Every country seems to have a criminal folk hero. England has Ronnie Biggs, Canada has a noted bank robber named Paddy Mitchell; the United States has Jesse James and a veritable pantheon of other villains. Australia, both a country and a continent, has one outlaw of renown, a national anti-hero named Ned Kelly. .
Ned Kelly is much prized by Australians. A few years ago, when British rocker, Mick Jagger, was selected to star as Ned Kelly in a movie of the same name, Australian critics panned the movie mightily, taking issue particularly with the premise that a Brit could accurately portray a legend of Oz. .
North-east of Melbourne in the Australian state of Victoria and extending to the border of the state of New South Wales, the Murray River, is a ranching region known to this day as Kelly Country. Here the legend of Ned Kelly was played out.
Biography (1854-1880).
Ned, the eldest of eight children, was born to Irish parents in Victoria in 1854. His father was an ex-convict and mothers a migrant.
Ned attended school at Avenel until his father died on 27 December 1866. .
• 1869, Ned was arrested for alleged assault and held for ten days on remand but the charge was dismissed. .
• 1870, he was arrested and held in custody for seven weeks as a suspected accomplice of the bushranger.
• 1873, Ned's younger brother James was sentenced to five years' imprisonment for cattle stealing and upon his release was subsequently given ten years' for horse stealing. .
• 1874, he was discharged and worked for two years as a timber worker. .
• 1876, he joined his stepfather, George King, in horse stealing. .
• 1877, Dan Kelly was sentenced to three months' for damaging property and was wanted for horse stealing. .
• 1878, rewards of £100 were offered for the capture of Ned and Dan Kelly. Police set out to capture Ned and Dan and on 25 October camped at Stringybark Creek.