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Remains of Australian outlaw Ned Kelly are identified after 130 years

Remains of Australian outlaw Ned Kelly are identified after 130 years

THE REMAINS of Australian outlaw Ned Kelly have been identified 130 years after he was hanged for murdering three policemen.

Kelly had been executed in Old Melbourne Gaol in November 1880 when he was aged 25.

Bizarrely, the massive effort to find and identify the remains began after what was thought to have been Kelly’s skull was returned to authorities in Western Australia in 2009.

A skull, which was purported to be that of the outlaw’s, had been been stolen from a display case at Old Melbourne Gaol in 1978

When a farmer handed over what he believed to be the missing skull the process to positively identify it was started.

Kelly’s body had been buried in the grounds of the Old Melbourne Gaol following his execution. But in 1929 a number of remains were moved during building work at the jail. 

Eventually the remains of 34 people were discovered in a mass grave at the jail site. 

Following months of tests, which involved using DNA samples from Leigh Olver the great-great grandson of Kelly’s sister, the outlaw’s headless skeleton was identified.

The tests were also able to establish that the skull found in 2009 was not that of the outlaw’s.

Kelly’s relatives will now be consulted on where the remains should be reburied.

Even today the subject of Ned Kelly can cause mixed views within Australian society. To some he remains an outlaw and police killer, but some people believe is was a folk hero.

 

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