I wrote on Facebook that last week was going to be a massive week for the Kelly World, and it turned out to be even bigger than I was expecting, with the release of the second of Doug Morrissey’s works about the Kelly outbreak a few days ago. My copy hasn’t arrived yet but once it does and I’ve had time to read it I will post my review of it here. If anyone else reads it and wants to write a review for posting here that would be most welcome.
The least momentous of the events on the Kelly Calendar in the last week was the Siege Dinner last Saturday night, which came and went without a murmur. I was amazed to learn afterwards that Grantlee Kieza spoke at the dinner but this hadn’t been mentioned anywhere beforehand which makes no sense at all. Why a fund-raiser and NK Centre promotor Joanne Griffiths wouldn’t advertise her star attraction is weird – more people would have come, more funds would have been raised…. A week later, there are still no reports on the NK Center Facebook page about what happened, and the Ned Kelly Center website is still a blank page “Under Construction. In fact, I think its pretty obvious she realises her only hope is to extract funding from the public purse. These ‘fund raisers’ and the ‘petition’ are just stunts aimed at local and state governments in the hope they will be persuaded to hand over millions of public dollars to her NK Center. God forbid!
This massive Kelly week actually got under way a couple of days before the siege dinner, last Thursday, June 28thwith an announcement that Matthew Holmes the movie director was launching a project to make a movie called “Glenrowan”. About a year before he had attempted to crowd-fund a movie they were going to call “The Legend of Ned Kelly”, but were unsuccessful. Now they are saying that there is so much in the Kelly story that it would be almost impossible to have done justice to it in one film so instead he and Aidan Phelan have written a script that focusses just on the siege at Glenrowan. Aidan Phelan invited readers to submit questions about the movie on his Bushranger Facebook page – about the only place I am not banned from – so I submitted four. Phelan answered them all very intelligently and I was most especially interested to learn that the Glenrowan movie will NOT mention the Kelly Republic of North east Victoria. Phelan says HERE “There is no tangible evidence that we can point to as proof of the concept, only anecdotal evidence that can’t be verified at this stage, and oral histories. No doubt this will upset a lot of ‘kelly-ites’ and will cause a lot of anti-kelly commentators to pat themselves on the back but it all comes down to our dedication to providing the facts of the story” Well said Aidan.
I also asked if they would depict the bullying and humiliation that I wrote about on the Blog a couple of weeks ago, of eighteen-year-old John Delaney. Disappointingly, Phelan says that after initially including it, they later dropped that scene due to time constraints, but remarked that it was “a really fantastic moment narratively and historically because it really will cause the audience to question their opinions of Ned, and that’s what the whole film is about, Its about questioning the accepted version of things” So, wouldn’t it be better to leave it in?
But you could have knocked me over with a feather! This is a dramatic turnaround from a year ago when I was blocked from their website for asking questions. This year they are not only accepting questions from me but answering them. And the answers are very encouraging. However I would urge them to put the Delaney scene back in and not waste too much time on things like hop-skip-jump competitions and more scenes than are necessary showing wood splintering under police fire, and bottles shattering on shelves as the hostages scream and cower on the floor, as in The Last Outlaw. The indications are that if they stick to the facts as they say they will, this could be a very violent film. Phelan was most emphatic that Aaron Sherrits murder will be part of the movie, and I have no doubt they will show in great detail every death at the Inn, Neds every wound, Hare collapsing from blood lost from his shattered wrist, Joe Byrnes body strung up, the burned corpses of Steve and Dan…. And will it end with a hanging? It will be a couple of years before we find out.
The most important announcement last week for the Kelly world, by a country mile, was of course the release of Stuart Dawsons book, Ned Kelly and the Myth of a Republic of North east Victoria. Morrissey’s book will set you back about forty bucks but Dawson, in an act of incredible generosity is giving away the results of several years of intense research for absolutely nothing. The free PDF can be downloaded from HERE and so nobody who claims to be interested in Kelly history has any excuse for not printing it off and reading it. Its an absolute landmark Kelly publication. Predictably, the Kelly FB sites are almost completely silent about it – they’re all more interested in the movie that’s two years away – but no-body seems to have noticed the fact that their movie is going to back up Dawson’s conclusion, that their beloved Kelly Republic is a myth – that’s why it won’t be in the movie.
An article about Dawson’s free book appeared in the Border Mail. They say all publicity is good publicity so at least readers will know that Dawson’s book is out there, but I thought the article was typical tabloid trash, the lowest quality of journalism. The fact the book is available on the internet for free wasn’t mentioned and yet that is surely a major point of difference between that Kelly work and every other one that’s ever been created? I suppose the writer was concerned that if he mentioned Dawsons book was available for free people might read it. Instead the lazy journalist tried to turn the debate into an attack on Ian Jones, a beloved figure in the north-east. Dawson rightly declined an interview, trying to avoid the journalists attempt to focus on personalities rather than the actual arguments and evidence presented in the book. But that wasn’t good enough for the hack who then gave Ian Jones and Matt Shore most of the column inches to attack Dawson’s book even though both of these people hadn’t ever read it. What a ridiculous joke! How on earth can the opinions of people who have never even seen a work be relevant in an article about it?
