Mrs Jones

COOKSON'S INTERVIEW WITH MRS. JONES.

(sent in by Sharon Hollingsworth)

Below are sections lifted from the B.W. Cookson 'The
Kelly Gang From Within' articles in the Sydney "Sun" that ran September
1st and 2nd 1911 which deal directly with Mrs. Ann Jones's tragic
recollections about the Siege of Glenrowan.

In the first few paragraphs of the September 1st article Brian Cookson
meets Mrs. Jones and she wishes to shake his hand as he is an
Englishman. She tells him: "It seems that my memory stopped thirty years
ago-when...Oh, that awful night! Oh, my poor innocent children! My
God! Oh, sir, if you knew what Australia and Australians had done for me
and mine you would pity me from the bottom of your heart-you would
understand why I wanted to clasp an Englishman's hand once more before I
left this accursed place! But don't ask me to talk about it! I
can't-and yet sometimes it eases my mind. But no; the memory of it
makes me miserable unto death-after all these years." Cookson then
makes a few comments to the readers before Mrs. Jones gives some
background on her early history when she first arrived from England up
until running the Glenrowan Inn ..we pick up the narrative verbatin here
(all spelling and punctuation is left as the newspaper had it):

"When I took the hotel at Glenrowan it was a poor place, but I worked
hard to make a business. But there was always trouble. When the Kellys
began to get active the police used to think I was a sympathiser....I
was not...They blamed me for most of the things the Kellys did...I had
nothing whatever to do with them. And that is the truth. They accused me
of hiding them. The place only had five rooms, and there was no hiding
place in it. I didn't hide anyone...."But that awful night! The place
full of people-people and the Kelly crowd, with pistols and guns! And
my poor, innocent children! Think of that...Six of them, helpless, in
that crowded place, and the bullets flying through it!..My brave little
daughter was shot in the head. The brave police shot her. They didn't
care who they killed. They fired bullets right through the house, and
hit my innocent children...(Ex-Superintendent Hare, in his printed
history of the fight, fully bears out Mrs. Jones's statements in this
respect:-"When we commenced firing we were unaware there was anyone in
the house until we heard the most fearful shrieks coming from inside the
hotel from men, women, and children. We discovered afterwards that the
front of the building...was composed of thin weatherboards, and the
Martini-Henry bullets were going through the building amongst the
occupants. Two or three children were shot...There must have been a
terrible scene inside.") "I didn't know anything about the Kelly
lot-didn't know and didn't care. But the police said I did-said I
was a friend of them. So they never spared me or my children! "Well (and
the old woman rose in bed, and, with a face convulsed with pain, almost
screamed:-
"Those that persecuted me are dead, and in hell! In hell, long ago! And
I hope they'll [word missing] there!" [missing words] followed this
outburst, the invalid gasping, and clutching convulsively [words
missing]. When she resumed [words missing] a whisper:- [words missing]
that I wanted justice and my little children that were shot by their
cruel police, I told them to give me in charge if they liked. But they
didn't. They wouldn't listen to me at all. "I don't want any help now. I
get my living-enough to keep me-from England-from my last
husband's estate. His name was Smith.... "After the hotel was burnt down
that night I rebuilt it. I let it to another person. And she let it get
burnt down again. And it was only insured for a very little.

"DAMN THE KELLYS"

"Damn the Kellys! I never got a pound of their money all the time I was
there. Much good may it do them that did get it. But Jones's never got a
cent of it to my knowledge. I don't know who got it and I don't care. I
didn't.
"The police have said things about my character. Most of them never any.
I've known police do things that gaolbirds would be ashamed of. I've
known police to rob and beat drunken men, to rob each other, to rob
me-to rob anyone they could reach. And worse than that. And they've
come to me and asked me to befriend them, and I have refused. It wasn't
wise to go against the police in those days. But I didn't care. I have
references from the biggest and best men in Ireland. My husband-the
last one-was a gentleman. He came from the West End of London. And I
am living now on the interest of £2000 that he left me when he died.
"There's one of the Kellys I know. That's Jim. He was in trouble long
ago. But I have heard that it was not him, but a relative of his, that
did it. It wasn't much that was done, anyhow. Jim, he said that it would
be better for him, who was single, to do the time, than for the other,
who wasn't. So he did it. That's the sort of man he is." "But can you
remember what happened that night at your hotel?" "Remember? Yes! I can
never forget. Only there is so much to remember, and it all happened so
quickly, that sometimes I don't quite know which was first or last, or
what. But-"
Here the unfortunate woman fell into a fit of coughing and choking, so
severe that the attendant had to lift her out of bed and take remedial
measures of a special character. It was already well on in the
afternoon, and the interviewer took his leave, promising to return in
the morning.

A NARRATIVE OF DEATH.

