the average price of rural land was 25 shillings per acre. By
1853 the price had more than trebled, to £4. The immigrant married men and workers
who wanted to become small farmers had been dudded.
On the goldfields there was another source of friction. Much of the land sold in
these areas was bought by employees of the government camps—the gold commissioners,
police inspectors and magistrates—using money borrowed from prosperous local publicans
and merchants. James Johnston, newly married to Maggie Brown Howden and earning a
salary of £400 a year, started buying up land almost as soon as the couple arrived
in Ballarat in the winter of 1854.
These deals were seen as ‘insider’ trading—unfair and borderline corrupt. Worse still,
the capitalist land-grabbers did nothing to improve the lands, let alone cultivate
them. So there was still no agricultural produce flowing to the goldfields, and
diggers were no closer to the little smallholding they dreamed of. Food prices remained
high, especially in winter when the roads became impassable. Unskilled workers could
find no alternative employment at a time when public expenditure on roads, docks
or other infrastructure was negligible. Thus most miners, concluded Harry Hastings
Pearce via his grandmother’s tales, were condemned to the hopeless search for gold .
Land reform—it was such an obvious remedy! It nagged at people, until three little
words became a powerful slogan that resonated across all social groups on the goldfields.
Unlock the lands!
BRITISH JUSTICE
British and justice were the two words on everyone’s lips in the whingey winter of
1854. The words generally had a question mark attached.
This? You call this British justice?
Henry Mundy shuddered every time he saw the soldiers pass by— Lords’ and dukes’ sons,
friends of [Governor] La Trobe, mincing around with their gold epaulettes and lace
on their coats who knew nothing of the people or the country . The indignity of educated
professional men being lorded over by a pack of exiled nincompoops sickened Mundy,
and he knew he wasn’t alone. Things will not remain long as they are , he predicted. The British are a loyal law abiding people but they expect, what they have been accustomed
to, British justice .
English journalist William Howitt also noticed how incensed the diggers were by the
heavy-handed, arrogant treatment handed out by the police. The arbitrary, Russian
sort of way in which they were visited by the authorities , he called it. (Britain
was at war with Russia, in the Crimea, so it was a fairly weighty criticism.)
Examples of injustice and incivility occurred day after day. Prisoners could be left
manacled to tree logs if the tiny lockup was full, or if the jailer didn’t like them.
Honest men, too poor to pay their licence fee, were chained together with hardened
criminals. Women were locked up with men—nothing but a flimsy partition between
them. Other inmates were forced to act as servants, drawing water and chopping wood
for the soldiers up at the Government Camp.
Thomas and Frances Pierson went to the Ballarat Magistrates Court one Saturday morning
and witnessed several licence cases . One man had borrowed another’s licence. He was
jailed for two months in Geelong. A still more heathenish part of the matter , Thomas
later reflected in his diary, is that the man had a wife and six children in his
tent in Ballarat , and the poor woman had only just given birth to the sixth. The
English conduct in governing is a disgrace to any civilised nation , concluded Thomas.
ROBERT REDE
THE BIG KAHUNA
----
NEEDED TO CALM THE WATERS BUT INSTEAD STIRRED THE POT
BORN Suffolk, 1827
DIED Melbourne, 1904
ARRIVED 1851
AGE AT EUREKA 27
CHILDREN Single at Eureka, later a father of seven.
FAQ English landed gentry, oddjobber before coming to Victoria as a goldseeker. Appointed
Resident Commissioner at Ballarat in May 1854. Married Martha Clendinning’s daughter,
Margaret, in
1853 the price had more than trebled, to £4. The immigrant married men and workers
who wanted to become small farmers had been dudded.
On the goldfields there was another source of friction. Much of the land sold in
these areas was bought by employees of the government camps—the gold commissioners,
police inspectors and magistrates—using money borrowed from prosperous local publicans
and merchants. James Johnston, newly married to Maggie Brown Howden and earning a
salary of £400 a year, started buying up land almost as soon as the couple arrived
in Ballarat in the winter of 1854.
These deals were seen as ‘insider’ trading—unfair and borderline corrupt. Worse still,
the capitalist land-grabbers did nothing to improve the lands, let alone cultivate
them. So there was still no agricultural produce flowing to the goldfields, and
diggers were no closer to the little smallholding they dreamed of. Food prices remained
high, especially in winter when the roads became impassable. Unskilled workers could
find no alternative employment at a time when public expenditure on roads, docks
or other infrastructure was negligible. Thus most miners, concluded Harry Hastings
Pearce via his grandmother’s tales, were condemned to the hopeless search for gold .
Land reform—it was such an obvious remedy! It nagged at people, until three little
words became a powerful slogan that resonated across all social groups on the goldfields.
Unlock the lands!
BRITISH JUSTICE
British and justice were the two words on everyone’s lips in the whingey winter of
1854. The words generally had a question mark attached.
This? You call this British justice?
Henry Mundy shuddered every time he saw the soldiers pass by— Lords’ and dukes’ sons,
friends of [Governor] La Trobe, mincing around with their gold epaulettes and lace
on their coats who knew nothing of the people or the country . The indignity of educated
professional men being lorded over by a pack of exiled nincompoops sickened Mundy,
and he knew he wasn’t alone. Things will not remain long as they are , he predicted. The British are a loyal law abiding people but they expect, what they have been accustomed
to, British justice .
English journalist William Howitt also noticed how incensed the diggers were by the
heavy-handed, arrogant treatment handed out by the police. The arbitrary, Russian
sort of way in which they were visited by the authorities , he called it. (Britain
was at war with Russia, in the Crimea, so it was a fairly weighty criticism.)
Examples of injustice and incivility occurred day after day. Prisoners could be left
manacled to tree logs if the tiny lockup was full, or if the jailer didn’t like them.
Honest men, too poor to pay their licence fee, were chained together with hardened
criminals. Women were locked up with men—nothing but a flimsy partition between
them. Other inmates were forced to act as servants, drawing water and chopping wood
for the soldiers up at the Government Camp.
Thomas and Frances Pierson went to the Ballarat Magistrates Court one Saturday morning
and witnessed several licence cases . One man had borrowed another’s licence. He was
jailed for two months in Geelong. A still more heathenish part of the matter , Thomas
later reflected in his diary, is that the man had a wife and six children in his
tent in Ballarat , and the poor woman had only just given birth to the sixth. The
English conduct in governing is a disgrace to any civilised nation , concluded Thomas.
ROBERT REDE
THE BIG KAHUNA
----
NEEDED TO CALM THE WATERS BUT INSTEAD STIRRED THE POT
BORN Suffolk, 1827
DIED Melbourne, 1904
ARRIVED 1851
AGE AT EUREKA 27
CHILDREN Single at Eureka, later a father of seven.
FAQ English landed gentry, oddjobber before coming to Victoria as a goldseeker. Appointed
Resident Commissioner at Ballarat in May 1854. Married Martha Clendinning’s daughter,
Margaret, in
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