Eureka Stockade
Encyclopedia
The Eureka Rebellion of 1854 was an organised rebellion by gold miners which occurred at Eureka Lead in Ballarat
Ballarat, Victoria
Ballarat is a city in the state of Victoria, Australia, approximately west-north-west of the state capital Melbourne situated on the lower plains of the Great Dividing Range and the Yarrowee River catchment. It is the largest inland centre and third most populous city in the state and the fifth...

, Victoria, Australia. The Battle of Eureka Stockade (by which the rebellion is popularly known) was fought on 3 December 1854 and named for the stockade
Stockade
A stockade is an enclosure of palisades and tall walls made of logs placed side by side vertically with the tops sharpened to provide security.-Stockade as a security fence:...

 structure erected by miners during the conflict. Resulting in the deaths of over 30 people, it was the most significant conflict in the colonial history of Victoria.

The event was the culmination of civil disobedience
Civil disobedience
Civil disobedience is the active, professed refusal to obey certain laws, demands, and commands of a government, or of an occupying international power. Civil disobedience is commonly, though not always, defined as being nonviolent resistance. It is one form of civil resistance...

 in the Ballarat region during the Victorian gold rush
Victorian gold rush
The Victorian gold rush was a period in the history of Victoria, Australia approximately between 1851 and the late 1860s. In 10 years the Australian population nearly tripled.- Overview :During this era Victoria dominated the world's gold output...

 with miners objecting to heavily priced mining items, the expense of a Miner's Licence
Miner's Licence
The Miner's Licence was the colonial government's response to the Australian gold rushes and the need to provide infrastructure including policing. The Governor of New South Wales, Sir Charles Fitzroy invoked a sixteenth-century lawsuit, R v Earl of Northfartland which was decided in 1568, to...

, taxation (via the licence) without representation and the actions of the government and its agents (the police and military) The local rebellion in Ballarat grew from a Ballarat Reform League
Ballarat Reform League
The Ballarat Reform League was formed in November 11 1854 at Ballarat as a protest against the regulation of the gold diggings, specifically the League was formed with the view of abolishing the Miner's Licence and having the miners connected with the death of "John Martin", arrested...

 movement and culminated in organised battle at the stockades against colonial forces.

Mass public support for the captured 'rebels' in the colony's capital of Melbourne when they were placed on trial resulted in the introduction of full white male suffrage for elections for the lower house in the Victorian parliament
Victorian Legislative Assembly
The Victorian Legislative Assembly is the lower house of the Parliament of Victoria in Australia. Together with the Victorian Legislative Council, the upper house, it sits in Parliament House in the state capital, Melbourne.-History:...

. The Eureka Rebellion is controversially identified with the birth of democracy in Australia and interpreted by some as a political revolt.

Background to the event

The miners' demands included the right to vote and buy land, and the reduction of licence fees - heavy taxation on gold found. Agitation for these demands commenced with the Forest Creek Monster Meeting
Forest Creek Monster Meeting
One of the social effects of the Australian gold rushes in the colony of Victoria in the period 1851-54 was the growing demand for political representation and reasonable limits to taxation...

 of December 1851 and included the formation of the Anti-Gold Licence Association
Anti-Gold Licence Association
The Anti-Gold Licence Association was formed in Bendigo, Victoria, Australia on 6 June 1853.On 1 August Governor La Trobe was presented with a petition of more than 5,000 signatures, now known as the Bendigo Petition....

 at nearby Bendigo
Bendigo, Victoria
Bendigo is a major regional city in the state of Victoria, Australia, located very close to the geographical centre of the state and approximately north west of the state capital Melbourne. It is the second largest inland city and fourth most populous city in the state. The estimated urban...

 in 1853.

Aboriginal presence on the Ballarat goldfields

Historian Ian D. Clark
Ian D. Clark (historian)
Ian D. Clark is an academic historian and Toponymist whose primary work has focused on Victorian Aboriginal history, aboriginal toponymy and the frontier conflict between Indigenous Australians and immigrant settlers during the European settlement of Victoria, Australia.-Education and...

 has written on the Aboriginal presence on the Ballarat goldfields in the 1850s noting that while there is no evidence for any direct involvement of Aboriginal people in the events of the Eureka Rebellion in 1854, aboriginal people may be relevant to the Eureka story in situational, contextual and relational ways.

The events of the Eureka Rebellion took place on Wathaurong aboriginal land. Three Wathaurong clans lived in the vicinity of the Eureka diggings: the Burrumbeet baluk at Lakes Burrumbeet and Learmonth, Keyeet baluk, a sub-group of the Burrumbeet baluk, at Mt Buninyong, and the Tooloora baluk, at Mt Warranheip and Lal Lal Creek. There are numerous accounts of aboriginal presence in tha Ballarat area during the 1850s.

The early policing of the Ballarat Goldfields was done by the Native Police Corps
Native Police Corps
An Australian Native Police Corps was first established in 1842 in the Port Phillip District of the Australian colony of New South Wales...

. The introduction of the gold mining licence fee in 1851 and the overbearing methods of the Native Police Corps
Native Police Corps
An Australian Native Police Corps was first established in 1842 in the Port Phillip District of the Australian colony of New South Wales...

 in enforcing collection of the licence fee resulted in confrontations between diggers and the Gold Commissioner, considered by some historians such as M. Cannon and Weston Bate as preludes to the 1854 Eureka confrontation.

There is also oral history that Aboriginal people may have looked after some of the children of the Eureka miners after the military storming of the Eureka Stockade and subsequent massacre of miners. Although not corroborated by any written sources, the account has been deemed plausible by Professor Clark.

