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Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff you missed in History Class from housetop

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Speaker 1: works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast. I'm

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Speaker 1: to bling a chocolate boarding and I'm fair Daddy. And

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Speaker 1: this episode starts off in one of my favorite ways,

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Speaker 1: with the mysterious unidentified head or skull. Rather, it is

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Speaker 1: a good way to start a podcast. We've done it

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Speaker 1: a few times, but it's always a classic intro. So

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Speaker 1: here's how this story starts. In two thousand nine, a

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Speaker 1: West Australian farmer named Tom Baxer turned in a skull

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Speaker 1: to the authorities, claiming that it's the skull of Ned Kelly,

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Speaker 1: a famous bush ranger or bandit who was executed back

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Speaker 1: in the eighteen hundreds. His body was believed to be

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Speaker 1: buried in a mass grave, but for decades kelly skull

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Speaker 1: lived in a display case in Melbourne Jail until that is,

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Speaker 1: it was stolen in ninety so nobody has really known

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Speaker 1: where the skull or the head was since then. It's

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Speaker 1: been a mystery, and back there didn't really help illuminate

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Speaker 1: that question very much. He refuses to say how he

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Speaker 1: got the skull or if he was involved in its stuff,

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Speaker 1: which is kind of sketchy if you think about it. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I wonder if there will be more details on that

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Speaker 1: aspect of it in the future, but as far as

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Speaker 1: we know right now, researchers haven't positively identified the head

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Speaker 1: as Ned's. In two thousand ten, they issued kind of

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Speaker 1: a request for help. They had sort of reached to

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Speaker 1: the end of the road and as far as they

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Speaker 1: could go and testing things, and they asked people to

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Speaker 1: turn in any information that they know, any stories, any photographs,

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Speaker 1: and at least one man, according to a story in

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Speaker 1: August two thousand ten, has come forward with a tooth

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Speaker 1: that he believes belonged to the skull, so a tooth

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Speaker 1: that had been handed down through his family as a

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Speaker 1: souvenir of Ned Kelly exactly, and he has given it

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Speaker 1: to the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine, where which is

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Speaker 1: the body that's conducting the research and so what happens

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Speaker 1: with that know? Very funny. So there's been that renewed

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Speaker 1: interest in Kelly, but really he's never really gone away

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Speaker 1: from the Australian collective consciousness. He's been the celebrated outlaw,

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Speaker 1: the subject of many songs, books and films over the years,

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Speaker 1: and some even think of him as a national folk hero.

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Speaker 1: There are others, though, who consider him just as a

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Speaker 1: ruthless criminal, a villain. So we're going to try to

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Speaker 1: get to the bottom of how these takes on his

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Speaker 1: character could be so vastly different. And while we explore that,

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Speaker 1: we're also going to take a look at his wildlife

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Speaker 1: and the last stand that's been so romanticized over the years.

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Speaker 1: But to really understand Ned's story first you need to

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Speaker 1: know a little bit about bush rangers, and if you're

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Speaker 1: not Australian, it probably doesn't really have any context for you, right,

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Speaker 1: But bush rangers were basically bandits or highwaymen who specialized

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Speaker 1: in robbing or bailing up as it was called, stage coaches,

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Speaker 1: banks and small settlements. Yeah, we'll try to use the

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Speaker 1: authentic lingo in the Whenever week in So what they

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Speaker 1: did was sort of in the same vein as the

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Speaker 1: legendary English highway robbers, so they're often compared to the

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Speaker 1: likes of Dick Turpin. Also, sometimes you'll see comparisons to

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Speaker 1: the American wild West, people like Jesse James, But the

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Speaker 1: bush ranging industry actually went for longer than America's wild

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Speaker 1: West period. The main period of Australia's bush rangings fanned

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Speaker 1: about a hundred years from the guy who's considered the

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Speaker 1: first bush ranger, Black Caesar, to Ned Kelly's gang in

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Speaker 1: eighty Yeah. And there were also more bush rangers per

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Speaker 1: capita in Australia than there were outlaws in America, about

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Speaker 1: six thousand bush rangers during that period that we mentioned.

