During the Australian gold rushes, a significant number of workers moved from elsewhere in Australia and overseas to where gold had been discovered. Gold had been found several times before, but the colonial government of New South Wales had suppressed the news out of the fear that it would reduce the workforce and destabilise the economy.
The Australian gold rushes made the convict colonies into more progressive cities with the influx of free immigrants.
After the California gold rush began in 1848, many people went there from Australia, so the government sought approval from the British Colonial Office for the exploitation of mineral resources and offered rewards for finding gold.
History of discovery
The first gold rush in Australia began in May 1851 after prospector Edward Hargraves claimed to have discovered payable gold near Orange, at a site called Ophir. Hargraves had been to the California goldfields and had learned new gold prospecting techniques such as panning and cradling. Hargraves was offered rewards by the Colony of New South Wales and the Colony of Victoria. Before the end of the year, the gold rush had spread to many other parts of the state where gold had been found, not just to the west but also to the south and north of Sydney.
With the influx of free immigrants, the Australian gold rushes led to the development of more progressive cities from the former convict colonies. These hopefuls, termed diggers, brought new skills and professions, contributing to a burgeoning economy. The mateship that evolved between these diggers and their collective resistance to authority led to the emergence of a unique national identity. Although not all diggers found riches on the goldfields, many decided to stay and integrate into these communities.
In July 1851, Victoria's first gold rush began on the Clunes goldfield. In August, the gold rush spread to include the goldfield at Buninyong (today a suburb of Ballarat) 45 km (28 mi) away and, by early September 1851, to the nearby goldfield at Ballarat (then also known as Yuille's Diggings), followed in early September to the goldfield at Castlemaine (then known as Forest Creek and the Mount Alexander Goldfield) and the goldfield at Bendigo (then known as Bendigo Creek) in November 1851. Gold, just as in New South Wales, was also found in many other parts of the state. The Victorian Gold Discovery Committee wrote in 1854:
The discovery of the Victorian Goldfields has converted a remote dependency into a country of worldwide fame; it has attracted a population, extraordinary in number, with unprecedented rapidity; it has enhanced the value of property to an enormous extent; it has made this the richest country in the world; and, in less than three years, it has done for this colony the work of an age, and made its impulses felt in the most distant regions of the earth.
When the rush began at Ballarat, diggers discovered it was a prosperous goldfield. Lieutenant-Governor Charles La Trobe visited the site and watched five men uncover 136 troy ounces (149 oz; 4,200 g) of gold in one day. Mount Alexander was even richer than Ballarat. With gold sitting just under the surface, the shallowness allowed diggers to unearth gold nuggets easily. In 7 months, 2,400,000 pounds (1,100 t) of gold was transported from Mount Alexander to nearby capital cities.
The gold rushes led to a massive influx of people from overseas. Australia's total population increased nearly fourfold from 430,000 in 1851 to 1.7 million in 1871. Australia first became a multicultural society during the gold rush period. Between 1852 and 1860, 290,000 people migrated to Victoria from the British Isles, 15,000 came from other European countries, and 18,000 emigrated from the United States. Some Chileans who had participated in the California gold rush moved to Australia, and so did the technologies they had introduced to California, such as the Chilean mill, which became common in Australian mining.
Some non-European immigrants, however, were unwelcome, especially the Chinese:
The Chinese were particularly industrious, with techniques that differed widely from the Europeans. This and their physical appearance and fear of the unknown led to them being persecuted in a racist way that would be regarded as untenable today.
In 1855, 11,493 Chinese arrived in Melbourne. Chinese travelling outside New South Wales had to obtain special re-entry certificates. In 1855, Victoria enacted the Chinese Immigration Act 1855, severely limiting the number of Chinese passengers permitted on an arriving vessel. To evade the new law, many Chinese were landed in the south-east of South Australia and travelled more than 400 km across country to the Victorian goldfields, along tracks that are still evident today.
In 1885, following a call by the Western Australian government for a reward for the first find of gold, a discovery was made at Halls Creek, sparking a gold rush in that state.
Pre-rush gold finds
1788: A hoax
In August 1788, convict James Daley reported to several people that he had found gold, "an inexhaustible source of wealth", "some distance down the harbour" (Port Jackson, Sydney). On the pretence of showing an officer the position of his gold find, Daley absconded into the bush for a day. For this escapade, Daley was to receive 50 lashes. Still insisting that he had found gold, Daley next produced a specimen of gold ore. Governor Arthur Phillip then ordered Daley to again be taken down the harbour to point out where he had found the gold.
Before being taken down the harbour, after being warned by an officer that he would be put to death if he attempted to deceive him, Daley confessed that his story about finding gold was "a falsehood". He had manufactured the specimen of gold ore that he had exhibited from a gold guinea and a brass buckle, and he produced the remains of the same as proof. For this deception, Daley received 100 lashes. Many convicts continued to believe that Daley had found gold and that he had only changed his story to keep the place of the gold find to himself. James Daley was hanged in December 1788 for breaking and entering and theft.
Some convicts who were employed cutting a road over the Blue Mountains were rumoured to have found small pieces of gold in 1815.
1820: Blue Mountains, New South Wales
F. Stein was a Russian naturalist with the 1819–1821 Bellingshausen expedition to explore the Southern Ocean. Stein claimed to have sighted gold-bearing ore while he was on a 12-day trip to the Blue Mountains in March 1820. Many people were sceptical of his claim.
