OVER NED KELLY'S GRAVE

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 620, 23 March 1929, Page 19

OVER NED KELLY'S GRAVE

SCHOOL. TO BE BUILT AT MELBOURNE END OF HISTORIC GAOL The gloomy walls of the old Mel- j bourne gaol, 20,000 tons of bluestonc. j are thundering down about the graves j of Ned Kelly, Albert William Deem- ■ ing, Martha Needle, and others notori- j ous in Australian criminal records, to I make way for the new engineering j school at the Working Men’s College. ]

The yard in which were buried j those who paid the last grim penalty for their crimes is a long rectangular one ,surrounded by walls, apparently built to last centuries. Now this area, long given over to the correction of bad citizens, is to be dedicated to the making and training of good citizens.

The cheerful shouts of students will ring out where once prison bells tolled, and light feet will scamper through a bright new modern building, over a place where once only furtive whisperings, the wails of the condemned, and the rattling of irons could be heard.

That which is believed to be Ned Kelly’s grave lies by itself, and the initials “E.K.” with an arrow are on a wall some distance from the others. In the last few days, while the workers have been tearing down the wall fronting the street, many curious passers-by have peered through the bicycle shed trying to read the initials carved on the wall—J.V.P., F.K., J.C., E.M.N., and many others. Among the graves are those of William Barnes, 1885; Freeland Morrell, 1886; George Syme, 1888; Filipi Castillo. 1889; Robert Landells, 1S89: John Thomas Phelan. 1891; John Wilson, 1891: Martha Needle. 1594; and Albert William Deeming, 1892. The building of the old Melbourne gaol was first commenced in 1841. The stone is being carted away, and sold to the Harbour Trust for underwater work.

The walls are of massive slabs of bluestone, 2ft long and Ift square. The concrete is still as hard as ever, and each slab is only removed after hard work. Buried in the walls is an old pipe, and occasionally the workmen come upon the brickwork of an old underground tunnel.