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Speaker 1: And a lot of these bush rangers were really just

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Speaker 1: ruthless killers, but sometimes they've been glorified and characterized as

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Speaker 1: robin Hood type folk heroes, mainly because of the actions

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Speaker 1: of a few specific bush rangers, such as Edward Teddy,

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Speaker 1: the jew Boy Davis, who supposedly treated his victims humanely

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Speaker 1: and shared what he stole with the poor. And we

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Speaker 1: see this idea in the Kelly story too. There's certainly

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Speaker 1: a robin Hood element to it. So to set up

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Speaker 1: the period that this story takes in a little bit better,

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Speaker 1: we should explain that within that hundred year period of

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Speaker 1: bush ranging, there were two sort of sub periods. From

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Speaker 1: about seventeen eighty nine to the eighteen fifties, bush rangers

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Speaker 1: were mostly escaped convicts, but from the eighteen fifties to

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Speaker 1: eighteen eighty or so. Most bush rangers were free settlers

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Speaker 1: who had broken the lawn, and ned Kelly definitely fell

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Speaker 1: into that latter camp. Yeah. So. Ned Kelly was born

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Speaker 1: in June eighteen fifty five in the state of Victoria, Australia,

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Speaker 1: and he was the first son of Irish parents Ellen

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Speaker 1: and James called Red Kelly, and his dad had somewhat

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Speaker 1: of a criminal background himself. He had been transported from

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Speaker 1: Ireland to Australia for stealing and ned grew up in

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Speaker 1: this clan like atmosphere of Irish Australian families in this

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Speaker 1: area and according to an article by Graham Seal in

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Speaker 1: History Today, they were called free selectors, so basically poor

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Speaker 1: people who were allowed by the government to cultivate tracts

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Speaker 1: of land for a small amount of rent. Many of

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Speaker 1: these free selectors, ned Kelly's family certainly included, made their

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Speaker 1: living off of a combination of quote legal pastoral activities

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Speaker 1: and illegal activities such as stock stealing, which in Australia

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Speaker 1: was known as duffing, and this would consequently get them

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Speaker 1: into trouble with the law now and then. Yeah, and incidentally,

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Speaker 1: many feel that it's this association with an economically and

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Speaker 1: politically disadvantaged social group that helped characterize bush rangers like

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Speaker 1: Ned as quote poor Man's heroes. So that kind of

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Speaker 1: sets up the villain versus hero. Yeah, the robin Hood motif. Right.

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Speaker 1: So Ned had several run ins with the law while

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Speaker 1: he was growing up. By age sixteen, he had already

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Speaker 1: served one jail sentence, and that year he was convicted

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Speaker 1: of receiving stolen horse and had to serve another three

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Speaker 1: year jail sentence. By the time he got out in

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Speaker 1: February eighteen seventy four, Seal says he had transformed into hard,

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Speaker 1: bitter man. Yeah. Still, though he managed to stay out

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Speaker 1: of trouble for a few years. Three years, and then

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Speaker 1: in September eighteen seventy seven, he was arrested for public

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Speaker 1: drunkenness and got into this fight with four policemen while

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Speaker 1: he was trying to escape. Seven months later, though, things

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Speaker 1: really elevated to another level. One of the policemen who

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Speaker 1: had been involved in that fight, Constable Fitzpatrick, came to

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Speaker 1: the Kelly home, not coming after Ned, but to arrest

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Speaker 1: Ned's brother Dan for horse stealing. And what happened next

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Speaker 1: is up for debate. Yes, Fitzpatrick claimed that he was

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Speaker 1: assaulted by the Kelly's, including the mom Ellen she got

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Speaker 1: in on the fight too, But the Kellys claim that

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Speaker 1: Fitzpatrick tried to molest one of the daughters, one of

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Speaker 1: Ned Kelly's sisters basically, and the assault, including which included

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Speaker 1: a shot to the wrist, was kind of a self

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Speaker 1: defense thing, so the judge was prone to side with Fitzpatrick.