Imagine a reviewer saying I’ve never seen this movie, this Art exhibition, this play, I’ve never driven this new car, eaten at this new restaurant, heard this new album – but I’ll speak from a position of complete ignorance and tell you what I think of it!
So what did these commentators have to say? Ian Jones went for Dawsons throat, as he has done in the past when other authors have published stuff he doesn’t agree with, questioning his motives, and resorting to patronising sarcasm “…they have to say it doesn’t exist because obviously they are so bright if it did exist they would know about it” He also mentioned arguments for the republic that are directly and fully addressed in the book. If Jones had read them he may well have been speechless.
Matt Shore said he had spoken to a man who claims to have seen the Republic Declaration but he wouldn’t go public because “he would be treated akin to somebody that believes in UFOs”. Exactly! People who make claims without evidence can be dismissed without evidence. No credibility needs to be attached to it. Read the book Matt and you will see what I mean. As a Kelly history custodian your view of the book is worth hearing.
What SHOULD have happened is that once the journalist discovered both his sources hadn’t read the book, if they weren’t prepared to say “let me read it first”, he should have said “get back to me when you have”. Then you might have seen a quality piece of journalism. Instead we got rubbish.
Modern Kelly supporters are having a big struggle even imagining a Kelly story without a Republic – but here’s the interesting thing: for the majority of its life, there was no Republic myth in the Kelly story. Jim Kelly and Tom Lloyd and James Ryan supported Kelly but didn’t know anything about a Republic. JJ Kenneally had no trouble hailing Kelly as a hero without a republic myth. Same with Clune and Brown, Osbourne, Graham Jones and other Kelly writers down the years. None of them believed in a Republic. The important fact that Dawson has proven in his book, is that the Kelly republic idea has only been a serious part of the Kelly story for maybe 40 of the last 140 years, a very recent ‘add-on’ to the Kelly story, an attractive and clever embellishment that enhances the story and redeems the horrors of Glenrowan – but it’s an unhistorical artefact, a motivation and a plan that was never real, it wasn’t ever a part of the outbreak.
So Kelly followers, the good news is that history shows that you can safely accept the facts, the logic and the arguments of Dawson’s book that the Kelly republic is a Kelly Myth, not believe in the Republic and yet still be a sympathiser – just like most of the sympathisers who have gone before you. There are still plenty of reasons for you to continue to be fascinated by the Kelly story, but now you can safely dump the Republic and be more like the original, old-time Kelly sympathiser! Clinging to the republic myth, from now on, will be seen as akin to believing in UFO’s. Wacky!
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That Ned Kelly Center page says it is a non-profit organisation and donations over $2 are tax deductible. How does a private museum run by two distant descendants of a police killer get to be tax deductable? This is a scam. The tax office should investigate. This is a government money grab. It is disgusting.
More shite from the government funded donkey squad, this time the National Film and Sound Archive at http://dl.nfsa.gov.au/module/1596/
"From violent cop killer to a champion of the working class, bushranger Ned Kelly is a solid gold Australian icon and folk hero." Remember kids, "download a free copy of this Video Clip" and fill your heads with pure BS.
How do these fwits get taxpayer money to make this crap? We're all paying for this you know! And it's not even real history!
More sh*t from the donkeys in charge of teaching school children history. This time it's the National Galley Australia's Ned Kelly homework task after a one hour lesson plan of fatuous drivel – https://nga.gov.au/education/pdf/K-12-Resources/NGA-Resource-NolansNedKelly-YR5-6.pdf
Activity:
• Ask a parent to view the Meet Ned Kelly story on you tube and/or obtain a copy from school or the local library
• Write a list of the words and phrases used by the author to describe her viewpoints/ feelings of the main character, Ned Kelly. For example, ‘Ned loved his family and he was brave’, ‘Ned held no fear’, ‘Ned was fair’ etc
• Write a list of the words and phrases used by the author to develop empathy in the reader. For example, ‘Then Ned helped a stranger by swapping a horse. It was stolen but Ned didn’t know’ etc
Unbelievable shite.
Settle down Stuart! I agree with you – this material is misleading – but realise that the kelly story has been evolving ever since it began, and the evolution is continuing at an increasingly rapid rate since 2012, which is only six years ago, which is not long ago at all. I think its highly likely that this sort of garbage will begin to disappear from curricula and from other public documents and so on.
The Ned Kelly Alive project is something I am interested in though. I have a feeling they might be about to commit to something which is rapidly going to be seen as an outdated view of history, and they are going to end up realising they've blundered, if their PR Campaigns are going to revolve around any kind of heroic representation of Ned Kelly.
Hi Dee, I need valerian. Breathe deeply. And again. Ah, that's better. I remember reading last year that Morrissey had written to the government about factually incorrect material on the Ned Kelly page of the "About Australia" government website and they had no interest or intention of changing it, but said it was archival, even though it was still up for anyone to read as current government information. It was in the Australian newspaper, I think.
