What Time Was It When Joe Byrne Was Buried? [Sharon Hollingsworth]

A while back Dave White sent me a CD by Darren Coggan called "Hometown." Darren is a tremendous talent and I enjoyed his music immensely, especially the hauntingly beautiful song called "Silence and Me (Joe Byrne)" which was written by Ken McBeath. I highly recommend this CD.

The lyrics start out with:


They closed my eyes on a Sunday,

To those who once showed me fear,

Strung me up on a Tuesday,

For a handsome souvenir,

But I never was so lonesome without good company,

And when they lay me in my grave that night,

There was just silence and me.


Those are some powerful lyrics!

Kelly gang member Joe Byrne was buried in the Benalla cemetery on Tuesday, June 29, 1880. That fact is not in contention, what is in contention, however, is the time of burial. Reading through many sources there are two different times of burial given, at 4 P.M. and at midnight, and there are other vague references in newspapers and books as to him being buried in the evening or at night (obviously the writer of the song used one of those references).


Ian Jones, in his book "The Fatal Friendship," using information from the Weekly Times of July 3, 1880 told of Joe's body being placed in a rough coffin that was smuggled out the back of the police station. A 'well-armed constable' accompanied the undertaker through the dark streets to the cemetery where they interred him by lantern light. Afterwards the two 'saluted each other and went home.'


I have not been able to locate the Weekly Times article to see exactly what was said, but Jones never once mentioned midnight.

This bit from the Melbourne Herald further clouds things by saying that the burial was the day after the inquiry!
Perhaps this is some of the same (or exact?) wording of the Weekly Times article with the allusion to a well-armed constable and the salutation?

"After the Magisterial inquiry had been held on Byrne's body yesterday, the friends of the deceased were extremely anxious to get possession of it. They came to the station and the courthouse, and begged hard to be allowed to bury it at Greta. They were put off from time to time, and after dark the body was sneaked out by the back way from the police camp, and, with only an undertaker's man and a well-armed constable, was taken to the Benalla cemetery, and privately buried in a snug corner there. The constable and undertaker marched back again, saluted each other and went home."

Other articles even erroneously say that the body was given to the sympathisers for burial!


Joseph Ashmead in his unpublished manuscript says that "Byrne was wrapped in a blanket and buried by the police in the Benalla Cemetery at midnight."

In an early Kelly book (circa 1880) called "The Kelly Gang: Being Full and True Account" published by Frearson and Brother states that "Byrne was buried quietly at night in the Benalla Cemetery."


Superintendent Sadleir had testified before the Royal Commission that "The body of Byrne was buried at 4 o'clock on Tuesday afternoon in the Benalla cemetery.." (In the notes to The Fatal Friendship, Jones says "In the face of other evidence, Sadleir states that Joe's body was buried at 4 p.m.")


In Thomas McIntyre's unpublished manuscript there was this:

An inquiry was held upon the body of Byrne at 9 a.m. on the 29th. The inquiry was held in the courthouse, I was examined and identified the body as being one of the men who had shot the police on the 26th Oct. '78.
The verdict was 'The outlaw Joseph Byrne whose body was before the court and in possession of the police was by them whilst in the execution of their duty.'
Byrne was privately buried in Benalla Cemetery by the police the same day at 4 p.m.
Jones stated in The Fatal Friendship "That evening Captain Standish and squatter Robert McBean, both justices of the peace, sat in the empty Benalla courthouse to hear four witnesses."

So was the inquest in the morning or in the evening?

How could there be these differing times reported? If there was an evening inquiry then the 4 p.m. burial would be out. Were Sadleir and McIntyre around when the body was taken out? The old police station in Benalla was in Bridge Street West and the Benalla Cemetery is approximately 4 km (that would be around 2 and a half miles) away from the heart of the city. Even if smuggled out the back at night (especially near midnight) would there be many people still out and about on a bleak winter's evening? At 4 p.m. surely many would be out on their business and someone somewhere would have noticed a cart going towards the cemetery with a constable for escort, wouldn't they? Especially if some of they sympathisers had been petitioning all day long to get the body and were hanging around in the vicinity. But then, again, as the one report says the sympathisers had been told that the official inquest was slated for the following day (June 30th), but Standish seemed to have pulled a fast one and had a hurried inquiry on the 29th (evening or day?). All very confusing! It seems to have been orchestrated to be just that.

Another interesting dimension was this bit on the geomantica website where I had found the info given in a previous posting about Mr. Levy locating Joe Byrne's grave using dowsing:

...the site of Joe Byrne and
Martin Cherry's midnight burial was outside of consecrated ground and
it had been immediately ploughed up all around to disguise the
disturbance.


That is the first I had read about them ploughing up around it (which was a good idea and the same ruse was said to have been used for Dan and Steve's burial spot). Was Martin Cherry laid to rest earlier in the day or at the same time?  Will we ever know?

All we know for sure is that Joe Byrne's body was strung up for photographs to be taken sometime during the day of June 29th and he was in the ground before the sun rose the next morning.

Then, there was just silence and him.