THE TRUTH ABOUT THE KELLY STORY IS GETTING OUT : A BOOK REVIEW

“Australians, along with all other human beings, believe many things that are not true. This is because we have been told about them by people we respect – teachers, those in the media, authors, religious leaders, family members – and the stories have been constantly repeated – in history books, textbooks advertising materials, trivia quizzes and by word of mouth.”

This book, by its title and its external appearance looked lightweight to me, and I thought it was going to be a bit like “Error Australis” (subtitled ‘The Reality Recap of Australian History’) which also features Ned Kelly on the cover. However – and thankfully – its very different because Error Australis is indeed very lightweight, is entertaining in parts but more likely to confuse readers than inform them, and is supposed to be funny: but mostly its ‘humour’ is puerile and not amusing. I dont think its worth reading TBH.

“Furphies” on the other hand turned out to be a collection of surprisingly detailed analyses of some of the many popular beliefs about Australian history and culture that are not actually true. One of the first ones Jim Haynes mentions in passing is the belief that Australians regard themselves as rugged characters familiar with rural pursuits and the bush, inhabitants of the great wide brown land of deserts, burning sun and flooding rain. In fact, he writes “Only a tiny percentage of our population has ever lived in ‘the outback’ and it is as big a mystery to most Australians as it is to the rest of the world. The outback for most Australians is an exotic tourist destination.’

There are chapters on Captain Cook, The Ashes, Breaker Morant, Dad and Dave, Waltzing Matilde and many others, and of course, Ned Kelly. Haynes recounts how he was once a member of a bush band that often performed the Redgum song ‘Poor Ned’, and mentions that once he co-wrote a song about the Last Stand. Also, despite admitting to not really knowing very much of the Kelly story, in 2011 he took part in a public debate but lost trying to argue that Kelly was a villain. He says he’s still ‘mentally scarred and bruised’ from the hammering he received from the pro-Kelly audience. But from that debate his interest in getting to the bottom of it all grew. It was good timing because the following year 2012 was was when Ian MacFarlane’s ground-breaking book, “The Kelly Gang Unmasked” was published.

Part Six of ‘Furphies’ is titled “The Myth of Ned Kellys Republic and Rebel Heritage”. Haynes decided to ignore the age old “hero or villain” debate, writing that “millions of words” have already been written about it, and he focussed instead on challenging ‘the recurring myths of the Kelly uprising and Neds supposed ‘rebel heritage’, and it begins with a very unambiguous assertion that Kelly fans will no doubt recoil from:

“It is a furphy that Ned Kelly had an Irish rebel heritage or any notion of leading an uprising to form a Republic in North East Victoria.”

 

 Haynes traces the “Kelly Republic Myth” back to a letter about the Kelly Gang published in Melbourne Punch as long ago as 1879, when the Gang was still on the run. Its important to note that the Melbourne Punch was a satirical magazine, a source of entertainment and cynical commentary that featured humorous articles, illustrations and cartoons poking fun at the city’s politics, society, and culture. The letter, titled ‘LATEST FROM MR KELLY’ was in the form of a  fake ransom note, claiming the Gang had kidnapped Standish and would release him unharmed if the ‘govment’ granted the Gang pardons and let them ‘clear out of the coloni’. It was entirely made up.

The next relevant mention was an article that appeared in a sort of gossip column in the Bulletin magazine in July 1900, and was the first to use the word ‘republic’ in relation to the Outbreak and Ned Kelly. It was also entirely made up, it was unattributed, and various versions of it were recycled in other papers over the subsequent months and years.  By the time it got to making an appearance in a popular soft news entertainment column called “This Australia: Strange and Amazing Facts” in 1941 the story now included for the first time a claim that Ned Kelly was to be the first President of the Republic. Once again this newer version appeared in other newspapers at the time, and then it quietly slipped into  the mainstream Kelly literature when Max Brown inserted it into his serious biography of Ned Kelly, adding further to the growing story an assertion  that documents taken from Ned Kellys pocket when he was captured alluded to a Republic. In fact, the source of that claim was an 1880 news report of ‘a rumour’ that when captured Ned Kelly had in his possession a ‘a pocket book containing a number of letters implicating persons of good positions and the name of one member of parliament is mentioned”. The rumour about a ‘pocket book’ and letters became a claim about a ‘pocket’ containing a Republic document on the basis of nothing, but that didn’t stop subsequent authors adding it into their biographies. Subsequently the republic myth became the central uniting feature of the entire Kelly story, so vital that even Ian Jones, Kellys greatest advocate and most ardent promotor of the claims about Republic asserted that without it, Kellys plan to bring mass murder to Glenrowan was madness.

