7. Ballarat.—On the 10th of August the Geelong newspapers announced that deposits of auriferous earth had been discovered at Buninyong, and very soon the sunny slopes of that peaceful and pastoral district were swarming with prospecting parties; the quietly browsing sheep were startled from their favourite solitudes by crowds of men, who hastened with pick and spade to break up the soil in every direction, each eager to out-strip the other in the race for wealth. This region, however, did not realise the expectations that had been formed of it, and many of the diggers began to move northwards, in the direction of Clunes. But at Clunes, also, there had been disappointment, for the gold was mostly embedded in quartz rock, and these early miners were not prepared to extract it; parties from Clunes were therefore moving southwards to Buninyong, and the two currents met on the slopes of the Yarrowee, a streamlet whose banks were afterwards famous as the Ballarat diggings. The first comers began to work at a bend in the creek, which they called Golden Point. Here, for a time, each man could easily earn from £20 to £40 a day, and crowds of people hurried to the scene. Every one selected a piece of ground, which he called his claim, and set to work to dig a hole in it; but when the bottom of the sandy layer was reached, and there seemed to be nothing but pipe-clay below, the claim was supposed to be worked out, and was straightway abandoned. However, a miner named Cavanagh determined to try an experiment, and, having entered one of these deserted claims, he dug through the layer of pipe-clay, when he had the good fortune to come suddenly upon several large deposits of grain gold. He had reached what had been in long past ages the bed of the creek, where, in every little hollow, for century after century, the flowing waters had gently deposited the gold which they had washed out of the rocks in the mountains. In many cases these “pockets,” as they were called, were found to contain gold to the value of thousands of pounds, so that very soon all the claims were carried down a few feet further, and with such success that, before a month had passed, Ballarat took rank as the richest goldfield in the world. In October there were ten thousand men at work on the Yarrowee; acre after acre was covered with circular heaps of red and yellow sand, each with its shaft in the middle, in which men were toiling beneath the ground to excavate the soil and pass it to their companions above, who quickly hurried with it to the banks of the creek, where twelve hundred “cradles,” rocked by brawny arms, were washing the sand from the gold.
8. Mount Alexander.—In the month of September a party, who had gone about forty miles north-east of Clunes to Mount Alexander, discovered near the present site of Castlemaine a valuable seam of gold-bearing earth. The fame of this place soon spread through all the colony; many left Ballarat to seek it, and crowds of people hastened from Melbourne and Geelong to share in the glittering prizes. In October, eight thousand men had gathered in the district; in November, there were not less than twenty-five thousand diggers at work, and three tons of gold were waiting in the tent of the commissioner to be carried to Melbourne. The road to Mount Alexander was crowded with men of all ranks and conditions, pressing eagerly onward to be in time.
9. Sandhurst.—A few weeks later the glories both of Ballarat and of Mount Alexander were dimmed for a time by the discovery of gold on the Bendigo Creek, which seemed at first to be the richest of all the goldfields. In the course of a few months nearly forty thousand persons were scattered along the banks of the streamlet where the handsome streets of Bendigo now stand.
In the month of May, 1852, there must have been close upon seventy thousand men in the country between Buninyong and Bendigo, all engaged in the same occupation. Melbourne and Geelong were silent and deserted; for all classes were alike infected with the same excitement—lawyers, doctors, clerks, merchants, labourers, mechanics, all were to be found struggling through the miry ruts that served for a highway to Bendigo. The sailors left the ships in the bay with scarcely a man to take care of them; even the very policemen deserted, and the warders in the gaols resigned in a body. The price of labour now became excessive, for no man was willing to stay away from the diggings unless tempted by the offer of four or five times the ordinary wage.
10. Immigration.—Meanwhile the news of these great discoveries had travelled to Europe, so that, after the middle of 1852, ships began to arrive freighted with thousands of men of all nations, who no sooner landed in Melbourne than they started for the diggings. During this year nearly one hundred thousand persons were thus brought into the country, and the population was doubled at a bound. Next year ninety-two thousand fresh arrivals landed, and Victoria thus became the most populous of the colonies. During the two following years it received a further accession of a hundred and fifty thousand; so that, in 1856, it contained four hundred thousand inhabitants, or about five times the number it possessed in 1850. The staple industry was, of course, the mining for gold, of which, in 1852, one hundred and seventy-four tons were raised, valued at £14,000,000. During the next ten years £100,000,000 worth of gold was exported from Victoria.
Some of the nuggets that were found are of historic note. The “Sarah Sands,” discovered in 1853, was worth about £6,500. In 1857 the “Blanche Barkly,” worth £7,000, was discovered; and the following year produced the “Welcome Nugget,” which was sold for £10,500, and was the greatest on record, until, in 1869, the “Welcome Stranger” was dug out, which proved to be slightly larger.
CHAPTER XIII.
VICTORIA, 1851-1855.