Murder of James Scobie

On 6 October 1854, Scottish miner James Scobie
James Scobie
James Scobie was a Scottish gold digger murdered at Ballarat, Victoria, Australia on 7 October 1854. He was born on 29 November 1826.An inquest into his death was held the same afternoon. At the inquest, the hotel keeper, James Bentley, and his staff denied taking part in the death...

 was murdered at the Eureka hotel. Ten days later, on 17 October 1853, at the Eureka Hotel between 5,000 and 10,000 miners gathered to protest that James Bentley, the hotel proprietor and prime suspect in Scobie's murder, had not been charged. Bentley and his wife Catherine fled for their lives as the hotel was burnt down.

Further unrest

On 22 October 1854, Ballarat Catholics met to protest the treatment of Father Smyth.
The next day the arrests of miners McIntyre and Fletcher for the Eureka Hotel fire saw a mass meeting which attracted 4,000 miners. The meeting determined to establish a "Digger's Right Society", to maintain their rights. On 1 November 1854, 3,000 miners met once again at Bakery Hill. They were addressed by Thomas Kennedy, Henry Holyoake, George Black and Henry Ross
Henry Ross
Captain Henry Ross was a Canadian gold miner at Ballarat, Victoria, Australia, and was known on the goldfields as the 'bridegroom' of the miners flag, the Southern Cross, the Eureka Flag...

. The diggers were further angered by the arrest of another seven of their number for the Eureka Hotel fire.

Ballarat Reform League

On Saturday, 11 November 1854 a crowd estimated at more than 10,000 miners gathered at Bakery Hill, directly opposite the government encampment. At this meeting, the Ballarat Reform League
Ballarat Reform League
The Ballarat Reform League was formed in November 11 1854 at Ballarat as a protest against the regulation of the gold diggings, specifically the League was formed with the view of abolishing the Miner's Licence and having the miners connected with the death of "John Martin", arrested...

 was created, under the chairmanship of Chartist
Chartism
Chartism was a movement for political and social reform in the United Kingdom during the mid-19th century, between 1838 and 1859. It takes its name from the People's Charter of 1838. Chartism was possibly the first mass working class labour movement in the world...

 John Basson Humffray
John Basson Humffray
John Basson Humffray was born in Newtown, Montgomeryshire, Wales and became active in the Chartist movement before migrating to Victoria, Australia in 1853, arriving in Ballarat in November that year....

. Several other Reform League leaders, including Kennedy and Holyoake, had been involved with the Chartist movement in England. Many of the miners had past involvement in the Chartist movement and the social upheavals in Britain, Ireland, and continental Europe during the 1840s.

In setting its goals, the Ballarat Reform League used the British Chartist movement's principles. The meeting passed a resolution "that it is the inalienable right of every citizen to have a voice in making the laws he is called on to obey, that taxation without representation is tyranny". The meeting also resolved to secede from the United Kingdom if the situation did not improve.

Throughout the following weeks, the League sought to negotiate with Commissioner Robert Rede and Governor of Victoria, Sir Charles Hotham
Charles Hotham
Sir Charles Hotham, KCB, RN was Lieutenant-governor and, later, Governor of Victoria, Australia from 22 June 1854 to 10 November 1855.-Early life:...

, both on the specific unsubstantiated matters relating to Bentley and the men being tried for the burning of the Eureka Hotel, and on the broader issues of abolition of the licence, suffrage and democratic representation of the gold fields, and disbanding of the Gold Commission. Commissioner Rede's response has been attributed by many historians (most notably Manning Clark
Manning Clark
Charles Manning Hope Clark, AC , an Australian historian, was the author of the best-known general history of Australia, his six-volume A History of Australia, published between 1962 and 1987...

) to his belief in his right to exert authority over the "rabble." Rather than hear the grievances, he increased the police presence in the gold fields and summoned reinforcements from Melbourne.

On 28 November 1854, the reinforcements marching from Melbourne were attacked by a crowd of miners. A number were injured and a drummer boy was allegedly killed. The rumour of the drummer boy's death was perpetuated, even with a memorial erected to him in Ballarat Cemetery for many years, although historical research has shown that the boy, John Egan, continued military service until dying in 1860.

At a meeting of about 12,000 'diggers' on the following day, (29 November), the Reform League delegation relayed its failure to achieve any success in negotiations with the authorities. The miners resolved on open resistance to the authorities and to burn the hated licences,

Rede responded by ordering police to conduct a licence search on 30 November. Eight defaulters were arrested, and most of the military resources available had to be summoned to extricate the arresting officers from the angry mob that had assembled.

This raid prompted a change in the leadership of the Reform League, to people who argued in favour of 'physical force' rather than the 'moral force' championed by Humffray and the old leadership.

Preparations for war: the flag and the oath

In the rising tide of anger and resentment amongst the miners, a more militant leader, Peter Lalor
Peter Lalor
Peter Fintan Lalor was an activist turned politician who rose to fame for his leading role in the Eureka Rebellion, an event controversially identified with the "birth of democracy" in Australia.- Early life and migration to Australia :...

, was elected. In swift fashion, a military structure was assembled. Brigades were formed, and captains were appointed. Licences were burned, the rebel Eureka Flag
Eureka Flag
The Eureka Flag is a design; a dark blue field with a central white symmetric cross consisting five eight-pointed stars, representing the Crux constellation....

 was unfurled, and an oath of allegiance was sworn. The miners who encamped themselves around the flag vowed to defend themselves from licence hunts and harassment by the authorities.

The blue Eureka Flag designed by a Canadian miner, "Captain" Henry Ross
Henry Ross
Captain Henry Ross was a Canadian gold miner at Ballarat, Victoria, Australia, and was known on the goldfields as the 'bridegroom' of the miners flag, the Southern Cross, the Eureka Flag...

