Sketch of a landscape view of Lake Poltalloch including Aboriginal people at a campsite.

Ngarrindjeri is an Aboriginal nation of 18 language groups who occupied, and still inhabit, the Lower Murray, Coorong and Lakes area of South Australia. Their lands and waters extended 30km up the Murray from Lake Alexandrina, the length of the Coorong and the coastal area to Encounter Bay. Today this Aboriginal group is still very strong, with a large community of people based in the Lower Murray and Coorong area.

Alexander Charles Kelly was born at Leith, Scotland in 1811. He was awarded a medical degree by Edinburgh University in 1832. Kelly acted as a surgeon on the East India Company's ships in 1833. He emigrated to South Australia aboard the Baboo in 1840 and began a medical practice at Port Adelaide. A year later, he was appointed assistant surgeon at Adelaide Hospital.

He subsequently bought land at Morphett Vale in 1842 and named the property 'Trinity'. In 1845, Kelly began planting vines on his property, and became a partner in Tintara Vineyard Company in 1862. Kelly was married in 1854 to Annie Worthington (1826-1912). He sold his Trinity vineyard and began planting vines for Tintara at Willunga in 1863. Tintara went into voluntary liquidation in the 1870s. Kelly retired in 1876 and died in 1877.

Kelly, Alex C., 1811-1877

Narrinyeri (Australian people)

Jenkin, Graham Conquest of the Ngarrindjeri Point McLeay, S. Aust.: Raukkan Publishers, [1995]

Mattingley, Christobel and Hampton, David, eds Survival in our own land: 'Aboriginal' experiences in 'South Australia' since 1836 Adelaide, S. Aust.: Wakefield Press, 1988

Taplin, George The Narrinyeri: an account of the tribes of South Australian Aborigines inhabiting the country around the Lakes Alexandrina, Albert and Coorong, and the lower part of the River Murray: their manners and customs, also an account of the mission at Point McLeay, Adelaide: J.T. Shawyer, 1874

Kelly papers (PRG 628, State Library of South Australia).

State Library of South Australia factsheets online The Ngarrindjeri people

Australian dictionary of biography onlineseeKelly, Alexander Charles 1811-1877