There was a glint of sunshine abroad next day, and the general aspect of
the place was much less dreary. Inside the cottage of the ex-licensee of
the Glenrowan Inn-as it was known of old-there was nothing of
brightness. The old woman was able to breathe more easily, but she was
very weak. In time, however, she found speech to continue her narrative
of death and desolation:-
"Let me begin by saying that I was between two fires there," she said,
weakly. "The police were suspicious of me, because they believed I
assisted the outlaws. I did not. The Kellys hated me because they
believed I gave the police information about them. I got nothing but
abuse and mischief from both sides. And I never had anything to do with
either. That is the truth.
"I well remember Kelly coming to my place that dreadful night. It was
raining, and very wet. He took me and my dear little girl away, and
locked my two little boys up in a room by themselves. He made me turn
the key-said he would shoot me if I refused to do everything that he
told me. I begged him to lock myself and my daughter in my own room, but
he wouldn't.
"He took me and my little girl-she was 15 then-together with seven
men, over to the station. These were the men who were to take up the
line and wreck the train that was coming up with the police from
Melbourne. Kelly said to me, "I'll show you a sight now! I'll kill all
your ----- traps!" Then they went away up the line towards Wangaratta.
My daughter saw them pulling up the railway line, but I did not. "It
was very dark. We went on to the gatehouse, Dan Kelly marching along
with a rifle to mind us. The men who were working there were camped near
my place. That was because they had no chimney on their tents, and they
used to use my fire to cook with."
The old woman paused to make the pillow a trifle easier, and to settle
the awful nightcap more comfortably.
"Oh, but I'm glad there were no police at the hotel when those wretches
called that night!" she continued, in excited tones. "They'd have killed
them all. They were ripe for murder. They had determined to wreck the
special train, and to kill everyone who escaped death in the smash. They
would surely have killed any police they met that night. And if they met
them in my place they would have killed me. They said so. And they would
have murdered my innocent children as well. "They found that they hadn't
the proper tools to pull the line up with, so they came back. They got
the porter in charge, but he said he didn't know how to take it up. 'You
know how to do it!' shouted Ned Kelly, levelling his revolver at the
porter. 'Ned,' said the porter, 'I tell you I never worked a day on the
line in my life, and know nothing about it.' They believed him, and went
down to Reardon's. They took Reardon along, and the other men, and made
them pull up the line. The other men were platelayers. "After the line
was destroyed the Kellys took the other men to the gatehouse. They had
no down on any of them-only me and Reardon. They used to think that
Reardon was spying upon them, with me. My daughter came up to me at the
gatehouse. I might say that Steve Hart was sick, and didn't want to go
out that night, but they made him. They were all strangers to me at
first. I knew nothing at all about them. "After the night's work-it
was morning when they finished-Ned Kelly asked the men if they'd like
to go into their tents and get breakfast. They'd been out since 1
o'clock, and said they were hungry. Dan Kelly turned to me and said,
'Here, Mother Jones, you'd better see if you can get them anything to
eat.'
"So they all went to my place-to the hotel. But there was not enough
bread. The men got some from their tents, and with that and what the
girls found they made shift for breakfast. My poor little daughter,
after having been up all night, had to wait on them.

WANTED TO GET DRUNK.

"At this time all the gang were quite sober. Byrne had had a few drinks.
He came up and snatched a bottle of brandy out of the bar. I cried,
because I had very little goods, and could not afford to lose it. So I
tried to get it back. I implored Ned Kelly not to let them take the
liquor away. He said he wouldn't let them, but he did nothing to stop
them. They were all eager to get drunk. And they got pretty drunk. They
started preparing to go away, putting their iron clothes on. But they
got wandering all over the house, and some of them couldn't get their
iron hats over their heads.
"It was the liquor that caught them-nothing else. They stayed there
drinking and going on with foolishness when they could have been away
easily.
"They had a lot of people shut up in the hotel. But they let Curnow, the
schoolmaster, go. It was Curnow that held the red handkerchief up and
stopped the train.
The police said afterwards that Kelly would not have let Curnow go but
for the fact that he was mates with them before. That'll tell you the
kind of things the police were.
"It was a terrible day. And when the police came and started firing
bullets into the house-it was full of people-it was awful. Brave
police! They lay in the gullies, and behind the trees, and shot bullets
at the house, knowing that it was full of people. My poor innocent
little children suffered most. My little boy was shot." A paroxysm of
coughing and weeping convulsed the invalid for a few minutes. It was
with cheeks wet with tears that she continued. "My brave little girl was
shot, too-shot with a big rifle bullet that had gone through half the
house first, or it would have killed her. The bullets were coming all
through the house, tearing through the walls, smashing everything,
and- ... Oh, my poor, innocent children! I shall never forget them.
"My poor little boy was mortally hurt. But no one had mercy. The police
kept on shooting, and no one knew who would be the next to fall. The
bullets were doing the outlaws no harm at all. They were only hurting
us. The police might have rushed the place easily and captured them-if
they had been men enough. But they were not men. They lay there in
safety and kept firing at the house.