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Speaker 1: He reviewed the case six months later and he sentenced

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Speaker 1: Ellen to three years in jail her role in this

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Speaker 1: in this fight, and then also said that he would

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Speaker 1: have given Ned and Dan fifteen years each, but they

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Speaker 1: had disappeared. Yeah, Ned and Dan had fled into the

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Speaker 1: Wombat Ranges and set up camp in the hills, which

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Speaker 1: they knew well. Two of their friends, Steve Hart and

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Speaker 1: Joe Byrne, joined them there in October. Event though, a

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Speaker 1: team of four policemen were sent to track this new

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Speaker 1: Kelly Gang as they were known, down where they were

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Speaker 1: camping out. Then on October the police and the Kelly

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Speaker 1: gang had a confrontation at Stringy Bark Creek, and some

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Speaker 1: sources you'll see that it was a police raid on

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Speaker 1: the Kelly camp and others you see that the Kelly's

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Speaker 1: actually ambushed and bailed up or robbed the police, regardless

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Speaker 1: of how the confrontation came about. A gunfight ensued and

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Speaker 1: the three policemen were killed. One McIntyre escaped to tell

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Speaker 1: the tale back in Melbourne. And after that, I mean,

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Speaker 1: this was really a turning point for them. After that,

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Speaker 1: the government declared the four Kelly Gang members outlaws and

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Speaker 1: put a high price on their heads. They even passed

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Speaker 1: thing called the Outlaw React. I don't know if I'm

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Speaker 1: pronouncing that right. It's kind of a strange word, but

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Speaker 1: this law basically said that the rights and the property

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Speaker 1: of the outlaws are forfeit and any citizen can kill

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Speaker 1: them on site. Sympathizers and they had many at the time,

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Speaker 1: could also be imprisoned and lose all of their belongings

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Speaker 1: as well. Okay, so you think after this new act

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Speaker 1: the Kelly Gang would have sort of tried to play

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Speaker 1: it cool. You know, you might have your friends turn

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Speaker 1: into enemy suddenly if there's a reward, or your friends

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Speaker 1: could get into trouble for for sympathizing with you. But

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Speaker 1: it didn't cause the Kelly Gang to lay low at all.

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Speaker 1: Less than six weeks later, on December tenth, they raided

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Speaker 1: the town of Euroa and robbed the bank and stole

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Speaker 1: food from the shops in the town. Of course, they

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Speaker 1: made off with a lot of gold in cash two

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Speaker 1: thousand pounds worth, but Ned also stole deeds and mortgages

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Speaker 1: held in the bank safe and this is something that

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Speaker 1: really endeared him to the struggling free selectors in Victoria,

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Speaker 1: to the poor people. They saw the banks as discriminating

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Speaker 1: against poor Irish settlers in the area. This reminded me

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Speaker 1: a little bit of of Bonnie and Clyde, people like

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Speaker 1: them for for robbing banks. Yeah, once they got away,

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Speaker 1: the Kelly gang divided up the loot between themselves, their families,

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Speaker 1: and their sympathizers, so again sharing with people who helped

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Speaker 1: them out. Authorities increased the reward for the Kelly's at

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Speaker 1: this point from two thousand pounds to four thousand, but

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Speaker 1: this didn't have an effect on the loyalty of their

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Speaker 1: supporters at all. They even wrote songs about it. So

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Speaker 1: here's just a little bet from one here. Oh Patty dear,

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Speaker 1: did you hear the news that's going around on the

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Speaker 1: head of bold Ned Kelly. They have placed a thousand

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Speaker 1: pounds for Steve Hart and Dan Kelly five hundred more.

