The reporters on the train heading for Glenrowan ( Australasian Sketcher.)
There were several reporters at the siege from the very beginning of the day.
There were reporters from The Age, John McWhirter, The Argus, Joe Melvin, The Sketcher and The Australasian, (reporter and artist) Carrington, George Allen from the Daily Telegraph.
The reporters received a message that a train was being organised to go after the gang who had just broken cover.
The scoop of the century lay ahead.
So how did these reporters know that the Kelly's had broken cover? According to 'Ned Kelly, The Last Stand', Carrington/Jones, it happened this way.
'I left home last
Sunday evening, June 27, about 7 o'clock, with the intention of passing an hour
or so, and enjoying a glass of grog, with an old friend in Melbourne. Happening
to look in at The Argus office on my way to his house I found that a telegram
had just been received from Beechworth with the startling intelligence that,
"the Kellys had broken out again and shot a man". Knowing that I
should have to start out as soon as possible for the scene of the outrage, I
turned up Bradshaw (the official railway guide), and finding that I could not
leave for Beechworth until 10 minutes past 6 on the Monday morning, I continued
my journey to pay my promised visit........I was on my way to Spencer St
station, having previously requisitioned a felt hat, a big pair of woollen
gloves, and three pound notes from another friend. On the platform I met the
representatives of the three morning journals (John McWhirter of The Age, George
Allen of The Daily Telegraph and Joe Melvin of The Argus, a fellow member of the
Yorick club and a born war correspondent, already armed with a revolver). We
waited a long time in the expectation that some of the heads of the police,
perhaps even the Chief Commissioner himself, would take advantage of the
special, but we waited in vain, and it was three minutes to ten when the train -
consisting of engine, one carriage and brake van - passed out of the Melbourne
yard on its most eventful journey'. (Carrington)
The Yorick Club of
Collins St East Melbourne was founded by Marcus Clarke in 1868.
It was
frequented by people such as J.J. Shillinglaw, Adam Lindsay Gordon,
George Gordon
McCrae and
Carrington.