, and bearing nothing but the Southern Cross
Crux
Crux is the smallest of the 88 modern constellations, but is one of the most distinctive. Its name is Latin for cross, and it is dominated by a cross-shaped asterism that is commonly known as the Southern Cross.-Visibility:...

, was flown for the first (recorded) time. The flag was believed to have been sewn by Anastasia Hayes. As a gesture of defiance , it deliberately excluded the British Union Flag
Flag of the United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland uses as its national flag the royal banner known as the Union Flag or, popularly, Union Jack. The current design of the Union Flag dates from the union of Ireland and Great Britain in 1801...

, which is included in the official flag of Australia
Flag of Australia
The flag of Australia is a defaced Blue Ensign: a blue field with the Union Flag in the canton , and a large white seven-pointed star known as the Commonwealth Star in the lower hoist quarter...

. The Argus newspaper of 4 December 1854 reported that the Union Flag was hoisted underneath the Eureka flag.

At the meeting on Bakery Hill an oath of allegiance was sworn by Peter Lalor to the affirmation of his fellow demonstrators: "We swear by the Southern Cross to stand truly by each other and fight to defend our rights and liberties."

Stockade description

The stockade itself was a ramshackle affair hastily constructed over the following days from timber and overturned carts. The structure was never meant to be a military stockade or fortress. In the words of Lalor: "it was nothing more than an enclosure to keep our own men together, and was never erected with an eye to military defence". Lalor had already outlined a plan whereby, "if the government forces came to attack us, we should meet them on the Gravel Pits, and if compelled, we should retreat by the heights to the old Canadian Gully, and there make our final stand".

Irish born people were strongly represented at the Eureka Stockade. Eureka historians have discovered that as well as most of the miners inside the stockade, in the area where the defensive position was established, the miners were overwhelmingly Irish. Even the password used at the Eureka Stockade – Vinegar Hill
Castle Hill convict rebellion
The Castle Hill Rebellion of 4 March 1804, also called the Second Battle of Vinegar Hill, was a large-scale rebellion by Irish convicts against British colonial authority in Australia...

 – was the scene of an 1804 Irish convict uprising in New South Wales.

During 2 December, some 1500 men trained in and around the stockade. A further two hundred Americans, the Independent Californian Rangers, under the leadership of James McGill, arrived about 4.00pm. The Americans were armed with revolvers and Mexican knives and possessed horses. In a fateful decision, McGill decided to take most of the Californian Rangers away from the stockade to intercept rumoured British reinforcements coming from Melbourne. Rede's spies observed these actions. That night many of the miners went back to their own tents after the traditional Saturday night carousing, with the assumption that the Queen's military forces would not be sent to attack on the Sabbath (Sunday). A small contingent of about 150 miners remained at the stockade overnight, which the spies reported to Rede.

Battle/conflict

Rede's inaction thus far did not reflect his true intent, and at 3 am on Sunday, 3 December 1854, a party of 276 police and military personnel under the command of Captain J.W. Thomas
John Wellesley Thomas
Lieutenant-General Sir John Wellesley Thomas, KCB was a distinguished British military officer who served in Afghanistan, Australia, and China. He was the commander of the British military and police forces that quelled the rebellion at the Eureka Stockade in Ballarat, Victoria, Australia in...

 approached the Eureka Stockade and a battle ensued. There is no agreement as to which side fired first, but the battle was fierce, brief, and terribly one-sided. The ramshackle army of miners was hopelessly outclassed by a military regiment and was routed in about 10 minutes. During the height of the battle, Lalor was shot in his right arm, took refuge under some timber and was smuggled out of the stockade and hidden. His arm was later amputated.

Stories tell how women ran forward and threw themselves over the injured to prevent further indiscriminate killing. The Commission of Inquiry would later say that it was "a needless as well as a ruthless sacrifice of human life indiscriminate of innocent or guilty, and after all resistance had disappeared".
Early in the battle "Captain" Henry Ross was shot dead.

According to Lalor's report, fourteen miners (mostly Irish) died inside the stockade and an additional eight died later from injuries they sustained. A further dozen were wounded but recovered. Three months after the Eureka Stockade, Peter Lalor wrote: "As the inhuman brutalities practised by the troops are so well known, it is unnecessary for me to repeat them. There were 34 digger casualties of which 22 died. The unusual proportion of the killed to the wounded, is owing to the butchery of the military and troopers after the surrender."

By 8am, Captain Pasley, the second in command of the British forces, sickened by the carnage, saved a group of prisoners from being bayoneted and threatened to shoot any police or soldiers who continued with the slaughter. One hundred and fourteen diggers, some wounded, were marched off to the Government camp about two kilometres away, where they were kept in an overcrowded lock-up, before being moved to a more spacious barn on Monday morning.

Among the soldiers and military police, six were killed, including Captain Wise. Martial law
Martial law
Martial law is the imposition of military rule by military authorities over designated regions on an emergency basis— only temporary—when the civilian government or civilian authorities fail to function effectively , when there are extensive riots and protests, or when the disobedience of the law...

 was imposed, and all armed resistance collapsed. News of the massacre spread quickly to Melbourne and other gold field regions, turning a perceived Government military victory in repressing a minor insurrection into a public relations disaster. Thousands of people in Melbourne turned out to condemn the authorities, in defiance of their mayor and some Legislative Councillors, who tried to rally support for the government. In Ballarat, only one man responded to the call for special constables, although in Melbourne 1500 were sworn in and armed with batons. Many people voiced their support for the diggers' requested reforms.