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Speaker 1: They'll give that if the sum were doubled, sure that

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Speaker 1: Kelly boys would live. I wish we could set that

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Speaker 1: the music. I know, if only we knew what the

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Speaker 1: tune was supposed to be. Maybe maybe some of you'

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Speaker 1: all do. We're both thinking the same thing, um, So

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Speaker 1: you know, obviously, if you have people writing folk ballads

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Speaker 1: about you, you're pretty pop ler. And that loyalty really

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Speaker 1: continued into their next job, which was a raid on Gildery,

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Speaker 1: And during that they locked at police officers in their

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Speaker 1: own spells and nasquerrated around town in the police uniform.

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Speaker 1: So pretty bold stuff. Yeah, and they did their usual.

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Speaker 1: They held up banks and shops again, and they locked

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Speaker 1: up the townspeople in the hotel. It wasn't so bad

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Speaker 1: to be a hostage, though important if you were a policeman,

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Speaker 1: as long as you were in a policeman right. Apparently,

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Speaker 1: the Kelly gang treated everyone to drinks and Ned made speeches.

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Speaker 1: They made off with two thousand pounds once again, and

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Speaker 1: once again they also burned mortgages. Ned also left a

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Speaker 1: ten thousand words statement with a bank teller that came

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Speaker 1: to be known as the Gildery Letter. Now that letter

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Speaker 1: only exists in a copy, but it's got some pretty

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Speaker 1: interesting content. It catalogs complaints and grievances of Ned Kelly

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Speaker 1: and his gang against the government, the police, wealthy squatters.

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Speaker 1: Basically just shows his whole point of view and why

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Speaker 1: lays it all down, why people sympathize with him. So

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Speaker 1: at this point that Kelly gang was really ratting high,

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Speaker 1: but they were off the code nervous because the police

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Speaker 1: seemed to be getting too hot on their trail. They

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Speaker 1: needed to shake him off somehow. So their last raid

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Speaker 1: took place June on a small town surrounding a rail

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Speaker 1: station called glenn Rowan. But the raid was really about

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Speaker 1: more than just getting loot this time. The night before

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Speaker 1: they killed a man named Aaron Sharrett, who was a

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Speaker 1: one time pier but who had also been acting as

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Speaker 1: a sort of double agent. So he was a friend

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Speaker 1: of the Kelly gangs, but he was informing on them

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Speaker 1: to the police, and so they had reason to kill

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Speaker 1: him for for that that fact, of course, but they

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Speaker 1: also hoped that his murder would lure the bulk of

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Speaker 1: the Special District Police Force onto a train that would

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Speaker 1: pass through Glen Rowan, so his murder would essentially act

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Speaker 1: as a trap for the police. So, banking on the

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Speaker 1: fact that all the police would be on this train

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Speaker 1: taking this train, the gang had lifted the rails off

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Speaker 1: to the side near a hilltop with the intent of

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Speaker 1: derailing the train and killing all the police on board

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Speaker 1: and then picking off whomever was left. Yeah, So after

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Speaker 1: setting this up, they raided the town as usual, stole

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Speaker 1: food and money, and locked up the locals and Glenn

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Speaker 1: Rowan's Jones Hotel where they sang, dance, drank and basically

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Speaker 1: carried on with the crowd while they waited for the

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Speaker 1: police to arrive. So it seemed like a pretty good plan,

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Speaker 1: but Ned made a couple of major mistakes here. He

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Speaker 1: told the hostages about his plans for one, and then

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Speaker 1: he let a few of them go home. One of them,

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Speaker 1: a school teacher named Thomas Kernow, went to the track

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Speaker 1: and warned the police by waving a lantern. So the

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Speaker 1: train stopped just in time, and about thirty seven police

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Speaker 1: got off and headed for the hotel. So when the

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Speaker 1: Kelly gang heard the train stop, they knew the jig

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Speaker 1: was up and they had just one more move to

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Speaker 1: pull out of their bag of tricks. A few months

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Speaker 1: before the attack on Glenn rowan plowshares and some cast

