Eureka: The Unfinished Revolution

by Peter Fitzsimons

  Now, a lesser man might have simply reckoned that as the gold had been found by his stockman, who was working on his property at the time, that fellow is due no part of the reward. But not Dr Kerr. Grateful for the find, he is sure to give his loyal servant Jemmy, together with two other Aboriginal workers he is close to, Long Tommy and Tommy Bumbo, ‘two flocks of sheep, two saddle horses and a quantity of rations, and supply them with a team of bullocks to plough some land in which they are about to sow a crop of maize and potatoes’.17

  7 July 1851, Victoria awakes to the news

  It is the Geelong Advertiser that has the honour of breaking the news of James Esmond’s stunning find to wider Melbourne:

  GOLD IN THE PYRENEES

  The long-sought treasure is at length found! Victoria is a gold country, and from Geelong goes forth the first glad tidings of the discovery. Mr Esmond arrived in Geelong on Saturday with some beautiful specimens of gold, in quartz, and gold-dust in a ‘debris’ of the same species of rock … The specimens shown are sufficient to satisfy the most sceptical, whilst the respectability of the discoverer, Mr Esmond, is a guarantee against the practice of any ‘sham’.18

  15 July 1851, Melbourne consecrates and celebrates a different success

  A holiday for everyone! For today is the day, dear friends, ‘to transform the chrysalis, “His Honour”, into the gay butterfly “His Excellency”’,19 and ‘the Port Phillip of yesterday makes way for the Victoria of today’.20 At half past ten, all of the troops, all the mounted and city police arrive at the Government Offices in the company of the heads of all the government departments, ready to witness Charles La Trobe, accompanied by His Honour the Resident Judge William a Beckett and the newly installed Attorney-General, William Foster Stawell, be so anointed. In the open space in front of the Treasury it is William Stawell himself - closely observed by Solicitor-General Redmond Barry among other leading officials - who has La Trobe repeat the sacred oaths, after which the Resident Judge declares that Charles Joseph La Trobe is now, officially, the Lieutenant-Governor of the colony. At this point the field battery fires its guns in celebration as a signal to the city, near and far, that the great event has occurred. The assembled multitude of the city’s leading dignitaries bursts forth with three cheers, and the band strikes up with a stirring rendition of ‘God Save the Queen’.

  This is a very auspicious day in the colony of ‘Victoria’, as everyone is now delighted to call it. For on this day the impact of the Separation Bill passed by the British Parliament the year before is truly felt, as Victoria becomes a separate entity from New South Wales, one that will soon have its own Legislative Council - composed of 20 members elected by substantial property owners, together with ten members appointed by the Lieutenant-Governor - whose role it will be to advise the Lieutenant-Governor. True, this governing body is not going to be representative of the people at all, but only a certain section of the population, and that section will comprise the wealthiest and most powerful in Victoria: the squatters. But, for the moment, that fact is lost in the general celebrations of independence.

  What it means, as The Argus has already noted in an editorial on the subject, is that, ‘The depressing influence of our connexion with Sydney is at an end. Our laws have to be discussed and amended amongst ourselves.’21And yet, opines the paper, from those to whom much is given, much is expected: ‘Let us remember this, in our aim to lift the dear land of our adoption into a high place in the scale of nations. Let us think of her in no lower light than that of the model colony, and strain our utmost nerve to justify the title. Let that be the Pole Star by which we ever steer; and even if we have to struggle with a baffling wind here, and an adverse current there, let us never falter in our course … We are one of the smallest, and youngest of British colonies, but we have that within us, which properly developed shall to some extent influence the destinies of the world.’ 22

  18 July 1851, Bathurst is agog

  The excitement in both colonies is now overwhelming. For, back at Bathurst, the almost unhinged exhilaration engendered by the find of the Kerr Nugget is staggering in its effect. On this day, The Sydney Morning Herald, relying on its colleagues at the Bathurst Free Press, report the news:

  Bathurst is mad again! The delirium of golden fever has returned with increased intensity. Men meet together, stare stupidly at each other, talk incoherent nonsense, and wonder what will happen next. Everybody has a hundred times seen a hundred weight of flour; a hundred weight of sugar or potatoes, is an everyday fact, but a hundred weight of gold is a phrase scarcely known in the English language. It is beyond the range of our ordinary ideas - a sort of physical incomprehensibility - but that it is a material existence, our own eyes bore witness on Monday last.23

  If the news of the find thrills the denizens of Bathurst and beyond, far beyond measure, it does not - with the exception of Dr Kerr himself - thrill the squatters. As their workers now leave in droves, there are urgent communications with the government, suggesting, sometimes insisting, that the diggings be stopped immediately. Otherwise, they warn, their own operations will simply have to cease. In response, the government prevaricates - they are on the side of the squatters, but they also must be realistic. Such is the frenzy to get to the goldfields at any price, at any personal cost, that it is obvious no law the authorities might come up with would be able to stop the general flood.

  25 July 1851, this way to paradise, from Geelong

  While passing through Geelong once more, on the way back to his diggings, James Esmond had entrusted the journalist Clarke with the location of his find - on the condition that Clarke not publish it until Esmond has had time to buy his supplies and be back at Clunes. And on this day, after another find in the same locale confirms that Esmond is telling the truth, Clarke now gives specific directions in the Geelong Advertiser as to where the goldfield lies:24

  From Geelong to Buninyong is fifty miles; arrived there, Clunes Diggings are about twenty-seven miles further, to gain which make for Clarke’s, and from Clarke’s outstation turn off to Coghill - the ‘Gold Field’ is before you within a short distance - work! and success attend you!25

  On the same day, a letter to The Argus reports that in this location: ‘The diggers are in great spirits - our old cook has gathered an ounce. When they are provided with proper implements, they expect ten times the present produce per man. In spite of the extreme severity of the weather there are daily arrivals. There are forty today on the ground. Warren, shoemaker, is so sanguine that he expects to realise PS2000 by Christmas. “Will not put an awl in leather again.” Such are his expressions. Esson is to commence cradling on Monday, under the direction of Esmond, who arrived today.

  ‘P.S. Ten o’clock, Sunday. David Anderson has returned from the diggings, and says the cook has realised two and half ounces in a week.’26

  The cook! Two and a half ounces in a week! The cobbler! PS2000 before Christmas!

  Though it is not yet a rush - the reports are too scattered and uncertain for men to throw it all in to pursue what is not yet truly confirmed - in short order gold - gold! - is the only subject anyone cares to talk about. Do you think it’s real? Think this cove, Esmond, is on the up and up? At least fifty men do, and are soon on their way to Clunes, where they join the amazingly accommodating Esmond at the diggings.

  Wednesday, 23 July 1851, The Sydney Morning Herald declares …

  On this issue of the discovery of the Kerr Nugget, and in this issue, the Herald - rarely one to publish prose that is not as sober as a judge and as serious as the 1850 drought - simply cannot help itself and reaches for the purple ink as the ramifications continue to sink in:

  From the monarch on the throne to the peasant at the plough, there will be astonishment, wonder, and admiration. From the palace to the cottage, from the drawing-room to the nursery, from the philosopher and the statesman to the school-boy, this Lump of Gold and the land which produced it will for a while be the all-absorbing tonic.27

  With th
is knowledge of the stunning riches that this brown land possesses comes a new-found confidence, a notion that perhaps Australia can be more than a mere off shoot of another country.

  ‘We have within ourselves, in our own rich and prolific goldfields,’ proudly proclaims The People’s Advocate and New South Wales Vindicator shortly after the Herald article, ‘the elements of all future greatness - the elements of future nationality, and of coming independence … Yes! We shall be a NATION; not a mere dependency of a far off country, which however we may venerate and love as a birth place of ourselves and our fore-fathers, has been to us in this our bright southern home, but a cruel step-mother.’28

  RAH!