Exact numbers of deaths and injuries and persons are difficult to determine as many miners "fled to the surrounding bush and it is likely a good many more died a lonely death or suffered the agony of their wounds, hidden from the authorities for fear of repercussions." according to Eureka researcher and author Dorothy Wickham. The official register of deaths in the Ballarat District Register shows 27 names associated with the stockade battle at Eureka.

Aftermath

Historian Geoffrey Blainey
Geoffrey Blainey
Geoffrey Norman Blainey AC , is a prominent Australian historian.Blainey was born in Melbourne and raised in a series of Victorian country towns before attending Wesley College and the University of Melbourne. While at university he was editor of Farrago, the newspaper of the University of...

 has commented, "Every government in the world would probably have counter-attacked in the face of the building of the stockade." For a few weeks it appeared that the status quo
Status quo
Statu quo, a commonly used form of the original Latin "statu quo" – literally "the state in which" – is a Latin term meaning the current or existing state of affairs. To maintain the status quo is to keep the things the way they presently are...

 had been restored, and Rede ruled the camps with an iron fist.

Trials for sedition and high treason

The first trial relating to the rebellion was a charge of sedition
Australian sedition law
Australian sedition law is the area of the criminal law of Australia relating to the crime of sedition.Effectively defunct for nearly half a century, these laws returned to public notice in 2005 when changes were included in an Anti-terrorism Bill announced by Prime Minister Howard prior to a...

 against Henry Seekamp
Henry Seekamp
Henry Erle Seekamp was the journalist, editor and owner of the Ballarat Times at the time of the Eureka Stockade in 1854...

 of the Ballarat Times. Seekamp was arrested in his newspaper office on 4 December 1854, for a series of articles that appeared in the Ballarat Times. Many of these articles were written by George Lang, the son of the prominent republican and Presbyterian Minister of Sydney, the Reverend John Dunmore Lang
John Dunmore Lang
John Dunmore Lang , Australian Presbyterian clergyman, writer, politician and activist, was the first prominent advocate of an independent Australian nation and of Australian republicanism.-Background and Family:...

. He was tried and convicted of seditious libel by a Melbourne jury on 23 January 1855 and, after a series of appeals, sentenced to six months imprisonment on 23 March. He was released from prison on 28 June 1855, precisely three months early.
Of the approximately 120 'diggers' detained after the rebellion, thirteen were brought to trial. They were:
  • Timothy Hayes, Chairman of the Ballarat Reform League, from Ireland
  • James McFie Campbell, a black man from Kingston
    Kingston, Jamaica
    Kingston is the capital and largest city of Jamaica, located on the southeastern coast of the island. It faces a natural harbour protected by the Palisadoes, a long sand spit which connects the town of Port Royal and the Norman Manley International Airport to the rest of the island...

    , Jamaica
    Jamaica
    Jamaica is an island nation of the Greater Antilles, in length, up to in width and 10,990 square kilometres in area. It is situated in the Caribbean Sea, about south of Cuba, and west of Hispaniola, the island harbouring the nation-states Haiti and the Dominican Republic...

  • Raffaello Carboni
    Raffaello Carboni
    Raffaello Carboni was an Italian revolutionary and writer. He is primarily remembered now as the author of the main eyewitness account of events at the Eureka Stockade in Ballarat, Australia.-Biography:...

    , an Italian and trusted lieutenant who was in charge of the European diggers as he spoke a few European languages. Carboni self published his account of the Eureka Stockade a year after the Stockade, the only comprehensive eyewitness account.
  • Jacob Sorenson, a Jew from Scotland
  • John Manning, a Ballarat Times journalist, from Ireland
  • John Phelan, a friend and business partner of Peter Lalor, from Ireland
  • Thomas Dignum, born in Sydney
  • John Joseph, a black American from New York City or Baltimore, United States
  • James Beattie, from Ireland
  • William Molloy, from Ireland
  • Jan Vennick, from the Netherlands
  • Michael Tuohy, from Ireland
  • Henry Reid, from Ireland


The first trial started on 22 February 1855, with defendants being brought before the court on charges of high treason. Joseph was one of three Americans arrested at the stockade, with the United States Consul intervening for the release of the other two Americans. The prosecution was handled by Attorney General William Stawell representing the Crown before Chief Justice William à Beckett
William à Beckett
Sir William à Beckett was a British barrister and the first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of Victoria.-Background:Born in London, he was the eldest son of William à Beckett, also a solicitor...

. The jury deliberated for about half an hour before returning a verdict of "not guilty". "A sudden burst of applause arose in the court" reported The Argus, but was instantly checked by court officers. The Chief Justice condemned this as an attempt to influence the jury; he sentenced two men identified by the Crown Solicitor as having applauded to a week in prison for contempt. Over 10,000 people had come to hear the jury's verdict. John Joseph was carried around the streets of Melbourne in a chair in triumph, according to the Ballarat Star.

Under the auspices of Victorian Chief Justice Redmond Barry
Redmond Barry
Sir Redmond Barry KCMG was an Irish colonial judge in Victoria, Australia.-Early life:Barry was the son of Major-General Henry Green Barry, of Ballyclough, County Cork and his wife Phoebe Drought, daughter of John Armstrong Drought and Letita Head...

, all the other 13 accused men were rapidly acquitted to great public acclaim. The trials have on several occasions been called a farce. Rede himself was quietly removed from the camps and reassigned to an insignificant position in rural Victoria.

Commission of Enquiry

Governor Hotham
Charles Hotham
Sir Charles Hotham, KCB, RN was Lieutenant-governor and, later, Governor of Victoria, Australia from 22 June 1854 to 10 November 1855.-Early life:...

, on 16 November 1854, appointed a Royal Commission on goldfields problems and grievances. According to Blainey, "It was perhaps the most generous concession offered by a governor to a major opponent in the history of Australia up to that time. The members of the commission were appointed before Eureka...they were men who were likely to be sympathetic to the diggers."