Which project is the Ned Kelly Alive project? Was that the one where Wangaratta council were going to start throwing ratepayer's money around and paid over $100 grand for a consultant, or was it a bigger State government Ned Kelly Route tourist project?
Glad to see on the hate site that Ian Jones is still with us. But he is still spouting guff about HIS Ned republic theory. He hasn't read Stuart's expose of the Ned republic, nor does he know who Stuart is but, as usual, that does not stop him pontificating about his fave idea about Ned.
This is idle nonsense. Get with it Ian. Read Dr Dawson's expose of the Ned republic. Respond to his criticisms of it. After all, it was you who came up with the Ned republic.
We are generally in favour of NE Victoria benefiting from the Kelly story, but attractions need not be based on the disproved Kelly folklore. Exactly the same numbers of tourists, perhaps more, would be attracted by accurate information (including Bill's police camp at Stringybark Creek).
The Prime Minister's "Ned Kelly" page is riddled with basic errors and should be removed forthwith. The public servants protecting this rubbish should have their fat butts kicked. Ian MacFarlane pointed out many years ago that this site exposes Aussies to hatred, ridicule and contempt. In UK they gloat about our devotion to a police murderer.
Wake up, Mal – get rid of it now!
Steve Jager kindly sent me a copy of a long response to my republic myth book that he is posting on a site he runs called "Australian Bushrangers". I ask people here not to attack him about it, and certainly not claim to be doing that on my behalf. I do not support personal attacks on people in discussing these matters. I will do a response ASAP in a day or two.
Hi Ashleigh, I'm not sure what website you mean but as I don't use the web for discussion (apart from some promotional postings here at Dee's blog), I'm not sure what you're saying here. I'm not interested in doing Q&A about the republic myth book. It is very short, and anyone can read it and make up their own minds without any extra help from me. It does not indulge in personal criticisms of Ian Jones or the other historians whose work is reviewed and critiqued. It is an academic book that was subject to rigorous academic peer review by the four subject matter experts listed in the preface, two of whom are not inherently critical of Ned Kelly, and revisions made in response to their various feedback. Three long established, highly reputable and well respected historians were then invited to read it with a view to providing a back cover comment if they approved of it. Two of these are not from Kelly studies at all, but are well known for their us historical analysis and methodology in other areas of Australian history while having a general knowledge of the Kelly story. All three endorsed the study and resulting book. So all up seven accomplished, published, and respected professional historians have read and endorsed the book. Now it is up to readers to make up their own minds about the evidence and arguments presented. It is written in plain English and anyone can follow it. It is free, so anyone can download and read it. It even has a nice picture on the front cover. If anyone wants to critique it they are very welcome. All they need to do is put their review and evidence together, and publish it somewhere in paper or on the open web where everyone can easily read it, and then we can all have a look. It's that simple.
Response to Steve part 3
Next we have the Cope letter, which I discussed on page 47. It oozes revenge absolutely. But not a word of republicanism, which was my point. The quote from Ned Kelly after his trial, that it would take 10,000 police to get rid of the Kellys, is also discussed in my book. This is not an analysis of my book, just quotes published 5 years ago, which I did discuss. It’s in the book and footnotes for anyone interested.
I have not seen the Bush Music Club’s 1956 “Songs from the Kelly Country”, but we learn from James Jupp’s “The Australian People”, p. 450, that “The ballad commemorating [Bold Jack] Donahoe’s last stand was widely circulated in the oral tradition, as were other ‘treason songs’ which were never set down on paper. In time it emerged in an indigenised version as ‘The Wild Colonial Boy’.” Clearly what was called treason songs were anti-police or anti-authority songs, not political treason. John Medith, who complied that short book of Kelly songs, went on to collect many more Kelly songs in his Meredith and Scott “100 years of Acrimony” book. I discussed these in my section on the Kelly folk tradition, and none of the Kelly songs and ballads had any political content.
This reply has taken about 2 hours to check and write up, and I won’t be doing it for others! What I hope to show here is why historical discussion needs to be founded on rigorous historical analysis and argument of what has actually been put forward. All the points raised in the above material have been addressed in the book. I have taken some trouble to try and explain how I researched and discussed these same pieces, and how the questioning of them arose, which was partly thanks to Steve’s 2013 republic post, to help explain the process of investigation used in the book. I read a great deal of pro-Kelly, anti-Kelly and more or less neutral Kelly material. I read every cited or mentioned source that anyone in my travels claimed as evidence for a republic, and Steve’s material was a part of that. It is a huge mass of stuff to review, and there are over 1,000 source references in the book that have all had to be read, considered, and often followed up further. But at the end here, we have just gone around in a circle. No new previously undiscussed evidence for a republic has been produced. No concrete argument has been made against any of the analyses put forward in the book. There is nothing wrong with what has been put forward, but we haven’t moved anywhere as it has all been addressed in the book already.
