Home to our local legend former AFL Geelong player Billy Brownless is, Jerilderie is worth visiting for its profound history of Ned Kelly.
This is where Ned Kelly and his Gang robbed the ‘Jerilderie Bank’. More than two thousand pounds were stolen before Kelly and his gang walked to the Telegraph Office and chopped down the telegraph poles. He and his gang held 30 people hostage overnight in the Royal Mail Hotel where Ned Kelly wrote the famous Jerilderie Letter which documents Kelly’s passionate pleas of innocence and desires for justice for both his family and the poor Irish settlers of Victoria’s north-east. It has also been described as the Ned Kelly ‘manifesto’ and remains the only source providing a direct link between the Kelly Gang and the actions they are accused of.
Ironically the current Jerilderie Police Station features no less than 19 structural components mimicking Ned Kelly’s distinctive face plate. Some examples include walls made of differently toned bricks making up his image to storm drains with holes cut in the same pattern.
