Ned's Body

[Stephen Whiteside]

That's interesting, Neville.

Thanks, worddancer and Heather.

[Maureen K Clifford]

This might be of interest Stephen taken from our local paper the Queensland Times


Ipswich's links to the Kelly Gang could rewrite history after confirmation that the remains of Ned Kelly have been identified through DNA testing.
Doctors and scientists at the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine have confirmed the find at Melbourne's Pentridge prison.
Ipswich historian and councillor Paul Tully said that in 1933, a man claiming to be Dan Kelly walked into the offices of Brisbane's Sunday Truth Newspaper and said he and fellow bushranger Steve Hart had escaped the hotel fire at Glenrowan in 1880 and made their way to Queensland.

Cr Tully said the man appeared at the Brisbane Exhibition in 1934 in Sideshow Alley and displayed an intimate knowledge of the Kelly Gang and family and noone ever succeeded in exposing him as an impostor.

He lived for a time under the old railway bridge in suburban Toombul and at Ipswich, Rosewood and Fernvale.

In 1948, on the day he had been released from the Brisbane General Hospital, he was hit and killed by a coal train at the end of Wharf St, in Ipswich.

He was buried in a pauper's grave at the Ipswich General Cemetery on July 31 1948 under the named of James Ryan, which he adopted after coming to Queensland.

Cr Tully said former Moreton Shire deputy chairman John Harris, who still lives at Fernvale, recalled sitting in his lap as a young boy and said he had large burns and scars on his back which the man claimed he got in the fire at Glenrowan.

Cr Tully said the man had the initials "D.K." branded on his buttocks and John Harris swears to this day he had met the real Dan Kelly.

Cr Tully who has been following the Queensland connection to the Kelly Gang for more than 20 years said the DNA confirmation of the Kelly Gang leader brought forward the possibility of the remains at the Ipswich Cemetery being exhumed.

Cr Tully said the two bodies which came out of the fire at Glenrowan had been burnt beyond recognition and were never identified by the family.

He said it was possible the pair had escaped the fire in the smoke and confusion and that two of the townsfolk who had been taken hostage in the hotel by Ned Kelly had perished in the inferno.

"The final resting place of Ned Kelly's younger brother Dan could well be in the pauper's section of the Ipswich Cemetery where the Ipswich Council has erected a memorial to this man who died penniless and without any family or friends.

"Victorians have rejected the Queensland connection to the Kelly gang in the past but they have never been able to disprove it."
Cr Tully said if DNA testing proved it was Dan Kelly, Australia's history books on the Kelly Gang would have to be re-written.

[worddancer]

Hi Maureen,

Why would someone be branded on the buttocks with his own initials?

Amazing how the things can emerge from the past to become today's scientific mystery.
So long as the old records and books are retained when and if new evidence emerges, the full story can be told.
Hard copy is not easily doctored, but with electronic records alteration is easier.

Thanks for the historic report,

Eliza

[r.magnay]

If that is true it makes ned Kelly an even worse criminal, one or two innocent hostages perished while the murderers lived on!

[Stephen Whiteside]

Thanks, Maureen. I don't personally believe that Dan Kelly and Steve Hart escaped the fire at Annie Jones' Inn. I don't think any serious students of the Kelly story believe it either. As I recall, there was a passing parson who entered the Inn during the early stages of the fire, and identified the dead bodies of Kelly and Hart prior to their being burned. He described them in some detail, including the position in which they were lying. It seems likely they had taken poison (which they all carried for such a purpose - I think they had also poisoned their dog) and were well and truly dead before being burnt. In fact, they were probably already dead even before Ned made his last desperate attempt to rescue them both by returning to the Inn from the shelter of the trees behind it, which led, of course, to his capture. They all had pretty strong feelings about not being taken alive. Some of his supporters attempted to shoot him shortly after he had been taken into police custody.

By all means, though, exume the bodies in Queensland and test them - if somebody's prepared to pay for it. I think it would be quite an expensive exercise.

[Darren]

I am not sure if this is true or an old wifes tale. (Is that a sexist comment now?)

I was told that executed prisoners were buried standing up and facing the outer wall of the jail. The theory was that left standing they would not have eternal rest and facing the outside wall was to constantly remind them (not that a dead person can be reminded) of where they were.

Certainly sounds like something that authorities would be keen on. More punishment after the ultimate punishment!

Darren