1823: Bathurst region, New South Wales
The first officially recognised gold find in Australia was on 15 February 1823, by assistant surveyor James McBrien, at Fish River, between Rydal and Bathurst, New South Wales. McBrien noted the date in his field survey book along with, "At E. [End of the survey line] 1 chain 50 links to river and marked a gum tree. At this place I found numerous particles of gold convenient to river."
1834: Monaro district, New South Wales
In 1834, with government help, John Lhotsky travelled to the Monaro district of New South Wales and explored its southern mountains. On returning to Sydney in that same year, he exhibited specimens that he had collected that contained gold.
1837: Segenhoe, New South Wales
In 1837, gold and silver ore was found about 50 kilometres (30 mi) from Segenhoe near Aberdeen. The find was described in the newspapers as the discovery of a gold and silver mine about 50 kilometres (30 mi) from Thomas Potter Macqueen's Segenhoe Estate, by a Russian stockman employed in the neighbourhood of the discovery, which was located on Crown land.
1839: Bathurst region, New South Wales
Paweł Strzelecki, geologist and explorer, found small amounts of gold in silicate in 1839 at the Vale of Clwyd near Hartley, a location on the road to Bathurst.
1840: Lefroy, Tasmania
Gold is believed to have been found in Northern Tasmania at The Den (formerly known as Lefroy or Nine Mile Springs) near George Town in 1840 by a convict. In the 1880s, this became known as the Lefroy goldfields.
1841–1842: Bathurst and Goulburn regions, New South Wales
The Reverend William Branwhite Clarke found gold on the Coxs River, a location on the road to Bathurst, in 1841. In 1842, he found gold on the Wollondilly River. In 1843, Clarke spoke to many people about the abundance of gold likely to be found in the colony of New South Wales. On 9 April 1844, Clarke exhibited a sample of gold in quartz to Governor Sir George Gipps. In that same year, Clarke showed the sample and spoke of the probable abundance of gold to some members of the New South Wales Legislative Council, including Justice Roger Therry, the member for Camden, and Joseph Phelps Robinson, then member for the Town of Melbourne.
In evidence that Clarke gave before a Select Committee of the NSW Legislative Council in September 1852, he stated that the subject was not followed up as "the matter was regarded as one of curiosity only, and considerations of the penal character of the colony kept the subject quiet, as much as the general ignorance of the value of such an indication." Towards the end of 1853, Clarke was given a grant of £1,000 (equivalent to A$154,000 in 2022) by the New South Wales government for his services in connection with the discovery of gold. The same amount (£1,000) was voted by the Victorian Gold Discovery Committee in 1854.
1841: Pyrenees Ranges and Plenty Ranges, Victoria
Gold was found in the Pyrenees Ranges near Clunes, and in the Plenty Ranges near Melbourne in 1841; the gold was sent to Hobart, where it was sold.
From 1843: Victoria
Beginning in 1843, gold samples were brought several times into the watchmaker's shop of T. J. Thomas in Melbourne by "bushmen". The specimens were looked upon as curiosities.
1844: Bundalong, Victoria
A shepherd named Smith thought that he had found gold near the Ovens River in 1844, and reported the matter to Charles La Trobe, who advised him to say nothing about it.
1846: Castambul, South Australia
Gold was found in South Australia, and Australia's first gold mine was established. From the earliest days of the Colony of South Australia, men, including Johannes Menge, the geologist with the South Australian Company, had been seeking gold. "Armed with miner's pick, numberless explorers are to be found prying into the depths of the valleys or climbing the mountain tops. No place is too remote".
Gold was found in January 1846 by Captain Thomas Terrell at the Victoria Mine near Castambul, in the Adelaide Hills, South Australia, about 16 kilometres (10 mi) east of Adelaide. Some of the gold was made into a brooch sent to Queen Victoria. Samples were displayed at the Great Exhibition at the Crystal Palace in 1851. Share prices rose from £2 to £30, but soon fell back to £3 when no further gold was found. Unfortunately for the investors and everyone else concerned, the mine's total gold production never amounted to more than 24 ounces (680 g).
1847: Victoria
Gold was found at Port Phillip (Victoria) by a shepherd. In April 1847, a shepherd took a sample of ore about the size of an apple, which he believed to be copper, into the jewellery store of Charles Brentani in Collins Street, Melbourne, where the sample was purchased by an employee, Joseph Forrester, a gold and silver smith. The shepherd refused to disclose to Forrester where he had obtained the nugget, but stated that "there was plenty more of it where it came from" on the station where he worked about 100 kilometres (60 mi) from Melbourne. The sample was tested by Forrester and found to be 65 percent virgin gold. A sample of this ore was given to Captain Clinch, who took it to Hobart.
1847: Beaconsfield, Tasmania
It is said that John Gardner found gold-bearing quartz in 1847 on Blythe Creek, near Beaconsfield, on the other side of the Tamar River from George Town.
1848: Wellington, New South Wales
Gold was found by a shepherd named McGregor at Mitchells Creek near Wellington, New South Wales, in 1848 on the Montefiore's squatting run, "Nanima". The Bathurst Free Press noted, on 25 May 1850, that "Neither is there any doubt in the fact that Mr M'Gregor found a considerable quantity of the precious metal some years ago, near Mitchell's Creek, and it is surmised he still gets more in the same locality."