When its report was handed down, it was scathing in its assessment of all aspects of the administration of the gold fields, and particularly the Eureka Stockade affair. It made several major recommendations, one of which was to restrict Chinese immigration. Its recommendations were only put into effect after the Stockade. The gold licences
Miner's Licence
The Miner's Licence was the colonial government's response to the Australian gold rushes and the need to provide infrastructure including policing. The Governor of New South Wales, Sir Charles Fitzroy invoked a sixteenth-century lawsuit, R v Earl of Northfartland which was decided in 1568, to...

 were then abolished, and replaced by an annual miner's right
Miner's Right
The Miner's Right was introduced in 1855 in the colony of Victoria, replacing the Miner's Licence. Protests in 1853 at Bendigo with the formation of the Anti-Gold Licence Association and the rebellion of Eureka Stockade in December 1854 at Ballarat led to reform of the system with a cheaper annual...

 and an export fee based on the value of the gold. Mining wardens replaced the gold commissioners, and police numbers were cut drastically. The Legislative Council was expanded to allow representation to the major goldfields and Peter Lalor
Peter Lalor
Peter Fintan Lalor was an activist turned politician who rose to fame for his leading role in the Eureka Rebellion, an event controversially identified with the "birth of democracy" in Australia.- Early life and migration to Australia :...

 and John Basson Humffray
John Basson Humffray
John Basson Humffray was born in Newtown, Montgomeryshire, Wales and became active in the Chartist movement before migrating to Victoria, Australia in 1853, arriving in Ballarat in November that year....

 were elected for Ballarat, although there were property qualifications with regards to eligibility to vote in upper house elections in Victoria until the 1950s. After 12 months, all but one of the demands of the Ballarat Reform League had been granted. Lalor and Humffray both enjoyed distinguished careers as politicians, with Lalor later elected as Speaker of the Legislative Assembly of Victoria.

Peter Lalor

Peter Lalor, originally from Raheen, County Laois
Raheen, County Laois
Raheen is a small village in County Laois south of Portlaoise in Ireland.-History:Raheen has an imposing Catholic church, dating from 1857. The first Catholic church, a thatched chapel, was built in 1729; the site was granted by a Protestant family named Baldwin. Mr...

, Ireland was the leader of the miners who fought at the Eureka Stockade, and the author of the oath of allegiance used by the miners at the Eureka Stockade which he swore to their affirmation.

After the battle, Lalor wrote in a statement to the colonists of Victoria, "There are two things connected with the late outbreak (Eureka) which I deeply regret. The first is, that we should have been forced to take up arms at all; and the second is, that when we were compelled to take the field in our own defence, we were unable (through want of arms, ammunition and a little organisation) to inflict on the real authors of the outbreak the punishment they so richly deserved."

Lalor was elected unopposed in the 1856 Victorian elections. As he was the Eureka hero his policies were not scrutinised at all before the election and his later voting record as a parliamentarian shows he once opposed a bill to introduce full white-male suffrage in the colony of Victoria.

During a speech in the Legislative Council in 1856 he said, "I would ask these gentlemen what they mean by the term 'democracy'. Do they mean Chartism or Republicanism? If so, I never was, I am not now, nor do I ever intend to be a democrat. But if a democrat means opposition to a tyrannical press, a tyrannical people, or a tyrannical government, then I have been, I am still, and will ever remain a democrat."

Historians, including Weston Bate suggested that there was some hypocrisy in Lalor's folk hero status due to his post-stockade political opportunism and self interest.

Commemoration and legacy

The materials used to build the stockade were rapidly removed to be used for the mines, and the entire area around the site was so extensively worked that the original landscape became unrecognisable, so identifying the exact location of the stockade is now virtually impossible.

Over the next thirty years, press interest in the events that had taken place at the Eureka Stockade dwindled, but Eureka was kept alive at the campfires and in the pubs, and in memorial events in Ballarat. In addition, key figures such as Lalor and Humfray were still in the public eye.

1880s

Eureka had not been forgotten: it was readily remembered. Similar flags have been flown at rebellions since including a flag similar to the Eureka flag which was flown above the Barcaldine
Barcaldine, Queensland
Barcaldine is a small town in Western Queensland, Australia, approximately by road west of the city of Rockhampton. The town is situated on Lagoon Creek, which flows into the Alice River approximately five kilometres south of the Barcaldine. This is the administrative centre of the Barcaldine...

 strike camp in the 1891 Australian shearers' strike
1891 Australian shearers' strike
350px|thumb|Shearers' strike camp, Hughenden, central Queensland, 1891.The 1891 shearers' strike is one of Australia's earliest and most important industrial disputes. Working conditions for sheep shearers in 19th century Australia weren't good. In 1891 wool was one of Australia's largest industries...

. The rebellion was also recalled in the poetry of Henry Lawson
Henry Lawson
Henry Lawson was an Australian writer and poet. Along with his contemporary Banjo Paterson, Lawson is among the best-known Australian poets and fiction writers of the colonial period and is often called Australia's "greatest writer"...

, such as Flag of the Southern Cross (1887), Eureka (A Fragment) (1889), The Fight at Eureka Stockade (1890), and Freedom on the Wallaby
Freedom on the Wallaby
"Freedom on the Wallaby", Henry Lawson's well known poem, was written as a comment on the 1891 Australian shearers' strike and published by William Lane in the Worker in Brisbane, 16 May 1891....

