Cape Bedford Mission

The Cape Bedford Mission was the first Christian mission on the Cape York Peninsula of Queensland, Australia. It is the oldest surviving mission in northern Queensland.

Founded by Lutheran staff from the Cooper Creek area of South Australia (who also established the Elim Aboriginal mission in Queensland), it became a stable community with the assignment of two young Neuendettelsau missionaries (George Schwarz and Wilhelm Poland). Schwarz stayed for 55 years, and Poland for 20; they added the Hope Vale site.

The community was evacuated during World War II because its German missionaries were reclassified as "enemy aliens" and imprisoned for the duration. After the war, Hope Vale was established on a new site. Schwarz is still remembered there; it has remained a cohesive community, home to indigenous activists.

The Cape Bedford mission was seen as a stepping stone into New Guinea, which Germany had acquired in 1884, Papua was British. Johann Flierl, who was working at the Cooper Creek mission in South Australia, was authorized to start a Lutheran mission in New Guinea. However, he was delayed for several months in Cookstown in 1885 and used this time to establish the Cape Bedford mission.

Flierl stayed for six months before moving to German New Guinea. He was replaced by C. A. Meyer and his wife, Mathilde, from the Cooper Creek mission. In September 1886, George Pfalzer and his wife (also named Mathilde) arrived from Germany to assist Meyer.

In January 1887, government start-up funding for the mission was withdrawn. Its support was taken over by the Neuendettelsau Society in Bavaria and German Lutheran communities in southern Australia. After another reorganization of the mission staff, George Schwarz arrived in September 1887 and Wilhelm Poland in 1889. These missionaries and their wives helped stabilize the mission and make it more cohesive. The Polands ran a school at Elim, while Schwarz settled with the young men on a new outstation at Hopevale for agricultural and pastoral work.

...
Wikipedia