"DEAR MOTHER I'M SHOT!"

"When my dear little boy was hit he stood up, looked around, and then
fell down. 'Oh, God,' he cried, in such a piteous voice. 'Mother, dear
mother, I'm shot!'...."
The recollection of this pitiful tragedy caused the old woman to break
into a fit of frantic sobbing. It was with a choking voice that she
proceeded:-
"I could not get to the poor child for some time. He was lying on the
floor, bleeding from a great bullet wound in his little back....The
murdering police! They had killed him!....When I got to him I turned him
over. He was all blood....I found the hole....It was terrible....His
life-blood was pouring out of it, and his poor little white face was
turned up, the eyes looking into mine as though imploring help....Oh, my
God, forgive those who did this thing!...I tore off part of my apron,
and tried to stop up the hole in his back with it....I wanted to go out
for help, but Dan Kelly would not let me, 'You can't go,' he said,
'we're turning the prisoners out now.' "So I could only go back to my
dying boy and cry over him. There was no help... " 'What can we do?' the
Kellys said.
" 'Go! Go out! You cowards! Go out and play on the green! Go out and
fight like men if you want to fight! Or run away like curs if you are
afraid! Go out of here! Do you want to see all my family murdered? Oh,
you cowardly wretches!"
"But I couldn't move them. They wouldn't go. They were getting very
sober and very sad by this. The police were all round the house, scores
of them, and it seemed as if they couldn't escape. And there was my
innocent boy, dying on the floor, to warn them what would happen to
bloodthirsty men like themselves.
"My daughter and I dragged my wounded son into the kitchen between us.
Two or three got hold of him and took him out and started to carry him
to Reardon's, where we might get help. But the police stopped them, and
said if they didn't go back they'd blow holes in them. "I was frantic
with anguish and anxiety-the anxiety to do something for my dying boy.
I called out to the police to let us go. They refused. I said to
them,'Get up, you wretches, and die in the road yourselves! Don't lie
down there in hiding! Stand up like men!' "All this time the bullets
were flying about thick. But I never got hit. I wouldn't have cared if I
had. I was mad with grief. I had had a daughter killed only a few months
before, and now it seemed that all my children were to be massacred....I
was mad. "The police hated me. The Kellys believed I used to 'plant'
police in my house. It was a foolish lie-there was no room. You
couldn't hide a cat in it.
"I was wandering....My boy died. Died miserably and without help. And my
brave little girl, who was wounded herself, never got over it....She
died not long after.... And it was her brother's awful death that killed
her! He was such a clever, quiet boy!...Oh, dear! Oh, dear! "She was a
brave girl....Through all that dreadful night she never lost her head.
Sick with her wound, bleeding and sore, she showed courage that should
have shamed both the Kellys and the police....That is her picture-that
one on the wall near the dark frame....That is her. Dear, brave little
woman.
"She wanted to defy the Kellys and the police-wanted us all to run out
of the house to some place of safety. When they carried the dying boy
away she followed. She said she didn't care if she was killed-if her
dear brother was to die she wanted to die with him. "Ned Kelly was most
cruel to all of us all day. He said that if he could see his way to burn
down the house and those who set the police on to him he'd do it. "I
have four children living. My son Owen is in West Australia; Terry is a
policeman in the West; Headington is a farmer over there; and Tom is a
schoolmaster somewhere in New South Wales. "It was that Inspector
Sadleir who made them burn my place down. They hadn't the courage to
rush it and capture the Kellys. "My character has always been good. Of
course, keeping a small country inn is a rough life, but we come of a
good family, and have always kept ourselves decently. My father-his
name was Kennedy-was highly commended to Governor Bourke when he came
out here by several big people in Ireland. My father was the first white
man on the Buckland. I have lived a good life, and brought up a big
family....And they shot my dear, innocent, brave children-oh! the
cowards! And we got no compensation, Nothing at all." Exhausted with the
strain of her narrative, the old woman lay back upon the pillow weeping
bitterly. In a broken voice she bade her visitor farewell. "I shall not
be long here," she moaned; "soon I shall see my dear murdered children
again! Goodbye! God bless you for letting me shake the hand of an
Englishman in this accursed place."

The last few paragraphs has Cookson leaving the cottage
as the old woman turns towards the wall and begins sobbing. He gives a
few final poignant thoughts to the readers as he compares the sadness
and wrecked lives of both Mrs. Jones and Mrs. Kelly.

My thanks to Roselyn who has graciously passed copies of the Cookson
articles on to Sharon Hollingsworth and to Sharon who typed this up and
passed it on to this site.