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Speaker 1: iron started disappearing throughout the area, and it turns out

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Speaker 1: that the gang had used it to create crude suits

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Speaker 1: of armor for themselves. So a little bit about this armor,

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Speaker 1: which has become famous over the one of the best. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: if you can easily look at pictures of this, and

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Speaker 1: it's probably one of the best known things about Ned

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Speaker 1: Kelly and the Kelly Gang. This armor consisted of back

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Speaker 1: and breastplates and an adjustable metal apron that protected the

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Speaker 1: growing area of the wear. And each suit this is

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Speaker 1: what I found really remarkable. Each suit weighed eighty pounds.

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Speaker 1: Only one of them, that was Ned's, had a helmet

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Speaker 1: that had slits and advisor, and that it'sself weighed about

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Speaker 1: sixteen pounds, and he was the only one strong enough

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Speaker 1: supposedly to wear the suit, the helmet and still handle

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Speaker 1: a gun at the same time. Yeah, it sounds like

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Speaker 1: it would be quite cumbersome, but yeah, it doesn't look

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Speaker 1: very comfortable. If you do get a chance to check

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Speaker 1: out these pictures, it's kind of like a broke down

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Speaker 1: tin man does look like a really shabby tin man.

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Speaker 1: And it looks like some pretty crucial areas are left

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Speaker 1: vulnerable still, so maybe it's not quite worth it. Well,

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Speaker 1: we're gonna it's funny you should mention that, Sarah out

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Speaker 1: more about that. So the bush Rangers put on this

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Speaker 1: this crude armor and stood outside the hotel waiting for

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Speaker 1: the police and of course a gun battle and food

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Speaker 1: and civilians trying to get out of the hotel during

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Speaker 1: the fight didn't want to get caught in the crossfire.

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Speaker 1: But the armor really didn't seem to do the gang

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Speaker 1: that much good. It was clunky, of course, and it

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Speaker 1: caused painful bruising when it did stop a bullet. It

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Speaker 1: just was like a sheet of cast iron hitting your chest,

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Speaker 1: which couldn't be very comfortable. So, perhaps not surprisingly, Joe Byrne,

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Speaker 1: Dan Kelly, and Steve Hart were all shot dead during

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Speaker 1: that gunfight. Ned Kelly was shot in the foot, the arm,

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Speaker 1: and the thumb and several other places. It seems he

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Speaker 1: retreated into the bush and lost consciousness briefly. When he

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Speaker 1: woke up, though, instead of escaping, he tried to attack

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Speaker 1: the policeman, crashing out from behind them and firing at them.

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Speaker 1: The whole time. He fought them for about a half

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Speaker 1: an hour, some sources say, before they finally took him

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Speaker 1: down by a shotgun blast to the legs. After that,

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Speaker 1: he was taken to Melbourne where he recovered from all

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Speaker 1: thirty of his wounds and stood trial and was found

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Speaker 1: guilty sentenced to be hung, even though there were public

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Speaker 1: protest us and some people even campaign to have a

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Speaker 1: sentence reduced. Yeah. So Kelly was hanged on November eleventh,

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Speaker 1: eighteen eighty and his last words were such his life.

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Speaker 1: But weirdly, he'd told Justice Barry, who was the same

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Speaker 1: judge who had sentenced his mom. Yeah, he probably already

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Speaker 1: had a grudge against him, but he told Justice Barry

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Speaker 1: that he Barry would shortly follow him to the grave,

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Speaker 1: And sure enough Barry died of a heart attack just

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Speaker 1: two weeks later. Yeah, and this must have just only

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Speaker 1: added to the legend that's lived on through stories and songs.

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Speaker 1: In fact, Australia's first feature length film was nineteen o

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Speaker 1: six is the story of the Kelly Gang. I wonder

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Speaker 1: if there have been movies and Kelly since then. I'm sure,

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Speaker 1: I'm sure there are. I don't, unfortunately, have the names here,

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Speaker 1: But I think there are many movies, books, um stories, songs.

