1845
A pepper-box revolver from Lambing Flat
White Australia fights back
This primitive gun – a pepper-box revolver – was used in the first violent confrontations between white and Asian settlers, and led in part to the White Australia policy. The revolver is an early version of the repeating firearm, and one of the most common personal firearms in the 19th century.
The discovery of gold in New South Wales and Victoria in the 1850s brought a massive influx of immigrants from China. Prospecting required hours of backbreaking work for meagre returns. Europeans tended to be lone speculators, but the Chinese organised themselves into cooperative groups.
A journey from China to Dai Gum San, the ‘new gold mountain’ in far-off Australia, cost around £12. This money was usually raised by the immigrant paying heavy interest charges to a travel agent or by using his family as collateral. The trip to Australia was hazardous, and immigrants often slept on decks open to the weather, with little food and water.
When the gold rush was at its height, the Victorian government tried to limit the flood of ‘celestials’ and imposed a £10 tax on Chinese immigrants. So the Chinese sailed to South Australia instead and walked to the goldfields. Between 1857 and 1863, 16 261 Chinese males and one female landed at the port of Robe on Guichen Bay in South Australia and walked 800 kilometres to the Bendigo goldfields. It was one of the largest single migrations in all human history, and is the largest in Australian history.
A local described the scene of a Chinese trek to the goldfields as ‘between six and seven hundred coming overland from Adelaide. They had four wagons carrying their sick, lame and provisions. They were all walking single file, each one with a pole and two baskets. They stretched for over two miles [3 kilometres] in procession.’
The journey took five weeks, the people jog-trotting 35 kilometres a day in long, single-file groups, wearing parasol hats, woollen blouses and blue trousers. On their shoulders they balanced bamboo poles carrying buckets, cradles, shovels and bedding. They flew paper kites at their camps and smoked opium.
On the goldfields the Chinese were victims of discrimination by the Anglo-Irish establishment. Forced off the best sites, they were bullied into re-mining areas that others had worked dry. The Europeans accused the Chinese of using too much water, muddying the waterholes, and being unsanitary, un-Christian and generally immoral. A Chinese Immigration Regulation Bill went before the New South Wales parliament.
The first anti-Chinese violence occurred in Bendigo in July 1854, and a major riot broke out at Buckland River in July 1857. These attacks were thuggish mob incidents that aimed to drive the Chinese away. The violence in Victoria encouraged the Chinese to move north to New South Wales, and by 1861 there were 13,000 Chinese migrants on the New South Wales goldfields. The anti-Chinese violence continued, with brawls in the Burragorang region at Spring Creek, Stoney Creek, Back Creek, Wombat, Blackguard Gully and Tipperary Gully.
Trouble began in the Burragorang area in December 1860. A miners’ ‘vigilance committee’ on 12 December alleged that Chinese people were running gambling dens and other immoral activities. These allegations fired up a mob, who set upon the Chinese camp, killing several people and wounding others. A military unit was sent to restore order and remained until June 1861.
The major riot on the New South Wales goldfields took place at Lambing Flat on 30 June 1861. The provocation came from the New South Wales Legislative Council, which rejected an anti-Chinese immigration bill; this was combined with a rumour that 1500 more Chinese prospectors were on their way to the area.
Some 3000 white men rallied in front of a banner that said ‘Roll up! Roll up!’ Fired up on xenophobic oratory and accompanied by a brass band, the mob moved through the Chinese camp beating the people, looting their possessions and cutting off their pigtails. Chinese miners’ tents were set on fire and their mining tools destroyed. The Lambing Flat Miner newspaper estimated the value of property destroyed at £3000.
One thousand Chinese people took shelter on the Currowang sheep station, 20 kilometres away. The white mob moved 8 kilometres further on to the Back Creek Chinese camp, where they did more looting and assaulting. Over the coming days, police arrived and arrested the ringleaders and restored order. Nonetheless, the attacks on Chinese continued. On 14 July, the police were attacked by almost 1000 miners. One rioter died in that melee.
The police and military presence was increased to almost 300 reinforcements and they remained for a year. Peace was restored but the Lambing Flat massacre cast a pall over Chinese–Australian relations for a century.
In Victoria, ‘An Act to Make Provision for Certain Immigrants’ was passed in 1855. The New South Wales government passed the Chinese Immigration Restriction and Regulation Act in 1861, Queensland introduced restrictions in 1877, and Western Australia followed suit in 1886. This eventually led, upon Federation, to the Immigration Restriction Act 1901 – commonly known as the White Australia policy.
Out of shame, the town of Lambing Flat changed its name to Young.