At this point we are still where we started: I have claimed that no documentary evidence whatsoever exists for the belief that Ned Kelly or any sympathiser of his day had the slightest notion of declaring or even thinking of a republic. That claim remains undisputed by this discussion. It follows that the claim continues to rest, as McQuilton said it did, one hundred percent on oral history, and that (despite his best efforts) it is fruitless to look for documentary corroboration, as there isn’t any. If we can agree on that much, then those who wish to believe there is something in the oral history claims can continue to believe them if they wish to do so, and ignore the basis for questioning them that I put forward. It doesn’t bother me either way. My point is that there can still be an interesting discussion about Ned Kelly without the slightest hint of any republic claim. And I think that is where the matter rests now. I agree with Steve’s concluding comment that regardless of me “making a compelling argument, the myth surrounding Kelly's republic will never fade.” That’s fair enough; people can believe whatever they like, and I never set out to changes someone’s faith, as it were. But we both seem now to be in some sort of agreement that it is a matter of belief rather than any evidence based fact that anyone has ever produced. I don’t know what else can be said.
Response to Steve, part 2
I was then able to trace its variations at the hands of a few news editors through to Beatty, and see how a whole bunch of 1940s newspaper editors picked up the republic item directly from Beatty and reproduced it in all states as “fact”. So, readers here, if you want to challenge anything in my book you need to carefully read both my discussion of the evidence in my book, plus the footnotes, plus the original source evidence that is being discussed. And you need to examine equally deeply the sources and origins of any evidence that you want to put forward as contrary to mine. Otherwise you are not doing critical history, just playing cut and paste, and saying that I should spend my time doing your analysis for you. It doesn’t work like that. I have done a critical examination of source evidence and come to certain conclusions based on a very standard process of analysis. If anyone else wants to challenge the analysis, they need to come up with a contrary analysis that makes sense of the same material, not just produce more examples of the same wrong thing.
Next is Maguire’s 1995 article about Radic’s alleged sighting of a republic declaration in 1961, which is discussed in the first 4 pages of my book. Note that Maguire states as fact that the declaration “was taken from the pocket of Ned Kelly after his dramatic capture”. Note that Maguire has made this up: there is no evidence anywhere to support this claim, as I discussed at length. In fact there is nothing relevant in that whole article that I didn’t challenge and demolish. Next, John Harber’s 2003 speech, and his statement that “Radic’s word would be considered hard evidence in a court of law due to his personal character”. I discussed that on page 2, and noted that Phillips’ legal test of the truthfulness of a recollection does not establish what was seen. It is no evidence at all of anything about a republic, just a statement that Radic’s recollections should be taken as true. As I quoted, in 2013 Radic himself no longer believed that what he had seen was a declaration for a republic, so that ends that one. There is much more analysis about that in the book if anyone is interested. Those who are simply annoyed by it should delete the PDF from their computer and get on with life. I’m not trying to convert you. But if you want to engage in historical criticism as opposed to mud-slinging, you have to do the necessary evidence gathering and analysis. The Kelly outbreak is one of the best documented events in Australian history. Anyone who says we can’t know about it in great detail because we weren’t there hasn’t bothered to look at the large mountain of available evidence. None of the large number of Kelly enthusiast writers of the last 100 years weren’t around then either, unless they are still kicking at 140 plus childhood, but that hasn’t held them back.
I discussed the Jerilderie letter in detail and showed why it is no evidence for a republic or republican sentiments. I also did several pages of comparisons with Kelly’s other letters to show why the belief doesn’t hold up. Steve makes some interesting points, but they are not a response to anything I wrote in my book. They are 5 years old, and are all points I took into consideration, amongst a lot of other things by a large number of people, when I was doing the background research to write the book. I then examined the Jerilderie letter text itself, and wrote my section around that directly. So people who want to criticise what I wrote need to respond to that, not to some other thing they have in mind. People are welcome to any views they like, and there are many other views out there as well, but let us be clear: this is an interesting 5 year old opinion piece, not a response to me.
There's more in the next post
I must first note in reply to Steve Jager’s lengthy response to my republic myth book, that he begins by challenging my point that the claim that Ned Kelly wanted to launch a republic was first made by Ian Jones from 1967 onwards (in his Wangaratta seminar paper, “A new view of Ned Kelly”), and that my statement is contradicted by a number of sources (which he presents) which predate Ian Jones by over 20 years. This is not the case at all. Steve’s quoted sources are not historically-based claims or evidence that Ned Kelly ever wanted to start a republic. They are two examples of the sources I put forward and analysed at length in the book, and demonstrated come from a 1940s believe-it-or-not-book, which in turn took them from a joke spoof item in the Bulletin magazine in 1900 or one of the subsequent close variations of that item. This somewhat bad start misrepresents my book and Steve’s claim of having evidence to contradict it, as we shall see below.
