The Irish Outlaw Who Took Australia (and Historians) by Storm People who’ve learnt about Ned Kelly’s life story usually end up with one question: Was Ned Kelly a hero or a villain? He’s been breaking laws since he was twelve. He’s been born into a family of criminals, learning their ways. He stole countless of horses. He was named Australia’s Most Wanted Man the moment he killed three police officers during a shoot-out. He injured many more.
But even after all of that, thousands of people assembled to save his life. Why? Because they all believed that he was a hero. I, on the other hand, fully believe that he was a villain. Ned Kelly was the leader of a group of outlaws named the ‘Kelly Gang’, a group formed in 1876. He was an evil genius, always coming up with plans to use against the policemen who rightly shunned Ned for his crimes within the community. He had his first run-in with the law at the age of 14, when he was jailed for six months on the charge of assault.
He was then sentenced to three years of hard labour for being part of a horse0stealing operation. The Kelly Gang changed from horse thieves to heartless murderers due to the events at Stringybark Creek. A search party of four policemen camped out in Stringybark Creek, not knowing that the man they were searching for was less than two kilometres away. Two of them left to hunt for food, firing their guns in the process. The Kelly Gang didn’t have a lot of weapons, so when they heard the gunshots they knew that there were police searching for them. Instead of waiting for the police to find them, they would go and search for them.