Haynes then briefly reviews the history of the Kelly family and their relations, exploding the myth that they were in any way typical Aussie battlers by reference to the long list of criminal charges convictions and sentences so many of them accumulated over the 11-year period that followed Red Kellys death.

Haynes next goes even further back in time to address the furphy that Ned Kellys convict father John ‘Red’ Kelly was an Irish rebel. It is indeed a furphy but it’s not one that featured prominently in any of the Kelly biographies, other than J J Kenneallys  eccentric 1929 publication ‘The Complete Inner History of the Kelly Gang’ This book, which reads more like a Tract ,claims to be a revelation of the whole truth about the Kelly story and makes claims about ‘Red’ which modern research has well and truly debunked. As Haynes says, Red Kelly was ‘merely a poor thief who stole from his neighbours’. Another related furphy is the one about the theft of two pigs that Red was transported for. It’s usually suggested Reds punishment was especially cruel because his was an insignificant crime and the victim was a wealthy landowner. In fact, the record shows that the victim, James Cooney was an equally poor landless labourer just like Reds own father. Haynes worked out that the value of the two pigs was the equivalent of fifteen years rent – so the loss would have been devastating to the pigs owner.

Lastly Haynes reviews the historical evidence that demonstrates that the idea that Ned Kelly had aspirations let alone a sophisticated understanding of politics to be yet another furphy.

For people interested in getting their Australian history accurate, this book has much to offer. For people only interested in the Kelly story it’s still a very good buy. Haynes analysis is not a rehash of the work of other modern scholars, though he references all of it. Rather he seems to have used those sources as stimuli to make his own enquiries and to verify their accuracy independently.  The result is an analysis that is not just up-to-date and detailed but intriguing to read as he traces the growth of   the legend from  flippant commentary in a satirical magazine to the full blown claim of it being historical fact,  and then from there to the place where modern scholarship has taken the Kelly legend to,  identifying the claims as a furphy.

To have the Ian Jones claims of a Kelly  Republic of North east Victoria identified  as a furphy in a  publication thats not a specifically Kelly related work is a major step forward in the replacement of myth  in the mainstream of the Australian history record with the true story.

Thanks Jim. Youre back on the winning side of the debate!

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11 Replies to “THE TRUTH ABOUT THE KELLY STORY IS GETTING OUT : A BOOK REVIEW”

  1. What is this chap’s background? Song writer/singer?
    He debated and lost, not sure why that would scar.
    At least it sounds like he gives a good account of the Republic.
    I wonder how well such a book would sell wined on the cover? This is always key.
    I will buy it for the non Kelly parts.

  2. Hi David, I really enjoyed reading Haynes’ “Great Furphies” book, with the most interesting one for me being how Edward Hargraves ended up with “the reward and fame for discovering gold in Australia” when in fact he took the credit for what someone else showed him and pumped his own self-publicity relentlessly in his successful pursuit of the reward for the first gold discovery; quite the cunning and double dealing manipulator.

    Haynes’ approach to exploding the Kelly Republic myth is from a different angle to the one I took (although he was familiar with my Republic myth publication), and he turns up some additional evidence in his own republic myth demolition adventure, but he comes to the same (to me inevitable) conclusion: the whole Kelly republic myth is bunkum. It’s nice to see someone else has traced and hammered that nonsense in detail and shown from a different angle just how stupid it always was.

    Haynes adds a further related exploration which I didn’t go into, and does a great job on it too: the tale that Ned Kelly’s father John ‘Red’ Kelly was some kind of Irish rebel back in old Ireland, transported for an “agrarian” offence, a claim given some credence by the reference to that in the Royal Commission’s Second Progress Report. Haynes scrutiny of the historical records shows that the John Kelly of rebel,background was a different John Kelly to Ned Kelly’s father, the man who stole two pigs from a poor neighbour – pigs worth the equivalent of 8 year’s rent to the poor man, so no minor thing in context – and also documents to anyone not familiar with the story that Ned’s dad lagged one of his criminal mates, Reagan. for shooting at a policeman in a robbery they committed together.