I’m not sure what to make of the statement that I have used oral history to refute oral history claims. That was post-publication feedback on the book from Leo Kennedy and is not part of the book. My discussion of oral history in the book shows why oral history claims are problematic. Steve has not addressed that at all there. I am not involved in making any oral history claims, and I leave that entirely to others. What I can say is that two other descendants of sympathiser families, who I will never name as it is none of anyone else’s business, have also contacted me and said they have never believed the republic stories. You would never know this from the Kelly books, but the republic claims are by no means universal among descendants of sympathiser families of those days. Other descendants of people who were around in those days with good family histories, but not involved with either the Kellys or their sympathisers, also dismiss such republic claims as outright nonsense. So now we turn to the list of items that follow his introduction, that are presented as evidence of republican sentiments which well predate Ian Jones in 1967. Note that while I treated these and many other source documents as the basis from which Jones and several other historians went on to develop a view of a Kelly republic movement, Steve seems to be representing them as being actual proof of a republic in themselves, rather than evidence to be questioned. I don’t see that at all.
The list of supporting evidence for his views, which he claims contradict my republic myth busting, was actually published by him in very similar form back on 25 April 2013, on the now-defunct Ned Kelly Forum. It was an exciting find for me back then, as I was only beginning my own republic investigation and searched relentlessly for anything I could find online about it. His 1945 Border Watch article is noted in my footnote 24 and discussed on p. 4 of my book, where I point out that it is taken verbatim from Beatty’s 1941 “Believe-it-or-not” book, and it was directly reproduced in a couple of other mid-1040s newspapers. His 1947 Northern Times article is quoted in my p. 54 discussion of that article, so see that for discussion.
It was actually Steve’s notice of these two articles, with their almost identical text about Kelly wanting to proclaim a republic, that caused me to search for other instances of the same item, and, as my footnotes show, I was not disappointed. When I read the Bulletin’s 1900 passage in Morrissey’s 2017 “Lawless Life” book it rang a bell. I looked up my old newspaper searches and bingo, that was where the news articles came from. They were just recycled nonsense from the 1900 Bulletin magazine via Beatty. What this shows is that multiple reprints of the same wrong stuff don’t give it any more weight as historical evidence. What we learn from it is that we need to try and find the original source of things that are bandied about. That may sometimes be impossible, but in this case, we have it – a joke spoof in the Bulletin. More follows in the next post due to word length.
You are asking us for too much forbearance, Stuart.
Several others, and me, can't wait to get stuck in.
The Hate Page webmaster has called this "great research".
What would he know?
I pointed out the religious character of Kelly belief years ago. The way people respond to your article demonstrates whether or not their interest is in discovering historical truth or defending a predetermined point of view about Ned Kelly at all costs. Steve ended his article with a "call to arms" so it's pretty clear what his allegiances are. They are to the Kelly myths and not to historical truth. He's not a "researcher" or "Kelly historian" so much as an "apologist" and "propagandist"
All I was going to point out was that Steve Jager's "research" was already comprehensively answered in your book, Stuart. He should have gone to Specsavers before reading it!
In his "research" about the letter from 'A Lady', I know of no examples of Maggie Kelly's handwriting from which to compare it. Maybe there are some but Steve jager did not provide us with any details. This was just guesswork, and inadequately researched. And, in any case, the letter did not suggest republican aspirations by the gang or Maggie, if it was her.
Will Steve Jager now post Stuart's responses on his 'Australian Bushrangers' website as he should?
I rather doubt it.
Good Morning all. I trust everyone is well. Just a quick call out to "Mr T." The week is ticking by and I still await a 'phone call from him. Will be nice to put a voice to the "name". And I am sure the conversation will be good. I am free tonight "Mr T." Hope you can spare a moment. Cheers. Have a great weekend everyone. Be good. MGP
Maybe it's you that should visit specsavers.It was not Maggie mentioned it was my cousin Kate.In regards to your last question it is none of your business.That is up to Steve not you.
Bob McGarrigle nice to see you have discovered you're not banned from here like I am from the place where you launch your nonstop personal attacks on me.
But now you're here perhaps you can explain to everyone how it is that you could claim to be a cousin of Kate Kelly. For her to be your cousin, Ellen and Red Kelly would need to have been your aunty and uncle, but I havent seen your name on any of the Kelly family trees. How can you not be embarrassed by such obvious sycophancy, creepy sucking-up to the real Kelly family?
Mr McGarrigle,
Steve Jager put up a post responding to Stuart Dawson's book. He kindly notified Stuart he had done so. In all fairness, he should add Stuart Dawson' responses to his post. To do otherwise would question his research.
Don't you get it, Bob? The media do this all the time. It's called BALANCE.
Mark, I said "I will eventually ring". I didn't say soon or immediately. I said eventually because I am busy with other things at the moment. Still am.
You are a bit scary too. You frequently post on what I regard as the loathsome Hate Site. I don't want them knowing who I am. They are always guessing who we are and maligning us. I have no guarantee you won't shaft me, even privately.
Bob McGarriglefc, and that is for Steve to say – not you!
My comments about Maggie apply equally to Kate. There is a well-known report by a school inspector of the scholastic accomplishments of the Kelly children and their classmates. Steve did not refer to it in his research, so we don't know whether any of Ned's sisters (or Ellen for that matter, from other sources) could read and write, do we!