1. Effects of Gold Excitement.—For the first few months after the discovery of gold in Victoria, many shrewd persons believed that the colony would be ruined by its seeming good fortune. None of the ordinary industries could be carried on whilst workmen were so scarce and wages so high. But, happily, these expectations proved fallacious; for, in 1852, when the great stream of people from Europe began to flow into the colony, every profession and every trade sprang into new and vigorous life. The vast crowds on the goldfields required to be fed, so the farmers found ample market for their corn, and the squatters for their beef and mutton. The miners required to be clothed, and the tailor and shoemaker must be had, whatever might be the prices they charged. Mechanics and artisans of every class found their labours in demand, and handsomely paid for. The merchants, also, found trade both brisk and lucrative; while the imports in 1850 were worth only three-quarters of a million, those of three years later were worth about twenty times that amount. After this enormous increase in population and business, it was found that there was quite as great an opportunity of gaining riches by remaining quietly engaged in one’s own occupation as by joining the restless throng upon the goldfields. The public revenue of the colony was in 1852 six times, and in 1853 twelve times as great as it had been before the discovery of gold; so that, both as individuals and as a nation, the people of Victoria had reason to be satisfied with the change.
2. Convicts Prevention Act.—There existed, however, one drawback; for the attractions of the goldfields had drawn from the neighbouring colonies, and more especially from Tasmania, great numbers of that class of convicts who, having served a part of their time, had been liberated on condition of good behaviour. They crossed over by hundreds, and soon gave rise to a serious difficulty; for, in the confused and unsettled state of the colony, they found only too great an opportunity for the display of their criminal propensities and perverted talents. Being by no means charmed with the toilsome life of the gold-miner, many of them became bushrangers. There were, in 1852, several bands of these lawless ruffians sweeping the country and robbing in all directions. As the gold was being conveyed from the diggings, escorted by bands of armed troopers, the bushrangers lurked upon the road, treacherously shot the troopers, and rifled the chests. On one occasion, their daring rose to such a height that a band of them boarded the ship Nelson whilst it lay at anchor in Hobson’s Bay, overpowered the crew, and removed gold to the value of £24,000—remarking, as they handed the boxes over the side of the vessel, that this was the best goldfield they had ever seen.
To prevent any further int
roduction of these undesirable immigrants, the Legislature, in 1852, passed what was called the “Convicts Prevention Act,” declaring that no person who had been convicted, and had not received an absolutely free pardon, should be allowed to enter the colony; and that all persons who came from Tasmania should be required to prove that they were free, before being allowed to land. Any ship captain who brought a convict into the colony was to be fined £100 for the offence.
3. Aspect of Goldfields.—Meanwhile the goldfields were growing apace. The discovery of the Eureka, Gravel Pits, and Canadian Leads made Ballarat once more the favourite; and in 1853 there were about forty thousand diggers at work on the Yarrowee. Hotels began to be built, theatres were erected, and here and there a little church rose among the long line of tents which occupied the slopes above the creek.
4. Scene on the Goldfields.—Below, on the flats, the scene was a busy one. Thousands upon thousands of holes covered the earth, where men emerged and disappeared like ants, each bearing a bag of sand which he either threw on a wheelbarrow or slung over his shoulder, and then carried forward, running nimbly along the thin paths among a multitude of holes, till he reached the little creek where he delivered the sand to one of the men who stood shoulder to shoulder, in long rows, for miles on either bank, all washing the sand and clay into the shallow current, whose waters were turned to a tint of dirty yellow. Such is the scene which presents itself by day; but at sunset a gun is fired from the commissioner’s tent and all cease work: then, against the evening sky, ten thousand fires send up their wreaths of thin blue smoke, and the diggers prepare their evening meals. Everything is hushed for a time, except that a dull murmur rises from the little crowds chatting over their pannikins of tea. But, as the darkness draws closer around, the noises begin to assume a merrier tone, and, mingling pleasantly in the evening air, there rise the loud notes of a sailor’s song, the merry jingle of a French political chant, or the rich strains of a German chorus.
In some tents the miners sit round boxes or stools, while, by the light of flaming oil-cans, they gamble for match boxes filled with gold-dust; in others they gather to drink the liquors illicitly sold by the “sly grog shops”. Many of the diggers betake themselves to the brilliantly-lighted theatres, and make the fragile walls tremble with their rough and hearty roars of applause: everywhere are heard the sounds of laughter and good humour. Then, at midnight, all to bed, except those foolish revellers who have stayed too late at the “grog shop”.
At dawn, again, they are all astir; for the day’s supply of water must be drawn from the stream ere its limpid current begins to assume the appearance of a clay-stained gutter. Making the allowances proper to the occasion, the community is both orderly and law-abiding, and the digger, in the midst of all his toil, enjoys a very agreeable existence.
5. The Licence Fee.—He had but one grievance to trouble his life, and that was the monthly payment of the licence fee. This tax had been imposed under the erroneous impression that every one who went upon the goldfields must of necessity earn a fortune. For a long time this mistake prevailed, because only the most successful diggers were much heard of. But there was an indistinguishable throng of those who earned much less than a labourer’s wage.
