AUTHOR SPOTLIGHT: W.H. FITCHETT
By SHARON HOLLINGSWORTH
Recently
at ebay I noticed an auction for a book published in 1938 with the cover title of
Epic Pages from Australia's Story-No. 1
Ned Kelly And His Gang
A Dramatic Story of Bushranging Days
by W.H. Fitchett
I was astonished when this small 64 page soft cover book closed at $101.00 AU (approx $77.00 US). Doing further research, which, of course, included a look into "What They Said About Ned!" by Brian McDonald, I found that the text of the book in question was lifted entirely whole cloth from one of the volumes of W.H. Fitchett's 1913 two volume set called "The New World of the South." Volume two of this set which is subtitled "The Romance of Australian History" contains nearly 100 pages of information on the Kellys (out of a total of 428 pages). I was able to locate this book and buy it for the amazingly reasonable price of $12.60 US ($16.32 AU). (I plan to give this book to Dave as a birthday gift....so shhhhh!!! nobody let on, ok? LOL!) The same information that is in the books above is also available under a couple of different titles as the culled information was republished again at later dates. See Brian's book for further details.
Before I offer more information on Fitchett's book and give a few interesting snippets from it, I would like to give a very brief outline of his life. William Henry Fitchett was born in England in 1842 and arrived in Australia with his family while still a boy. In 1866 he became a Methodist minister and was instrumental in the inception of the Methodist Ladie's College at Hawthorn. He became the Principal and held the job for 46 years. Besides his church and school duties, Fitchett also was an editor at Life magazine and also held editorships at the Southern Cross magazine and The Australian Review of Reviews. In addition he wrote over a dozen books. His best known was "Deeds That Won the Empire" (1897) which was a collection of articles he had written for the Argus. Over the years it went into 35 editions and sold nearly a quarter of a million copies. He also wrote some fiction works, some religious works, most notably "Wesley and His Century," and he wrote several books on the Napoleonic Wars. "The New World of the South" was, as noted above, a two volume set, and it was comprised of articles he had written for "Life." The section of the book which contains six chapters under the heading of "The Story of the Kellys" originally ran in "Life" from September 1909 through February 1910. Two of the chapters were first-person narratives contributed by Sergeant Steele and Ex-Sergeant James O'Dwyer (Dwyer) on the capture of Ned Kelly. More on these at the end of the article.
The other four chapters are a lively read and very enjoyable. Of course, there are several glaring errors, such as Red Kelly being transported after attempting to shoot his landlord back in Ireland and an arrest warrant being served on Maggie Skillian and her being subsequently gaoled for her part in the Fitzpatrick incident!!!!! There are a few other things that are not correct, but it still did not detract from my enjoyment of it.
One really shocking bit that is not sourced at all and we can safely assume is an error of epic proportions is where Fitchett has the following:
"But when the building had been consumed, two charred skeletons, little more than the trunk and skull of either being left, were discovered in the smouldering ruins-all that remained of the Kelly gang. Their armour was lying in the cinders beside them. An examination of one of the bodies - supposed to be that of Dan Kelly - showed that a bullet had entered beneath the jaw, passing out at the roof of the skull. It had, plainly, struck on the upper edge of the armour, close to the neck, and then glanced upwards; so that Dan Kelly's armour really contributed to his death."
On the subject of the armour, Fitchett says:
"And yet the four scoundrels who formed the Kelly gang will be remembered-in certain districts at least-with an unashamed admiration when all other criminals are forgotten. What is the secret of their fame? The use of shot-proof armour in their last raid was, no doubt, an original and picturesque detail, due, perhaps, to literature of the pre-Dick Deadwood order; but the use of this armour was, in fact, a singularly stupid blunder. It cost the gang the only quality on which their continued existence depended-the power of swift movement. In the fight at Glenrowan, the clumsy masses of iron they carried almost reduced them to helplessness. A member of the gang, clad in his absurd coat and helmet of hammered ploughshares, was obliged to hold his rifle out at arm's length to get a clear sight of his target. As a result, steady aim was impossible. "Had they been without armour," says Superintendent Hare, "when we first attacked them at the hotel, and could have taken proper aim at us, not one of us could have escaped being shot."
Another couple of bits that caught my eye:
"The hunt for them was like trying to discover, say, four ants in a thousand acres of wheat."
"For nearly two years now they had been hunted through scrub and forest like rats, and something of the dangerous fury of rats burned in their blood."
Fitchett also seems to be like me and is quite enamoured of Joe Byrne. Much of what he had about him in the book is quite gushingly positive in tone. But there were a few discordant notes. To give a few examples of his fondness for Joe:
"There is one quality, however, which differentiates the performances of the Kelly gang from those of the rest of their evil type. Some one member of the party-it was probably Byrne, certainly not Ned Kelly himself-had a strategic brain of really admirable quality. If the story of the robbery of the Euroa bank, of the raid on Jerilderie, and of the attempted destruction of the police train at Glenrowan, be analysed, it will be found that each represented an amazingly clever plan, thought out in advance in minutest detail, and carried into effect with a coolness nothing less than wonderful. The strategic cleverness exercised in these crimes, if employed on either side in the guerilla stages of the South African War or on an adequate scale in any war-might well have produced historic consequences."