Dee, I think Bob, on a previous occasion, told us he was a Lloyd descendant, but some problem occurred and he was adopted by the McGarrigles. This would not make him a direct cousin of Kate Kelly, but a distant relative of her's.
I have read Dawson's book carefully twice this week and looked up some of his notes. The Ned Kelly republic is total bullshit.
I was contacted today by Doug Morrissey by email, in relation to the response to my republic myth book that was posted by Lola Rowe on Bill Denheld’s Iron Icon website feedback page, http://www.denheldid.com/twohuts/feedback.html.
For the active link to the feedback, click here.
Doug Morrissey stated, and asked me to publicise, the following:
“Leo Kennedy tells me [i.e. Doug Morrissey] that Lola Rowe (nee LIoyd) responded to your republic piece on the Iron Icon website, stating she was present during my interview sessions with Tom LIoyd and that I never asked him about the Kelly republic. I have never laid eyes on this LIoyd relative. She definitely was not present during the interviews. What sort of researcher would I be, if I did not ask the central question about the republic during many hours of interviews.”
The email also contains a response by and from Leo Kennedy, who stated,
“Doug Morrissey’s interview sessions with Tom LIoyd in the 1980s took place over many months in Tom’s workshop at Riddell’s Creek. No one else was present. Some of the interviews were recorded on tape others were not. Tom would occasionally ask Doug to turn the tape off and they would discuss things Tom did not want to say on the record and Doug respected everything Tom told him in confidence. On some occasions, Tom spoke of the Kelly republic and expressed his belief it was unlikely to have happened. Doug was contacted by one of Tom’s daughters after his death asking for a copy of the recorded interviews. Doug was told that as Tom approached death, he expressed a worry that he had told Doug too much. A cassette copy of one interview was sent. To have a LIoyd relative reinventing the past in such a dishonest manner is a grave disservice to Doug and Tom LIoyd who respected each other beyond the interview situation.”
I have posted the above as requested.
Obviously you have no idea on Ancestry.I don't claim to be a cousin I know I am a cousin. My grt grt Grandmother is Jane Quinn Ellen Kellys sister and her husband Thomas Lloyd my grt grt Grandfather.Thus I am a 1st cousin of all the Kelly siblings 3 times removed.I am not a Kelly but a relation and have told you this several times and you know it.My family tree is on Ancestry under my family childrens names and I am on several trees if you know where to look.I am a Lloyd/Quinn/McGaffin/McGarrigle family member and proud of it..The reason you recieve attacks is because you ALWAYS attack us and you will get it in return everytime That I promise you.I have all the document proof under the sun and it has nothing to do with you David.I don't ask you for family proof of your family so mind your own business about mine.I also use my own name not like you .
Oh I see Bob – not a cousin but a cousin three-times removed! And no actual Kelly genes in your blood. Thanks for clearing that up. In the interests of openness and clarity I think you shouldn't say 'cousin' when you actually mean 'cousin three-times moved'.
And by the way Bob, I have stuck to our gentlemans agreement, but you haven't. Your posting of information I shared privately with you is beyond contemptible.
No I have no Kelly blood in me and have told you I am a Quinn/Lloyd descendant.Ellen Kelly is my grt grt aunt thus a first cousin just like my father, grandmother and great grandmother were.Winifred Lloyd grt granny (daughter of Jane Quinn and Tom Lloyd),Winifred Lloyd/McGaffin jnr my grandmother and my dads mother.If you people can't understand that stiff cheddar.If I am contemptible what in the hell are you well? I ended the agreement because you continued to slander wonderful people that I respect and you still are today..It was you that made the let bygones be bygones statement not me.I also agreed to moderate my comments and you made the same promise but you simply failed the test the very next day.For the benefit of Roy.My father was adopted in 1927 by the McGarrigle family and they retained dads christian names Harold Lloyd McGaffin then became Harold Lloyd McGarrigle after adoption thus my name.There are 11 family trees also on Ancestry to confirm my family details.It is public and not private so anyone can look at it.I am not like David I have absolutely nothing to hide not like the person that forgets his own name.
I have made a previous error with Ellen Kelly she is my Aunt 3 times removed as Ancestry states is the case.For John (Red Kelly) it says husband of ggg Aunt.I really couldn't give two hoots what some of you say about me or my family.I know I am totally honest with my comments not like some of you lot.I accept the misgivings and crimes of some of my family and recognise that but David continues to victimise innocent people as he always has done without any sympathy for them at all.I can assure people on here there are a lot more heroes in my family than villains.
Bob regarding your claim that I victimise innocent people, I would like you to please list the examples of this from, say, the last month .
Just for everyones interest , heres a list from the last month of comments you've made about me, which you claim are 'totally honest":
'con man'
'evil one'
'biggest bigot on the net'
'pretends to be a girl'
'telling lies as usual'
'absolute hypocrite'
'uses disgusting language'
'guilty of plagiarism all the time'
Bob are you proud of all that abuse and do you stand by it as being "totally honest"?