  And yet, even as these words are being penned and distributed, the story of the ownership of the nugget still has some way to go. For who truly does own it? Dr Kerr had felt that it was his to sell; after all, his stockman had found it. (As to that Aboriginal stockman, no-one is so ludicrous as to suggest that he owns it because he found it on land that was in fact his ancestral home.) The gold-dealer from Sydney, Thacker, Daniel & Co., had come up to negotiate a sale, paying Dr Kerr PS4140 for the privilege. The government, however, has an entirely different view. As the gold has been found on Crown land, by diggers unlicensed at the moment of discovery, the official view is that the nugget belongs to them, and it is so strong in this opinion that a ‘demand for its surrender into the hands of the government was made by the newly installed Gold Commissioner, Mr Hardy’.29

  When Messrs Thacker and Daniel take such a dim view of this demand that they refuse to comply, the government sends in the police and the gold is forcibly seized, causing great outrage, followed by lawyers, letters and great legal manoeuvring, even as the public at large cries out in outrage at the government’s actions.

  Finally, the government agrees to give the gold back to the finders, ‘provided they enter into a bond to pay Her Majesty a royalty of ten per cent, should the home government, upon inquiry into the merits of the case, insist upon such payment’.30

  The government is not without support in so doing, with The Southern Cross declaiming, ‘It is, no doubt, very hard upon the Messrs Thacker, but the case is altogether a singular one … If royalties are to be enforced at all, we cannot but consider 5 per cent on private lands, and 10 per cent on Crown Lands, as an exceedingly moderate impost, more especially as mines, minerals, and ship-building timber are reserved to the Crown in all deeds of grant. A premium for permission to work gold-mines cannot reasonably be objected to by a people desirous of preserving order, regularity, and good government.’31

  8-15 August 1851, gold fever spreads through Victoria

  Now that it has been established that there is gold in the quartz country around Clunes, there are a number of other prospectors who wish to see if there might be gold in their own regions. One of them is an English-born blacksmith by the name of Thomas Hiscock, who now hails from the small settlement of Buninyong, just seven miles south of Ballarat. There would forever afterwards be speculation that perhaps James Esmond had talked to Hiscock as he made his way back from Geelong to Clunes, maybe even describing to him the kind of hills with quartz and surface gravel that gold could be found in … but for whatever reason, only shortly after Esmond had passed through Buninyong, Hiscock made a key decision. In the company of his son, Thomas Hiscock Jnr, and one of his son’s friends, John Thomas, he decides to go looking for gold in any likely spots they can find within cooee of their Buninyong home.

  For many days, the men return to their homes each night empty-handed. But on this bright, shining morning of 8 August 1851, high on a slope of the White Horse Range, Thomas Snr sees a promising quartz boulder - he has been told this is what to look for - takes his pick and swings …

  Lower down on those same slopes, the two younger men hear a sudden exultant cry from the older man that he has found gold at last!

  Neither young man budges. They’ve heard it all before when old Tom had got excited about discovering small chunks of mica. But when he charges down the slopes to show them that this time he really has done it, there is no mistaking it. It glints, it gleams, it glitters, it glows, its glory will never fade - it is gold!

  And, as also follows the familiar pattern, the news is not long in getting out, allowing the rush to roar as it never has before.

  While it had been one thing for a digger to try his luck at faraway Clunes, Buninyong is only a day’s hard ride away from Geelong and well worth having a go at.

  Within just a few days the roads leaving both Geelong and Melbourne are filled with men from all walks of life, now practically running, eager to try their luck as all of the Melbourne newspapers, including The Herald in Melbourne, The Argus and Geelong Advertiser, lead, day after day, with ever more breathless stories: ‘GOLD!’, ‘OFF TO THE DIGGINGS’, ‘EUREKA’, and most appropriately of all … ‘MANIA’.

  Writing on 15 August, the correspondent for The Argus sums it up neatly: ‘Let all possible publicity be given to the great fuel, that an unlimited gold field exists in this, the finest colony in the Southern Hemisphere - the advantages we enjoy over our neighbours in Sydney cannot be too often repeated, or too glowingly penned.

