. Does not establish any relationship, date or place.)

Sources

• Source (death/burial): Australian Cemeteries Index — Inscription 9612417, Bertha Alcorn (d. 10 Aug 1965, West Terrace Cemetery, Portion Road 5 Ext) — accessed 11 Aug 2026
• Source: Donald Telfer, From the Borders to the Bush (ISBN 0 7316 6387 X), pp. 127–129
• Source: E.J. Telfer, Amongst Australian Aborigines (1939) — "Miss Bertha Telfer" at La Grange Bay, NW Australia (OCR ref line 16719); Bertha Telfer appointed to run Dulhi-Gunyah June 1912–1913 (Find&Connect)