Yes I have accused you of such things just as you have called my friends and I many names as well and far worse than the names you have mentioned.For those that don't know, David contacted me privately via my son Peter as I banned David on facebook simply because of his distasteful remarks .The reason he contacted me is because of my evil comment but that was well after the nasty comments that you made before me doing that to both myself and friends.It was you that called me a liar saying I wasn't related to the Kellys just as you have done here on your website in the last 24 hours.You keep on saying to me that it was I that broke the agreement ,we both did and thats a fact.I stand by all my remarks that I have made even though I have made errors but am human like anyone else.You continually refer to Mick Fitzsimons as the hate site and wouldn't you say that is rather provocative?I have also called your site the fake site in retalliation to your comment.As Peter has said to me more than once we are all acting like schoolboys and he is probably right there.Remember the days when I supported you on NKF just as Sharon Hollingsworth did.Then you disappeared off the scene just as I did.You then started your websites with your fake identity and I returned to answer a lot of the things that you continued to say.You have the right to your opinion just as I do with mine but you do NOT have the right to belittle people that disagree with you as you continually do.I respect you for what you have done in Queensland but do not respect you for the way you have treated my friends and I over family matters.Nobody deserves that treatment at all.I will let other people including your members here judge who is correct and who is wrong.Have a good day to you all…Regards Bob
Bob I asked you for a list not a speech.
I have that information David well and truly.but won't lower myself to your level or standard.I am sure if I mention your vulgarities you would deny it so whats the point.I have come onto your site for the sake of correcting errors nothing else.As you have said to many people in the past dont read what I have posted as well if you don't like it.I am still waiting on many questions that I have asked of you in the past without reply and you completely ignore. .Unfortunately you do not like answering them either do you David? You always want a debate as long as it is one sided in your favour.That you will never get from me.The truth will do me just fine as distorters of the truth have to have a very good memory I am told..Regards Bob
Mr T. Hello. I will not disclose who you are. You have my absolute word. I would indeed welcome a conversation though. I am not "scary". Just an average bloke with an interest in the Kelly story, ACDC's music, film and American History. Cheers.
The Hate Page is proclaiming that Chiltern was an important place in the Kelly story cause that's where the warrants against Ned and Dan (they do not say for what) were made.
This is all old hat. It's in the MacFarlane 2012 "The Kelly Gang Unmasked" book. "Warrants for horse stealing were issued at Chiltern against Ned Kelly on 15 March 1878 and Dan Kelly on 5 April 1878". (p. 56)
He also mentions that "Uniformed detachments of Garrison Artillery were sent to guard towns in north-eastern Victoria like Chiltern". (p. 161)
Forget the Hate Page. Get the MacFarlane book!
Hi Mark,
Further up this page you will find an instance where someone from the Hate Site made a promise to Dee but did not keep his word.
Even so, it is my intention to call you anyway.
You mentioned bravery earlier. I am not frightened of the webmaster of the Hate Site. Police checked him out for me five years ago, because I had concerns. Nothing was known. That does not mean he is not a violent person. It just means Victoria Police have no record of it. Can't say the same for some of the other characters on the Hate Site… I am presuming they are OK.
Bon was the best; interview with Molly is brilliant, so deadpan
Bob I think in the interests of honesty and openness you are duty bound to provide the list of names you say I have called you and your friends that are far worse than you calling me evil, a liar, a con man, a hypocrite etc etc. Put your list up Bob and let readers decide if youre just making stuff up. If you cant provide that list then people will realise that just like your claim that you are blocked from here and blocked from my FB pages, nothing you say should be believed.
Horrie and Alf (or should I say Dee),
You are so unbalanced if you believe that the media puts out Balanced Reports
I would like to inform the members of this blog that I have replied to David in his request for the names that he has called us.For the 2nd time here they are suckholes,dickheads,morons,scum,slagheap,hatepage,embarrassment to your family and a lot more.If members want to read the original it will be posted on Fitzys site today later on
I thought those names were about fitzty.You keep good company bob
If you ladies are quite done hitting each other with your handbags, can you re-adjust your wigs and untwist your knickers and get back to discussing the Kelly Gang? Slanging matches like that belong behind the scenes. It is a turn off to the casual viewer who are here to learn about an interesting part of Australian history. For us old timers who have seen (and at times, yes, reveled in) some really epic dust-ups it is just another day in the neighborhood.
I see over at Fitzy's facebook page that they are discussing Fitzpatrick doing gaol time. Brian Stevenson did a piece on this very subject way back in 2011 after finding a Trove article and then we all discussed it here at Dee's blog in 2015. At the earlier time we had not found the record but later on we did locate it and had updated (which was long before now). Goes to show that there is not too much more information out there to be discovered or re-discovered, but once in a while someone hits on a gold nugget. I suppose it is also good to bring a subject back up now and then as there are possibly new folks looking in who need to get up to speed, that is if they don't see the myriad personality conflicts going on and run for their very lives.