(1891),

In 1889, Melbourne businessmen employed renowned American cyclorama
Cyclorama
For the classical album Cyclorama, see Jonathan Goldstein; For the rock album Cyclorama by Styx, see Cyclorama ; for the theatrical backdrop, see Cyclorama...

 artist Thaddeus Welch, who teamed up with local artist Izett Watson to paint 1000 square feet (92.9 m²) of canvas of the Eureka Stockade, wrapped around a wooden structure. When it opened in Melbourne, the exhibition was an instant hit. The Age reported in 1891 that "it afforded a very good opportunity for people to see what it might have been like at Eureka". The Australasian claimed "that many persons familiar with the incidents depicted, were able to testify to the fidelity of the painted scene". The people of Melbourne flocked to the cyclorama, paid up and had their picture taken before it. It was eventually dismantled and disappeared from sight.

1890s

Mark Twain
Mark Twain
Samuel Langhorne Clemens , better known by his pen name Mark Twain, was an American author and humorist...

 visited the Victorian Goldfields in 1895. Following his visit, he said of the Eureka Stockade:

Memorials to soldiers and miners are located in the Ballarat Old Cemetery and the Eureka Stockade Memorial is located within the Eureka Stockade Gardens and is listed on the Australian National Heritage List
Australian National Heritage List
The Australian National Heritage List is a list of places deemed to be of outstanding heritage significance to Australia. The list includes natural, historic and indigenous places...

.

1950s

In 1954, the centenary of the event was officially celebrated; according to Geoffrey Blainey, who was in attendance, no one, apart from a small group of communists, was there. Plays commemorating the events were held at major theatres.

1980s and 1990s

A purpose built Interpretation centre
Interpretation centre
An interpretation centre, or interpretive centre, is an institution for dissemination of knowledge of natural or cultural heritage. Interpretation centres are a kind of new-style museum, often associated with visitor centres or ecomuseums, and located in connection to cultural, historic or natural...

 was erected in 1998 in suburb of Eureka
Eureka, Victoria
Eureka is a small eastern suburb of Ballarat, Victoria, Australia. At the 2006 census, Eureka had a population of 609.Eureka is bordered by Specimen Creek to the north, Canadian Creek to the south, Queen and Joseph streets to the west and Kline and Stawell Street to the east...

 near the site of the stockade. Designed to be a new landmark for Ballarat, the building featured an enormous sail
Sail
A sail is any type of surface intended to move a vessel, vehicle or rotor by being placed in a wind—in essence a propulsion wing. Sails are used in sailing.-History of sails:...

 emblazoned with the Eureka Flag. Before its development there was considerable debate over whether a replica or reconstruction of wooden structures was appropriate, however it was eventually decided against and this is seen by many as a reason for the apparent failure of the centre to draw significant tourist numbers. Due primarily to falling visitor numbers the centre was redeveloped between 2009–11.

In 1992, Sovereign Hill
Sovereign Hill
Sovereign Hill is an open air museum in Golden Point, a suburb of Ballarat, Victoria, Australia. Sovereign Hill depicts Ballarat's first ten years after the discovery of gold there in 1851. It was officially opened on 29 November 1970 and has become a nationally acclaimed tourist attraction...

 commenced a commemorative Son et lumière
Son et lumière
Son et lumière may refer to:*Son et lumière , a sound and light show*"Son et Lumiere", song by The Mars Volta on the album De-Loused in the Comatorium...

 known as "Blood Under the Southern Cross" which became a tourist drawcard and was revised and expanded from 2003.

2000s

In 2004, the 150th anniversary was celebrated. An Australian postage stamp featuring the Eureka Flag was released along with a set of commemorative coins. A ceremony in Ballarat known as the lantern walk was held at dawn. However, the Australian Prime Minister did not attend any commemorative events, and refused to allow the flag to fly over Parliament House.

In November 2004 then Premier of Victoria
Premiers of Victoria
The Premier of Victoria is the leader of the government in the Australian state of Victoria. The Premier is appointed by the Governor of Victoria, and is the leader of the political party able to secure a majority in the Legislative Assembly....

 Steve Bracks
Steve Bracks
Stephen Philip Bracks AC is a former Australian politician and the 44th Premier of Victoria. He first won the electoral district of Williamstown in 1994 for the Australian Labor Party, and was party leader and Premier from 1999 to 2007....

 announced that the Ballarat V/Line rail service would be renamed the Eureka Line to mark the 150th anniversary to take effect from late 2005 at the same time as a renaming of Spencer Street Station to Southern Cross Station
Southern Cross Station
Southern Cross is a major railway station and transport hub in Melbourne Docklands, Victoria, Australia. It is located on Spencer Street between Collins and La Trobe Streets at the western edge of the central business district...

, however the proposal was criticised by community groups including the Public Transport Users Association
Public Transport Users Association
The Public Transport Users Association is a community-based public transport lobby group in Victoria, Australia, based in Melbourne.- History and Aims :...

. Renaming of the line did not go ahead, however Spencer Street (railway) Station did become Southern Cross Station
Southern Cross Station
Southern Cross is a major railway station and transport hub in Melbourne Docklands, Victoria, Australia. It is located on Spencer Street between Collins and La Trobe Streets at the western edge of the central business district...

 on 13 December 2005 with Bracks stating the name would resonate with Victorians because it "stands for democracy and freedom because it flew over the Eureka Stockade".

Eureka Tower
Eureka Tower
Eureka Tower is a skyscraper located in the Southbank precinct of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. Construction began in August 2002 and the exterior completed on 1 June 2006. The plaza was finished in June 2006 and the building was officially opened on 11 October 2006...

, completed in 2006 is named in honour of the event and features symbolic aspects in its design including an architectural red stripe representing the blood spilt during the battle.