The average monthly earnings throughout the colony were not more than eight pounds for each man; and of this sum he had to pay thirty shillings every month for the mere permission to dig. To those who were fortunate this seemed but a trifle; but for those who earned little or nothing there was no resource but to evade payment, and many were the tricks adopted in order to “dodge the commissioners”. As there were more than one-fifth of the total number of diggers who systematically paid no fees, it was customary for the police to stop any man they met and demand to see his licence; if he had none, he was at once marched off to the place that served for a gaol, and there chained to a tree.
The police were in the habit of devoting two days a week to what was called “digger hunting”; and as they often experienced much trouble and vexation in doing what was unfortunately their duty, they were sometimes rough and summary in their proceedings. Hence arose a feeling of hostility among the diggers, not only to the police, but to all the officials on the goldfields. The first serious ebullition of the prevailing discontent took place on the Ovens, where a commissioner who had been unnecessarily rough to unlicensed diggers was assaulted and severely injured. But as violence was deprecated by the great body of miners, they held large meetings, in order to agitate in a more constitutional manner for the abolition of the fee. At first they sent a petition to Governor Latrobe, who declined to make any change. It was then hinted that, possibly, they might be driven to use force; and the Governor replied that, if they did, he was determined to do his duty. But in August, 1853, when the agitation was increasing, Latrobe hurriedly reduced the fee to twenty shillings per month. This appeased the miners for a time; but the precipitancy with which the Governor had changed his intention showed too plainly the weakness of the Government, for there was at that time scarcely a soldier in Victoria to repress an insurrection, if one should break out. Among the confused crowds on the goldfields there were numbers of troublesome spirits, many of them foreigners, who were only too happy to foment dissension. Thousands of miners had been disappointed in their hopes of wealth, and, being in a discontented frame of mind, they blamed the Governor for their misfortunes.
In spite of the concession that had been made to them, a spirit of dissatisfaction prevailed throughout all the goldfields; mutterings were heard as of a coming storm, and Latrobe, in alarm, sent to all the neighbouring colonies to ask for troops. As the Ninety-ninth Regiment was lying idle in Hobart Town, it was at once despatched to Melbourne.
6. Governor Hotham.—While matters were in this state, Governor Latrobe retired from office; and in June, 1854, Sir Charles Hotham arrived to fill the position. On his first arrival, he showed that his sympathies were, to a great extent, with the diggers. But he could scarcely be expected to make any important change until he had been a few months in the colony, and had learnt exactly the state of affairs, and, meanwhile, the discontent on the goldfields was daily increasing. The months of September and October, in 1854, were exceedingly dry; the creeks were greatly shrunk in volume, and in many places the diggers could find no water either for drinking or for gold-washing; and their irritation was not at all soothed by the manners of the commissioners and police. Besides this, the Government had thought it necessary to form a camp on the goldfields, so that a large body of soldiers dwelt constantly in the midst of the miners. The soldiers and officers, of course, supported the commissioners, and, like them, soon came to be regarded with the greatest disfavour.
The goldfield population was in this irritable state when a trifling incident kindled revolt.
7. Riot at Ballarat.—A digger named Scobie, late one evening, knocked at the door of Bentley’s Hotel, at Ballarat. Finding the place closed for the night, he tried to force an entrance, and continued his clamour so long that Bentley became angry, and sallied forth to chastise him. A crowd gathered to see the fight, and, in the darkness, Scobie’s head was split open with a spade. Whose hand it was that aimed the blow no one could tell; but the diggers universally believed that Bentley was himself the murderer. He was therefore arrested and tried, but acquitted by Mr. Dewes, the magistrate, who was said by the diggers to be secretly his partner in business. A great crowd assembled round the hotel, and a digger, named Kennedy, addressed the multitude, in vigorous Scottish accents, pointing out the spot where their companion’s blood had been shed, and asserting that his spirit hovered above and called for revenge. The authorities sent a few police to protect the place, but they were only a handful of men in the midst of a great and seething crowd of over eight thousand powerful diggers. For an hour or two the mob, though indulging in occasional banter, remained harmless. But a mischievous boy having thrown a stone, and broken the lamp in front of the hotel, the police made a movement as if they were about to seize the offender. T
his roused the diggers to anger, and in less than a minute every pane of glass was broken; the police were roughly jostled and cut by showers of stones; and the doors were broken open. The crowd burst tumultuously into the hotel, and the rooms were soon swarming with men drinking the liquors and searching for Bentley, who, however, had already escaped on a swift horse to the camp. As the noise and disorder increased, a man placed a handful of paper and rags against the wooden walls of the bowling alley, deliberately struck a match, and set fire to the place. The diggers now deserted the hotel and retired to a safe distance, in order to watch the conflagration. Meanwhile a company of soldiers had set out from the camp for the scene of the riot, and on their approach the crowd quietly dispersed; but by this time the hotel was reduced to a heap of smouldering ruins.
The History of Australia and New Zealand from 1606 to 1890 Page 11