Since someone said something about it at the other site, I would like to add that the reason Stuart Dawson did not add in information about the arrest or prison record, which he did know about, was because his article was centered on what happened at the Kelly homestead on April 15, 1878, thus it being titled "Redeeming Fitzpatrick : Ned Kelly and the Fitzpatrick Incident." He did detail about what happened with Fitzpatrick up until his dismissal from the force. He did not go into anything later from his civilian years as this was not a biography of the man's whole life.
And for the record, I have always thought that Fitzpatrick was a charming scoundrel who was a master at manipulating people (especially women) but his irresistible force finally met with the immovable object that was Joseph Ladd Mayes.
Yes Sharon I hear what you're saying!
You're quite right – I shouldn't respond to the weeks and weeks of unrelenting personal abuse and lies that are posted about me on the site that McGarrigle frequents, I should just ignore the egregious attacks on my character and profession, the invasions of my privacy and the rubbishing of a 'gentlemans agreement' I thought I had made with Bob to try to minimise the trash talking that goes on, I should just ignore it and talk about Ned Kelly. Ive been publicly described as a pervert, a criminal, a disgraced doctor, a creep, a liar, a psychopath and mentally unstable, a con man, evil, a hypocrite, malicious, vindictive, sick and twisted, creepy – yes, youre right I should just ignore all that. This week someone was informed on Facebook that I am a stalker! And I should just ignore the fact that the many people who know exactly who I am and what my values are never say anything in my defence or that the litany of allegations about me are outright lies and vilification. Yes, I should just ignore it all and discuss the Kelly story. So I apologise to you and everyone else I appear to have upset by failing to always ignore it all and once in a while expressing my frustration in intemperate ways.
But actually, this underbelly of extreme hate and bullying and vilification, this unrelenting wilful collective mob mentality that focuses hate and lies and threats and personal abuse on anyone who dares challenge the kelly story and the fond beliefs of so-called Kelly sympathisers, this utter refusal to discuss the actual story, this undertone of police hate and disrespect, this ignorant dismissal of scholarship and academic enquiry- isn't this actually part of the Kelly story ? Isn't this the dark secret of Kelly fancy that nobody wants to expose? And maybe its time it WAS exposed, that kelly mythology grew out of police hate and lies and continue to b at least partly sustained by utterly repugnant cyberbullying, perpetuation of lies and untruths about the known facts, and wilful refusal to look at new ones?
Maybe its time people interested in the Kelly story stood up to actively defend historical truths, academic rigour, open and respectful debate, and, instead of silently acquiescing to bullying and invasions of privacy, promotion of lies and ignorance actively condemned it, actively opposed and contradicted bullies and liars?
Is this a debate the Kelly world should be having now that it has got to the point where decent human beings – and you are one of them – are publicly being hounded and abused and vilified because they have an alternative view of a tiny moment in Australian history? Or should we just sweep it under the carpet and pretend it doesnt exist?
Dee, I truly do understand your frustration and your desire to expose the rotting dark underbelly. I also admire your desire to tilt at windmills, I really do. But, it seems that the further and harder you push, the further and harder they push back. It is a never-ending cycle that wastes precious time that could be used in positive ways to grow your brand. You have seen how I and a few others (that I will not name) have always just let it roll off our backs when we were vilified and slandered and do not let it get to us. Who really cares what these type folks think of us? Do celebrities care about what everyone is saying about them in the gossip magazines? Most are glad for the press, even bad press, heck, some even call the paparazzi on themselves just to get in the news cycle. Not that we are celebrities or stars by any reach of the imagination, but we are known entities in the Kelly world, so we should expect something to be said about us. Either folks like us or they don't and nothing we say or do will change their minds. Big whoop, either way! It won't stop us from researching and writing and proving them wrong when they are. How many times do we say play the ball, not the man?
You know, if the haters really want to hit us where it hurts the most, they can just stop mentioning our names or sites or books or what-have-you altogether. Yeah, that's right, deprive us of the spotlight, make like we don't matter. Marginalize us. Pretend we don't even exist. Do it! Only then might there be real peace in the briar patch (with a tip of the hat to Brer' Rabbit) and we can get back to doing what we do best unmolested.
Sharon you're quite right – again! You've been engaged in this debate far longer than I have, and survived, so clearly your wisdom is borne of long and I imagine often bitter experience, I appreciate and value your support. I'll go back to ignoring them. They hate that I know.
It was a good read about the republic before all this flak started flying about who is related to who or not and who insulted who first. That might interest two or three people out there but no one I know is interested. Two of us come and have a look here now and again and would like it to go back to Ned if that's alright.
Good Afternoon Mr T. I trust you had a great weekend. Do you think we could perhaps have our 'phone discussion this week? I look forward to hearing from you and as I said prior, your secret identity will be safe with me. Talk soon. Cheers, Thanks. MARK.
Hi Mark, you got an email address for me last week. Can you use it refresh me on the number to call please – and suggest a preferred time for me to call. Can't ring tomorrow. I having lunch with some of the folks here.
Email address? No, I dont have an email address I don't think. Refresh me. Meanwhile, (0406)382492. Anytime is good. Cheers.