He also states:
"In many respects, Joe Byrne was physically the finest, and morally the least objectionable, member of the gang, and the carried the brains of the entire party. Tall, straight, good-looking, fairly well educated, and certainly clever, h might have had an honourable and successful career but for the bias towards crime, or the fascination of adventure, that drew him into partnership with the Kellys. Byrne was, in a sense, the apologist, and even the poet of the gang. He wrote accounts of their doings-both in prose and verse-and tried to get his literary efforts published."
Writing about Euroa as Joe stood guard over prisoners, he relates about (George) Stephens wanting to take action (and yes, we know that it was not a stable, but a tool shed):
"Byrne's figure as he did "sentry-go" passed at intervals across a little open window in the wall. Stephens found in one corner of the stable an ax, and armed with this he came to the window, intending to strike Byrne as he went past, but found the window was too small to permit an effective stroke. Stephens then searched round the stable again, and found a hay-fork. With a thrust of this he might spear Byrne like a salmon, and he hurried to the window, fork in hand. But his fellow-captives, as they realised his intention, cried out in alarm, and pulled him away from the window. "We will all be shot!" they cried. And so Byrne escaped that deadly thrust of the hay-fork which might have changed history."
Then he says in the chapter about Jerilderie that Joe was the actual writer of the Jerilderie Letter!!!
"Joe Byrne, it seemed, had written a bushranger's apologia, an account of the doings of the gang calculated to present them to public sympathy as deserving and oppressed characters, and they intended to compel Mr. Gill to insert his literary curiosity in the columns of his journal."
But Fitchett does have bits where Joe is not seen as being in such a glow as previously:
"McIntyre says that Byrne and Hart were 'dreadfully cut up at the turn things had taken,' Byrne, specially, being horror-stricken. But their "horror" quickly evaporated, and they sat down coolly to wait for the arrival of the other two constables."
Talking of Euroa again, Fitchett has (again we know it was not a stable, and we also know it was not a plate-layer but a telegraph line-repairer he bailed up, though earlier in the passage the plate-layer was referred to as a 'line-repairer,' thus the possible confusion in what sort of line!):
"And then he went on to tell how, as Byrne, with his back turned towards him, began to unlock the door of the stable into which the plate-layer was to be thrust as a prisoner, the bushranger's hand shook so violently that he could scarcely put the key in the lock. What if the thirty prisoners inside made a rush upon him; or the stalwart plate-layer behind him had suddenly seized him by the scruff of the neck? Byrne had good reason for trembling."
Things take a darker turn:
"Byrne, it will be remembered, had wept like a terrified child when he saw Constable Lonergan fall under Ned Kelly's bullet in the police-camp at Mansfield, but his conscience had hardened since then. This latest scheme of bloody revenge was of his planning, and he took a leading share in carrying it out. Sherrit had been his most trusted chum, and had betrayed him. The passion for revenge burned like a flame in his blood."
Finally Fitchett offers this sad narrative as a summing up of Joe and his lost potential and lost life:
"The crowd thronged round to gaze at the
figure of Byrne. The haggard face was black with smoke-
but the pallor of death was beneath the grime. The contorted arms had a horrible
look. On one stiffened finger was a ring which somebody recognised. It had
belonged to Constable Scanlon. Byrne had taken it from the dead hand of his
victim a little over two years before, and that sign of murder was on his own
hand as he lay dead. The downy moustache on his upper lip spoke of youth, but
the face was drawn and deep-lined, the features of a hunted man."
So, as you can see, The Rev. Mr. W.H. Fitchett was a man who certainly had a way with words and knew how to play on the readers' emotions! The way he portrayed Joe was beautifully done as one could see the bloom and promise of youth, the steady decline and the ultimate tragedy of a crushed spirit and a life cut far too short. I highly recommend this book despite the errors found within!
Above I alluded to two chapters featuring policemen Steele and O'Dwyer. Sergeant Steele's narrative is called "My Fight with Ned Kelly" and O'Dwyer's is called "How We Captured Ned Kelly." Both give their personal experiences at the siege of Glenrowan and oddly James O'Dwyer (or Dwyer) does not relate how he ran up to a fallen Ned Kelly and attempted to kick him and thus bruised his shin on the armour in the process instead! I have typed up the Sergeant Steele narrative in full (verbatim) and have added it as a special bonus on a separate page for faster loading time. See FITCHETT/STEELE page.
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SOURCES:
The New World of the South: Volume Two-The Romance of Australian History, W.H. Fitchett, 1913, 428 pp., hb.
What They Said About Ned!, Brian McDonald, 2004, 102 pp., pb.
Dictionary of Australian Biography, Percival Serle, 1949.
A very special thanks to Brian McDonald for sending me scans of the cover and title pages of Fitchett's works and for all the information provided about these books in the bibliography section of "What They Said About Ned!". This was information I had not found anywhere else! As always, it was a pleasure having his assistance and input.