Debate over political significance

The Eureka Stockade (and other events) has been characterised as the "Birth of Australia". Its actual significance is uncertain; it has been variously mythologised by particular interest groups as a revolt of free men against imperial tyranny, of independent free enterprise against burdensome taxation, of labour against a privileged ruling class, or as an expression of republicanism
Republicanism in Australia
Republicanism in Australia is a movement to change Australia's status as a constitutional monarchy to a republican form of government. Such sentiments have been expressed in Australia from before federation onward to the present...

.

The Eureka Stockade was certainly the most prominent rebellion in Australia's history and, depending on how one defines rebellion, can be regarded as the only such event. (But see also Rum Rebellion
Rum Rebellion
The Rum Rebellion of 1808 was the only successful armed takeover of government in Australia's history. The Governor of New South Wales, William Bligh, was deposed by the New South Wales Corps under the command of Major George Johnston, working closely with John Macarthur, on 26 January 1808, 20...

, Vinegar Hill
Castle Hill convict rebellion
The Castle Hill Rebellion of 4 March 1804, also called the Second Battle of Vinegar Hill, was a large-scale rebellion by Irish convicts against British colonial authority in Australia...

 and more recently the New Guard
New Guard
The New Guard was a fascist movement in Australia formed in 1931. It was opposed to communism and democracy, called for class collaboration to replace class conflict, and engaged in street fighting against opponents and in plans for a coup d'etat against the Australian government...

.) Its significance, however, remains debatable. Some historians believe that the prominence of the event in the public record has come about because Australian history does not include a major armed rebellion phase equivalent to the French Revolution
French Revolution
The French Revolution , sometimes distinguished as the 'Great French Revolution' , was a period of radical social and political upheaval in France and Europe. The absolute monarchy that had ruled France for centuries collapsed in three years...

, the English Civil War
English Civil War
The English Civil War was a series of armed conflicts and political machinations between Parliamentarians and Royalists...

, or the American War of Independence or any of the numerous rebellions in Ireland before the ultimate successful Irish War of Independence
Irish War of Independence
The Irish War of Independence , Anglo-Irish War, Black and Tan War, or Tan War was a guerrilla war mounted by the Irish Republican Army against the British government and its forces in Ireland. It began in January 1919, following the Irish Republic's declaration of independence. Both sides agreed...

 of 1919–1921 which led to Ireland (excluding 6 north east counties) achieving dominion status: in consequence (according to this view) the Eureka story tends to be inflated well beyond its real significance. Others, however, maintain that Eureka was a seminal event and that it marked a major change in the course of Australian history.

The writings of Raffaello Carboni
Raffaello Carboni
Raffaello Carboni was an Italian revolutionary and writer. He is primarily remembered now as the author of the main eyewitness account of events at the Eureka Stockade in Ballarat, Australia.-Biography:...

, who was present at the Stockade, make it clear that "amongst the foreigners ... there was no democratic feeling, but merely a spirit of resistance to the licence fee"; and he also disputes the accusations "that have branded the miners of Ballarat as disloyal to their QUEEN" (emphasis as in the original).

In 1980, historian Geoffrey Blainey
Geoffrey Blainey
Geoffrey Norman Blainey AC , is a prominent Australian historian.Blainey was born in Melbourne and raised in a series of Victorian country towns before attending Wesley College and the University of Melbourne. While at university he was editor of Farrago, the newspaper of the University of...

 drew attention to the fact that many miners were temporary migrants from Britain and the United States, who did not intend to settle permanently in Australia. He wrote:
"Nowadays it is common to see the noble Eureka flag
Eureka Flag
The Eureka Flag is a design; a dark blue field with a central white symmetric cross consisting five eight-pointed stars, representing the Crux constellation....

 and the rebellion of 1854 as the symbol of Australian independence, of freedom from foreign domination; but many saw the rebellion in 1854 as an uprising by outsiders who were exploiting the country's resources and refusing to pay their fair share of taxes. So we make history do its handsprings."


In 1999, the Premier of New South Wales, Bob Carr, dismissed the Eureka Stockade as a "protest without consequence". Deputy Prime Minister John Anderson made the Eureka flag a federal election campaign issue in 2004 saying "I think people have tried to make too much of the Eureka Stockade...trying to give it a credibility and standing that it probably doesn't enjoy."

In 2004, the Premier of Victoria, Steve Bracks, delivered an opening address at the Eureka 150 Democracy Conference stating "that Eureka was about the struggle for basic democratic rights. It was not about a riot – it was about rights."

Publications

  • Deaths at Eureka by D. Wickham,
  • The Eureka Encyclopaedia by Corfield, Gervasoni and Wickham
  • The Eureka Flag: Our Starry Banner by D.Wickham, C. Gervasoni, V. D’Angri.
  • History of Ballarat & Some Ballarat Reminiscences, by Withers (facsimile)
  • Outbreak at Ballarat: Eureka from the Mount Alexander Mail by Clare Gervasoni
  • Shot in the Dark: A Pre-Eureka Incident by Dorothy Wickham
  • The Story of Eureka by John Lynch, -In 1895 Lynch, one of Lalor’s Captains at Eureka, wrote an account of the epic days at Ballarat in the 1850s.
  • Women of the Diggings: Ballarat 1854 by Dorothy Wickham.

Eureka Stockade (1907)

A black and white silent film directed by Arthur and George Cornwell, produced by the Australasian Cinematograph Company.

The surviving seven minute fragment (original length unknown) shows street scenes of Ballarat is believed to be part of the 1907 film, the second feature film made in Australia (after the 1906 production, The Story of the Kelly Gang
The Story of the Kelly Gang
The Story of the Kelly Gang is a 1906 Australian film that traces the life of the legendary bushranger Ned Kelly . It was written and directed by Charles Tait. The film ran for more than an hour, and was the longest narrative film yet seen in Australia, and the world. Its approximate reel length...