    This trait of lagging one’s criminal mates would be inherited by young Ned Kelly when he lagged Harry Power’s location to the police, much to the disbelief of Kelly enthusists. For example, Passey and Dean’s book “Harry Power” denied it. And yet there is definitive proof in the letter of Superintendent Nicolson to the Chief Commissioner of Police, of 24 Oct 1870, regarding “the information we had collected (from Kelly himself) about Power”. No honour amongst thieves in that!

  3. Anonymous says: Reply

    I’m looking forward to reading Bill Denhelds rebuttal on Dawsons Republic paper. Contained within his new book, “Ned Kelly: A certain truth”. I know that will send you both into a melt down and probably turn you against Bill and sulk but bring it!!

    1. What you hypocritical Kelly-loving morons have failed to understand since time immemorial is that vile personal attacks on people who you disagree with doesn’t constitute any kind of argument or count as any kind of defence of your Kelly mythology. Calling me an idiot and someone else a tool identifies you as a fool.

      As for Bills new book – Bill and I disagree on all sorts of things but whenever we catch up in person we have truly worthwhile, enjoyable and sometimes fierce discussions about all out agreements and disagreements. We respect each others points of view and we enjoy our differences and no doubt they will continue. But I wont be attacking Bill or spitting the dummy or sulking. He’s a man I admire and have enormous respect for – unlike the drug fucked idiots who promote the Republic on FB pages, the vile ignorant police hating anti-vax fools for whom no conspiracy theory is too extreme and bizarre to fall for, people like YOU who havent got a point of view you are capable of defending except by attacking anyone whose view you dont like. Go back to the toad you low life…

  4. Hi Anonymous, it seems you are still looking forward to reading it. Which means you haven’t read it yet. You are in for a surprise. Bill doesn’t reject that there was no Kelly republic, which was what my Republic Myth book was about. Rather, he has investigated the distribution of sympathisers and is apparently arguing (as my copy is still to arrive, but I had a quick chat) that there were more sympathisers than Morrissey maintained; and further that they were more politicised that I put forward. So it’s wait and see for the details. Note that I did explore a couple of separation movements, one in NSW and one in Victoria near the SA border; but maybe you didn’t read all of my book or you could have put forward your own research to dispute some of it. It must have been hard sitting there fuming since 2018, waiting for someone else to come along with arguments against my mythbuster so you could get all excited about it. The last person to claim a rebuttal of my Republic demolition job – which was endorsed by half a dozen top flight Australian historians – was someone who gave a talk at some Kelly event that got no further than a few re-assertions of material I had already demolished. I am a great admirer of Bill’s work and have interacted very positively with him since 2011, over a decade ago. I can’t imagine why you think I would be put off him by anything he writes! It will be fun to read regardless of what he argues. I was in fact encouraging him to get his book written and put out a year or so ago.

  5. Sharon Hollingsworth says: Reply

    These ding dongs or ming mongs or whatever the heck they are called just cannot fathom that we can actually have friendly communication with, and enjoy the company of, someone we may or may not agree with on every subject. (For instance, I am completely against “the jab”, but David and I are still great friends) It is called respect and kindness, which is a foreign concept to some. What dull, miserable, and meaningless lives some of these people must lead. Would that they would lead them somewhere else rather than in our orbital path. I am looking forward to what Stuart, David, and others have to say about Bill’s book.

    1. Anonymous says: Reply

      we can indeed converse decently Sharon. David cannot though based on the abuse that Bruce Cumming recently called him on.

      1. Sharon Hollingsworth says: Reply

        Nice try, but, nah, I am not gonna play that game. You are not going turn me against David/Dee no matter what you say. Re that gentlemen Bruce C. and the exchanges over at the fb page, please don’t bring that here. I feel for B.C., but he has some deep-seated issues that none of us are qualified to help with and which actually has zero to do with the Kelly saga. I believe only Christ alone can fix things for him.

        1. Thanks Sharon. Our bond is unique in the Kelly world.

      2. So when someone makes an allegation and you ask him to either substantiate it as true or retract it, thats abuse in your eyes is it? Goodness me!

        Once again you are proving my point- Kelly idolators are idiots. I look forward to your next demonstration of your stupidity…

  6. Thomas Whiteside says: Reply

    Well said Dee, Sharon, and Stuart. Love the discussions on this blog! People here are meticulous, respectful, and open-minded. That’s why so much interesting discussion and research takes place here.

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