Ned's burial wish

The Victorian Government recently announced that the remains of the bushranger Ned Kelly will be released to members of his family for burial.

This decision is in accordance with Kelly’s wishes which was recorded in a letter held in the PROV Collection (PROV holds the world’s largest accumulation of original records related to the Kelly Gang).
The letter, dated 10 November 1880, is held along with other letters Kelly wrote via dictation whilst in jail awaiting execution. Kelly was unable to write any of the letters himself owing to the injuries he had received at the Glenrowan Siege, and so signed them with his mark - an ‘X’. The letter is part of PROVs online Kelly Historical Collection, which are in turn effectively pages within the Kelly Capital Case file.
This file was created at the time by the Crown Law Department to document the process that occurred after his trial to determine whether a recommendation should be put to the Governor as to whether the mandatory death sentence should be commuted to a lesser one. (This was the case for all prisoners sentenced to death for capital offences).
Kelly was executed by hanging at the Old Melbourne Gaol 11th November 1880, and buried there.

Old Melbourne Gaol

 Following the closure of the Old Melbourne Gaol,in 1929 work was undertaken to allow extensions to the Working Men’s College (now RMIT) in the former prison yard (the initials of each executed inmate and the date of his or her execution were carved into the wall adjacent to the burial plot, some of these bluestone blocks are now in the Beaumaris breakwater). The remains of all executed inmates (approximately 30 individuals) that could be located were exhumed, transferred to Pentridge Prison, and re-interred in mass graves. In 1937, four additional coffins were unearthed in a different area, and taken to Pentridge for reburial.

The initial process of exhumation, re-internment was disorganised and over time the actual grave sites became confused, and after Pentridge closed and redeveloped into a housing estate, workers uncovered a mass graves site. Heritage Victoria were called in to investigate and identify the burial locations of the Old Melbourne Gaol  inmates, and also those of the ten executed Pentridge prisoners. In 2008-09 they discovered the individual plots of the Pentridge prisoners, and 3 mass graves of the Old Melbourne Gaol inmates.

Forensic profiling and analysis was undertakrn to identify the remains. This work identified one of the skeletons as Ned Kelly's, which his family descendants will re-bury in Kelly Country.