The True Story of the KellyGang of Bushrangers Chapter 15 page 3

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After the break up of Mr Hare’s watch camp at the Byrnes’ he spent his time almost continuously on shorter expeditions, sparing neither himself nor his horses nor men in his efforts to come upon the outlaws. To keep some kind of surveillance over the numerous sympathisers was in itself a formidable task, for their numbers were recruited again by the release, on April 22, of those arrested in the beginning of January and kept illegally in prison for nearly three months. The women, however, who had never been arrested, gave the most trouble. Mrs Skillion and Kate Kelly, well aware that they were being watched every night, before going to bed took out their dogs, and beat the bush for hundreds of yards round the house in search of constables, whom they sometimes discovered, shamefaced and shivering, waiting for the visitors of whose arrival there was no further chance that night. To abate the dog nuisance Mr Hare ordered his men to drop poisoned baits about the place, but the Kelly women were not to be beaten thus, and promptly put muzzles on their dogs. On one occasion Kate Kelly was seen riding away with a large bundle on the saddle to her cousin Tom Lloyd’s, and was supposed to be conveying clothes or provisions to her brothers, who, it was reported, would visit Lloyd’s next day. A police party accompanied by Sherritt went from Benalla, and arrived before daylight next morning near Lloyd’s house which they watched from a clamp of trees. Just at daybreak a boy issued from the house with dogs, which scented the police and led the boy so close to them that he must have discovered their hiding place. At any rate he ran back to the house and several shots were fired, which were probably intended to warn any of the outlaws who might be hiding in the vicinity to defer their visit to their cousin till the coast was clear.

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