What does a bushranger look like anyway?

Here are just some of the cads you will find on this site. They were all bushrangers.

The Term 'Bushranger' was first used in February 1805, in the Sydney Gazette which mentioned men "whose appearance sanctioned the suspicion of their being bushrangers". From this time, the term was used to describe those who attacked people on the roads or in the bush. Over 2000 bushrangers roamed the Australian countryside, from the convicts who escaped until just after the Kelly Gang's last stand.

Besides being called bushrangers (and all being dead) what else do all these men have in common? Oh yes they lived in AUSTRALIA but what else?

Well we all know Ned Kelly came from Irish stock and he had a gang and one of the gang was his brother. We also know he was tried and hung. So what about the others?

 

Henry Johnson was from Ireland, was convicted for stealing a pair of shoes and changed his name to Harry Power.

 

Thomas Rogan (middle row at left) had stolen horses before the age of 22 when he joined a gang of bushrangers, and he was later tried and hung.

Ben Hall's parent's were sent to gaol for minor stealing offences, he loved horses and died in a shootout with police. He was at one stage called 'Brave Ben Hall'.

Frederick Wordsworth Ward's father was a convict. He had worked with horses and went to prison for receiving stolen horses. There is mystery about his death with some thinking he died in a police shootout and others saying it was his relative. He was called Captain Thunderbolt.

Steve Hart was born to Irish parents, he worked as a jockey, he was in the Kelly gang. He may have died at the Glenrowan Inn shootout but some say he and Dan Kelly escaped.

 

So there seem to be some common threads such as Ireland and convicts and stealing but no one thing they all had in common. Maybe it was falling on hard luck.

What is a cad?
  Origin: 1780–90
  Meaning: bounder, rotter, rascal, rogue; heel.

Demise of the Kelly Gang

Dan Kelly's and Steve Hart's armour

recovered from the hotel at Glenrowan after it was burnt.

Oswald Thomas photographer

State Library of Victoria.

The siege at Glenrowan

The Kelly gang (Ned and Dan Kelly, Joe Byrne and Steve Hart) were surrounded at the Glenrowan Inn by the police on June 27, 1880 .  The gang had suits of armour to protect themselves, made by a local man, which were made of heavy iron and weighed about 44 kilograms each.  Probably made from plough shares and forged in a low temperature bush fire, the armour was tough enough to repel bullets but the men's legs and arms were not protected.  Joe Byrne was shot in the groin and died.
Ned Kelly's refusal to surrender, and his loyalty to his mates, when he could have escaped, is part of what created the Kelly legend.

When the siege was over, the bodies of Steve Hart, 21, and Dan Kelly, 19, lay side by side, in a back room of the inn.  A priest, Father Matthew Gibney, entered the burning inn and found them together, dead, with their helmets removed.  It is believed they shot each other.

See an original photo from after the siege.

RESOURCES:
Bushrangers at State Library of Victoria
The National Museum of Australia
NSW: National Library of Australia
Australian Nuclear Science and Technology Organisation

Steve Hart, outlaw

(1859 – 1880)

Steve Hart was renowned for being one of the Kelly Gang.

He was born and named Stephen, the 2nd son, to Irish immigrant parents Richard and Bridget Hart (nee Young) at Three Mile Creek near Wangaratta, Victoria. His mother and father were married in Yass, NSW in 1852.  His brothers were Richard (@1856 - 1934), Nicholas (d. 1878), and Thomas (the youngest), and his sisters Ellen (@1853-1924) Edith or Esther 'Ettie', Jane, Winifred and Agnes (b. 1872). William (b. 1852)

 

As a teenager Steve Hart probably sometimes worked as a jockey like his brother Nicholas. He was arrested for stealing horses from David Green, of Winton, and sentenced to imprisonment. After this he received more sentences which he served in Beechworth gaol where met Dan Kelly the youngest brother of Ned Kelly.

He became friends with Dan Kelly and that is how he became involved with the Kelly Gang. He took part in the robberies at Euroa and Jerilderie.

He died at the Glenrowan Inn shoot out at the age of 21.

Extract of the Police Gazette 5th March, 1879. The latest official description of the Kelly Gang: "Steve Hart, about 21 years of age, 5 feet 4 inches high, dark complexion, black hair, short dark hair on sides of face and chin, bandy legs, stout build, clumsy appearance, speaks very slowly, dressed in dark paget suit, light felt hat and elastic-side boots. 

See also: Demise of the Kelly Gang

The Mercury newspaper article from 1880 after his death at Trove

 

 REFERENCES:

Australia Birth Index, 1788-1922.