But this doesn't mean much. I tryed to recover mr3040. It has tfrt, it even loads the firmware, but doesn't flash it.
The TL-WR1043NDv1 didn't originally have tftp push-button recovery, it was only retrofitted in pretty late OEM firmware (u-boot) upgrades (around 2013).
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Bad news!
The older ones (TL-WR1043ND_V1_130325.zip and TL-WR1043ND_v1_130428.zip) doesn't have that awesome recovery function. 
I won't try them with ath79 images for now, sorry!
U-Boot 1.1.4 (Mar 19 2014 - 11:06:29) this one has it.
It is safe enough, because Wi-Fi works, but I understand you concern.
I'll probably test some old one from year '10 or '11.