On this day in 1880, Tipperary Town native John Sadleir led the police operation which resulted in the capture of famous bushranger Ned Kelly at Glenrowan, Victoria.
John Sadleir was born on the Brookeville estate, just south of Tipperary Town, in 1833. At the age of 19 in November 1852 he arrived in Melbourne. Within a month of his arrival, he had joined the police cadets and, in a career that spanned more than four decades, he is credited with having played a pioneering role in policing the state of Victoria.
It was when he was made superintendent in 1874 that he became involved in the pursuit of the infamous Kelly gang. On 28 June 1880 the Kelly gang were cornered while holding hostages at Mrs. Jones’ Hotel in Glenrowan. From about 5.30am that morning, Sadleir took charge of the siege. At the climax as a wounded Kelly, wearing a suit of armour forged from ploughshares lay wounded on the ground, it was Sadleir who arranged for medical attention for the bushranger and spoke sympathetically to him.
The Kelly gang suffered three fatalities during the siege while the police suffered none. Kelly, the son of a Tipperary man, would soonstand trial and was hanged on 11 November 1880. Subsequent to the siege, the government of Victoria set up a commission to investigate the efficiency of the police in apprehending the Kelly gang. Although the commission was highly critical of Sadleir’s handling of the siege, many newspaper reporters who were on the scene commended him for minimising fatalities.
In 1913, Sadleir published ‘Recollections of a Victorian Police Officer’. In it, he said of Ned Kelly: “the true picture of the bushranger shows him to be a very poor and sordid thing indeed. The Kellys, in spite of a few successful enterprises, were as poor and unheroic as any of their kind.” Unfortunately, the book contains scant information about his upbringing in county Tipperary.
John Sadleir died on 21 September 1919 in Melbourne. He is buried in Brighton Cemetery, Melbourne.
Sources:
https://oa.anu.edu.au/obituary/sadleir-john-13567
https://www.nenaghguardian.ie/2017/10/10/radio-story-of-tipp-man-who-caught-ned-kelly/
https://www.thejournal.ie/readme/column-the-forgotten-tipperary-man-who-pursued-ned-kellys-gang-3641528-Oct2017/
https://glenrowanthenovel.com/2021/09/27/death-of-mr-john-sadleir/
