Lillian May Telfer

Role: Daughter of Adam Francis Telfer and Margaret Dougal Telfer

Born: 7 August 1873 — Edgerston, South Australia
Died: 20 August 1951 — buried Manjimup, Western Australia

Father: Adam Francis Telfer (1842–1925)
Mother: Margaret Dougal Telfer (1849–1936)

Photo

John James Smith and his cousin, Lillian May Telfer — group portrait from the family book, in which Lillian stands at left behind her seated cousin. Lillian May was a Telfer by birth (daughter of Adam Francis Telfer and Margaret Dougal Telfer) — a cousin of John James Smith through the shared Telfer line — and here appears young, in an ornate dark dress with puffed sleeves and a multi-strand pearl necklace, before her long nursing years on the Kalgoorlie and Norseman goldfields and her 1922 marriage to Charlie McElhone. The printed plate caption reads "John James Smith and his cousin, Lillian May Telfer". (From the Borders to the Bush, 1989 — plate; photograph supplied by Mark Telfer)

Family

Life Summary

Lillian May Telfer was born on 7 August 1873 at Edgerston, South Australia, and died on 20 August 1951, buried at Manjimup, Western Australia. Daughter of Adam Francis Telfer and Margaret Dougal Telfer.

Source: A Telfer Family Tree — Supplement (2008), pp. 287 & 291: "3. Lillian May TELFER, b. 7 Aug 1873 Edgerston, SA d. 20 Aug 1951 bur Manjimup, WA + Charles McELHONE, b. circa 1885, m. 16 Apr 1922, d. 10 Nov 1971 bur Manjimup, WA". Read 3 Oct 2026 — both witnesses agree (publisher's embedded text layer and WeVisDoc-2B OCR both print 7 Aug 1873). The vault held 1872 with no source; corrected 3 Oct 2026.

Provisional: accepted under the 2026-10-03 soft-yes rule — certainly correct on today's evidence (two independent readers of the printed page), receipt attached, flagged for re-check when a South Australian birth registration is released or the $780 printed copy arrives.

Family Stories

🖊️ Anecdote — as told in From the Borders to the Bush (book pp. 286–287): Lill was the free spirit of the lot. Off she went nursing — and not gently; she took on the goldfields, Kalgoorlie and Norseman, tending miners in the heat and dust when the town was rough with money and men. Then she fell for an Irishman, Charlie McElhone, a larrikin who'd fought with the 16th Battalion in the first war and helped lay the Mundaring–Kalgoorlie water pipeline. They wed in 1922 and took up one of those Group 19 soldier-settlement dairies out near Manjimup. Oh, they worked their fingers to the bone on that place, and Lill had the cheek to christen it 'Slave-On Farm' — her little joke on the settlers they'd made us farmers into. She reckoned she scrubbed herself clean in a kerosene tin lit by a candle, no running water to speak of, and she laughed about it all her days. She died in 1951.

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

Receipt (why this page may be admitted)

Receipt: A Telfer Family Tree — Supplement (2008) pp.287 & 291 — '3. Lillian May TELFER, b. 7 Aug 1873 Edgerston, SA d. 20 Aug 1951 bur Manjimup, WA + Charles McELHONE'. Both witnesses print 7 Aug 1873; vault's unsourced 1872 corrected 3 Oct 2026.

Standard applied: soft yes / provisional (How We Work, settled 3 Oct 2026) — certainly correct on today's evidence, receipt attached, no certificate required.

Provisional flag: re-checked on the yearly pass and hardened if a certificate or released register arrives.

Sources