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Speaker 1: As we've said, there are plenty of opportunities, including many

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Speaker 1: biographies on Ned Kelly's life to learn more about him.

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Speaker 1: I think it's time for a new movie considering this lost,

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Speaker 1: potentially rediscovered head too. Yeah. Well, I think we'll have

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Speaker 1: to wait to see how that mystery unravels a little

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Speaker 1: more before that story is completely fleshed out. But I

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Speaker 1: think you might be right. But you know, even if

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Speaker 1: you're not an expert on Ned Kelly, you could sort

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Speaker 1: of invoke him in speech. There's a saying if someone

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Speaker 1: says you're as game as Ned Kelly, that means that

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Speaker 1: you're highly courageous, wicked, brave, willing to tackle big odds. Um.

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Speaker 1: So you could pass this on. It's like a nice

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Speaker 1: thing to say to people. I hope the Australians say

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Speaker 1: wicked brave. That's what you get from living in Boston. Yeah, well,

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Speaker 1: what can I say? Language seems to stick with us

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Speaker 1: no matter where we are. All right, let's see what

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Speaker 1: we have for listener mail today. Yeah, so this listener

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Speaker 1: mail is a weird Waldo postcard. I think it's so cool. Uh.

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Speaker 1: It's from Caitlin, and she wrote, Hi, Faran Deablina your

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Speaker 1: podcast a few months ago and fell in love. I've

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Speaker 1: always loved history, and you guys make it come alive.

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Speaker 1: I had a podcast idea the barefoot mailman legend here

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Speaker 1: in South Florida, before Henry Flagler established a good railway

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Speaker 1: system in Palm Beach, there was a mailman who walked

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Speaker 1: everywhere to deliver the mail barefoot. Of course, I don't

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Speaker 1: know if there's enough information out there about him, but

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Speaker 1: I've always found the story interesting. This is a strange story.

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Speaker 1: I wonder if he were armor too, perhaps armor and

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Speaker 1: no shoes. It doesn't sound very wise, it doesn't. It

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Speaker 1: sounds like if you get a parasite or just a

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Speaker 1: crushed foot from the weight of your armor. But anyways,

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Speaker 1: I really did like this Wear's Waldo postcard. It was

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Speaker 1: it's the parapeene from like the original Wears Waldo book,

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Speaker 1: and it kind of brought back old memories. I remember,

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Speaker 1: even a few years ago breaking out my old Wear's

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Speaker 1: Waldo book and I knew where Waldo was on every page,

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Speaker 1: like right away. And I don't know if I just

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Speaker 1: got better at at finding Waldo over the years or

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Speaker 1: if I if it's somewhere locked in my brain like

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Speaker 1: where Waldo is on each page. Mm hmmm. Al right,

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Speaker 1: well that's it for this edition of What's There It

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Speaker 1: does on the weekend. If you have any wonderful postcards

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Speaker 1: from for us from your various travels, or just some

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Speaker 1: insight to offer on any of our episodes. If you're

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Speaker 1: on Australian and have extra Ned Kelly stories, I'm sure

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Speaker 1: we've only begin to scratch the surface of his life.

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Speaker 1: We do actually have a postcard of Ned Kelly's helmet. Yes,

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Speaker 1: it's so cool. It's in my cubicle right now. We

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Speaker 1: love to get mail. We love to get emails. You

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Speaker 1: can send them to us at History Podcast at how

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Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. You can also look us up

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Speaker 1: on Twitter and myston History or on Facebook. And if

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Speaker 1: you want to learn a little bit more about trains

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Speaker 1: and crime, we do have an article on how the

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Speaker 1: Great Train Robbery works. You can look for it by

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Speaker 1: searching for a Great Train Robbery on our homepage at

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Speaker 1: www dot how staff works dot com. Be sure to

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Speaker 1: check out our new video podcast, Stuff from the Future.

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Speaker 1: Join how staff Work staff as we explore the most

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