). The film was first screened in the Athenaeum Hall, Melbourne on 19 October 1907. The film impressed critics of the time and was found to be a stirring portrayal of the events surrounding the Eureka Stockade, but failed to connect with audiences during the two weeks it was screened. Other scenes in the lost reels of the film were believed to have included gold seekers leaving London, issuing of licences, licence hunting, diggers chained to logs and rescued by mates, diggers burning Bentley's Hotel, the Rebellion, building the stockade, troops storming the stockade and the stockade in ruins.

The surviving 307 feet (93.6 m) of the 35mm film (5 mins @ 18fps) is stored at the National Film and Sound Archive
National Film and Sound Archive
The National Film and Sound Archive is Australia’s audiovisual archive, responsible for developing, preserving, maintaining, promoting and providing access to a national collection of audiovisual materials and related items...

.

Eureka Stockade (1949)

A 1949 British film, called Eureka Stockade
Eureka Stockade (film)
Eureka Stockade is a 1949 British film of the story surrounding Peter Lalor and the gold miners' rebellion of 1854 at the Eureka Stockade in Ballarat, Victoria...

, was made in Australia in 1949. The film starred Chips Rafferty
Chips Rafferty
Chips Rafferty MBE was an iconic Australian actor. Called "the living symbol of the typical Australian", Rafferty's career stretched from the 1940s until his death in 1971, and during this time he performed regularly in major Australian feature films as well as appearing in British and American...

 and focused on Peter Lalor and Rafaello Carboni. It was directed by Harry Watt
Harry Watt (director)
Harry Watt was a Scottish documentary and feature film director, who began his career working for John Grierson and Robert Flaherty. His 1959 film The Siege of Pinchgut was entered into the 9th Berlin International Film Festival...

, produced by Leslie Norman
Les Norman
Leslie A. Norman was a British director and producer. His career spanned nearly fifty years, from 1930 until 1978, and in that time he tried his hand at many different jobs, including editor, producer, and writer...

 and written by Walter Greenwood, Ralph Smart and Harry Watt.

The cast included Chips Rafferty
Chips Rafferty
Chips Rafferty MBE was an iconic Australian actor. Called "the living symbol of the typical Australian", Rafferty's career stretched from the 1940s until his death in 1971, and during this time he performed regularly in major Australian feature films as well as appearing in British and American...

, Jane Barrett, Jack Lambert, Gordon Jackson
Gordon Jackson (actor)
Gordon Cameron Jackson, OBE was a Scottish Emmy Award-winning actor best remembered for his roles as the butler Angus Hudson in Upstairs, Downstairs and George Cowley, the head of CI5, in The Professionals....

, Peter Finch
Peter Finch
Peter Finch was a British-born Australian actor. He is best remembered for his role as "crazed" television anchorman Howard Beale in the film Network, which earned him a posthumous Academy Award for Best Actor, his fifth Best Actor award from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts, and a...

, Sydney Loder and Leonard Teale
Leonard Teale
Leonard Teale AO , born Leonard George Thiele in Brisbane, was a well-known Australian actor of radio, television and films....

.

An abridged version of the film was released in the United States of America under the title, Massacre Hill.

Eureka Stockade (1984)

An Australian two-part television mini-series which aired on the Seven Network in 1984 starring Bryan Brown
Bryan Brown
Bryan Neathway Brown, AM is an Australian actor.-Early life:Brown was born in Sydney, the son of John Brown and Molly Brown, a house cleaner who worked as a pianist in the early days of the Langshaw School of Ballet. He grew up in the south-western Sydney suburb of Bankstown and began working at...

 as Peter Lalor. Directed by Rod Hardy, produced by Henry Crawford and written by Tom Hegarty.

The cast included Bryan Brown
Bryan Brown
Bryan Neathway Brown, AM is an Australian actor.-Early life:Brown was born in Sydney, the son of John Brown and Molly Brown, a house cleaner who worked as a pianist in the early days of the Langshaw School of Ballet. He grew up in the south-western Sydney suburb of Bankstown and began working at...

, Carol Burns, Bill Hunter and Brett Cullen.

See also

  • Flag of Australia
    Flag of Australia
    The flag of Australia is a defaced Blue Ensign: a blue field with the Union Flag in the canton , and a large white seven-pointed star known as the Commonwealth Star in the lower hoist quarter...

  • Eureka Flag
    Eureka Flag
    The Eureka Flag is a design; a dark blue field with a central white symmetric cross consisting five eight-pointed stars, representing the Crux constellation....

  • History of Victoria
    History of Victoria
    This article describes the history of the Australian state of Victoria.-Aboriginal history:The state of Victoria was originally home to many indigenous nations that had occupied the land for tens of thousands of years...

  • Butler Cole Aspinall
    Butler Cole Aspinall
    Butler Cole Aspinall was an Australian defence advocate. He was one of the counsel for the leaders of the Eureka Stockade, and defended Henry James O'Farrell for the attempted assassination of the Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh....

    , one of the defence counsel.
  • Darwin Rebellion
    Darwin Rebellion
    The Darwin Rebellion of 17 December 1918 was the culmination of unrest in the Australian Workers' Union which had grown between 1911 and 1919. Led by Harold Nelson, some 1000 demonstrators marched on Government House at Liberty Square in Darwin, Northern Territory, Australia where they burnt an...

  • John King (Eureka)
    John King (Eureka)
    John King was a Police Constable at the Eureka Stockade rebellion, one of Australia's few armed uprisings and often characterised controversially as the "birth of democracy" in Australia....

    , the Trooper who took down the flag during the stockade.

External links

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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