  ‘Our gold fields are in close proximity to our ports, one within four hours walk of Melbourne, another within one day’s walk of Geelong, and others within one hard day’s ride of either town; we have a superabundance of animal food; we have a superabundance of the richest land for agricultural purposes, only waiting for what the mother country has too much of - labour; we have a climate that cannot be surpassed under heaven. All we require is an ardent desire implanted in our breasts to make headway, and a determined resolve that we shall not lag behind.’32

  As it happens, ‘lagging’ is one thing not apparent, as the flood of men leaving their other posts of work to get to the diggings thickens by the hour.

  16 August 1851, La Trobe makes his move

  Charles La Trobe feels he has no choice. While the results of the discovery of gold within his colony are to date as far as he can ascertain, ‘but moderate’,33 he feels they are sufficient to do as Governor FitzRoy has done before him in New South Wales and declare that all the gold found belongs to Queen Victoria, and so issues a proclamation:

  ‘Now I, Charles Joseph La Trobe, Esq., Lieutenant-Governor aforesaid, on behalf of Her Majesty, do hereby publicly notify and declare that all persons who shall take from any land within the said colony, any gold, metal, or ore containing gold, or who, within any waste lands which have not yet been alienated by the Crown, shall dig for and disturb the soil in search of such gold, metal, or ore, without having been duly authorised in that behalf by Her Majesty’s Colonial Government, will be prosecuted both criminally and civilly as the law allows … GOD SAVE THE QUEEN!’34

  This is shortly followed up with six key provisional regulations, ‘under which Licenses may be obtained to dig for, search and remove the same’, that include: from the first day of September ‘no person [is] allowed to dig, search for or remove gold, on land, whether public or private, without first taking out or applying for a license’; the license fee is to be ‘fixed at one pound ten shillings per month, paid in advance’; and, perhaps most crucially, ‘No person will be eligible to obtain a license, or the renewal of a license, unless he shall produce some certificate of discharge from his last service, or prove to the satisfaction of the commissioner that he is not a person improperly absent from hired service.’35

  And that should stop the flood of labour away from the squatters.

  21 August 1851, reports come in from Buninyong, Clunes and … Ballarat

  A man with a felicitous and evocative turn of phrase, Geelong Advertiser journalist Alfred Clarke - now out Buninyong way, where they are yet to hear of the recent proclamation - continues to tramp far and wide on the diggings on behalf of his paper, taking notes in his diary in elegant longhand.

  A natural storyteller, he takes some pleasure in penning his thoughts, recording the feeling of t
his place, at this time:

  The scene presents a strange appearance, picturesque enough, but somewhat lugubrious during the heavy rains. Tents are pitched, fires are burning, trees are cut down, the sound of the axe is heard in all directions, cradles are rocking, and men crouching down to the water’s edge are intent on exploring the golden sands, which like true modesty retires before undue advances.36

  Everywhere he walks, he sees men he knows from Geelong, men who have deserted the solid brick and mortar of that town for the flapping tarpaulin of Buninyong, who have exchanged - yes, these are the perfect phrases to capture it - ‘comfort for inconvenience, ease for hardship, ordinary travail for hard labour, and all is set at nought against the desire for gold, gold that is to be rent from the bowels of the earth. Neither rain or storm overpowers the desire; the cry is still “they come, they come!”’37

  And so they do. Every hour, at least, a new party arrives, a few with swags on their backs; many with guns, acting as a kind of advance party to stake a claim before their group carrying the heavy supplies arrives many hours later; and here a lone man on a horse, eager to try his luck. And now, come the evening, ‘the cradle rests, the dippers and the tin dishes are thrown aside for the night, the horses are turned adrift, and the busy workers have retired to their tents, the line of which may be soon be traced by blazing fires. Beef, biscuit, and damper, all, or some form the evening’s repast, are then partaken of, pipes follow, and a deep slumber looms on the eventful day.’38

  Just before they partake of this well-deserved rest, Alfred Clarke walks from tent to tent, documenting how they are faring.