In 1903, Elizabeth Halford and her husband and family decided to make a fresh start in Western Australia after some disastrous farming seasons in South Australia. Mrs Halford was born Elizabeth Patience SHEPPEARD, the daughter of a Royal Navy paymaster and his wife and married William Henry HALFORD in 1881. They had three sons and four daughters.
Elizabeth Patience Halford
The entire family undertook the 1300 mile trek, bringing with them a buggy, wagon, cart, farming implements, a bicycle, and some horses and bullocks and they drove their cattle across the parched vastness of the Nullabour Plain. They left Mintabying near Tarcoola, South Australia in June 1903; after being delayed for a full year because of drought at Fowlers Bay, they arrived at Bulong in the Western Australian Goldfields on Christmas Eve 1904. The journey took 18 months.
The Halford bullock Cart and wagon
The journey was incredibly hazardous, the cattle were driven over cliffs and around blowholes and landslips and the vehicles were bogged and had to be man handled through impossible terrain. The family passed on, always searching for water and feed, moving from waterhole to waterhole and travelling at night to avoid the heat. Elizabeth and the girls would sometimes ride in the carts and other time on the horses, especially when wandering cattle had to be rounded up. They would wait at each waterhole till William and the boys had located the next one.
The Halford Family on route to Western Australia
Will, the eldest son, arrived at their destination in Bulong with Typhoid Fever, but survived. Not one head of cattle was lost. The Courage of Elizabeth Halford in taking part in the epic journey that few men would be willing to tackle, was greatly admired on the Goldfields in a day when women were constantly exhibiting their endurance in the face of spirit destroying hardships.
She and her daughters soon went into business in Kalgoorlie, establishing a dairy, while two of the sons became successful pastoralists. Later, leaving the dairy in the hands of a third son, Elizabeth moved to Mt Barker to settle with her husband and daughters.
The Halford Dairy
Elizabeth Patience Halford passed away in 1940 aged 87yrs. Her husband had died 12 years prior. She was survived by all her seven children. She was buried in the Quairading Cemetery, WA on the 31st Jul 1940. She has many descendants still living in Western Australia.
York Chronicle Friday 9 August 1940, page 4
The story of the Halford’s family remarkable journey across Australia is part of the rich history in the forging of our great state.
The full story (and others) can be read in this publication available from Hesperian Press or your local library:
The Overlanders Crossing the Nullarbor 1870s – 1970s
by Peter J Bridge with Ian Murray
ISBN 978-0-85905-496-6, 2011, $55.00* + POST
This collection contains all the pre WWII material on Nullarbor crossings that could be found. The emphasis is on those who travelled by boot, bicycle, camel, horse, wheelbarrow, covered wagon, and early cars and motorbikes.
Moya Sharp
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