The Eureka Rebellion was a series of events involving gold miners who revolted against the British administration of the colony of Victoria, Australia during the Victorian gold rush. It culminated in the Battle of the Eureka Stockade, which took place on 3 December 1854 at Ballarat between the rebels and the colonial forces of Australia. The fighting resulted in an official total of 27 deaths and many injuries, the majority of casualties being rebels. There was a preceding period beginning in 1851 of peaceful demonstrations and civil disobedience on the Victorian goldfields. The miners had various grievances, chiefly the cost of mining permits and the officious way the system was enforced.
The Victorian gold rush was a period in the history of Victoria, Australia approximately between 1851 and the late 1860s. It led to a period of extreme prosperity for the Australian colony, and an influx of population growth and financial capital for Melbourne, which was dubbed "Marvellous Melbourne" as a result of the procurement of wealth.
The Eureka Flag was flown at the Battle of the Eureka Stockade, which took place on 3 December 1854 at Ballarat in Victoria, Australia. It was the culmination of the 1851–1854 Eureka Rebellion on the Victorian goldfields, where miners protested against the cost of mining permits and the officious way the colonial authorities enforced the system along with other grievances. An estimated crowd of over 10,000 demonstrators swore allegiance to the flag as a symbol of defiance at Bakery Hill on 29 November 1854. It was then flown over the Eureka Stockade during the battle which left an official total of 27 deaths. Around 120 miners were arrested, and many others were badly wounded.
Peter Fintan Lalor was an Irish-Australian rebel and, later, politician who rose to fame for his leading role in the Eureka Rebellion, an event identified with the "birth of democracy" in Australia.
Sir Charles Hotham, KCB, RN was Lieutenant-Governor and, later, Governor of Victoria, Australia from 22 June 1854 to 10 November 1855.
John Basson Humffray was a leading advocate in the movement of miner reform process in the British colony of Victoria, and later a member of parliament.
Henry Ross was a Canadian-Australian gold miner who died in the Eureka Rebellion at the Ballarat gold fields in the British Colony of Victoria, now the state of Victoria in Australia. Ross is particularly remembered for his part in the creation of the rebel miners' flag, since named the Eureka Flag.
Henry Erle Seekamp was a journalist, owner and editor of the Ballarat Times during the 1854 Eureka Rebellion in Victoria, Australia. The newspaper was fiercely pro-miner, and he was responsible for a series of articles and several editorials that supported the Ballarat Reform League while condemning the government and police harassment of the diggers. After the Rebellion was put down, he was charged, found guilty of seditious libel, and imprisoned, becoming the only participant to receive gaol time.
Charles Alphonse Doudiet was a Swiss-born Canadian artist and digger present at the Eureka Stockade, Ballarat, in the British Colony of Victoria, in 1854. His sketchbook, discovered by his descendants in 1996, has provided contemporary images of events connected to the Eureka Rebellion, that were important for the authentication of the original Eureka Flag.
Raffaello Carboni was an Italian writer, composer and interpreter who wrote a book on the Eureka Stockade which he witnessed while living in Australia. After periods of travelling, he returned to Italy where he died in Rome.
Arthur Alfred Lynch was an Irish Australian civil engineer, physician, journalist, author, soldier, anti-imperialist and polymath. He served as MP in the UK House of Commons as member of the Irish Parliamentary Party, representing Galway Borough from 1901 to 1902, and later West Clare from 1909 to 1918. Lynch fought on the Boer side during the Boer War in South Africa, for which he was sentenced to death but later pardoned. He supported the British war effort in the First World War, raising his own Irish battalion in Munster towards the end of the war.
Evelyn Pitfield Shirley Sturt was born in Dorset, England. He was the youngest son of Thomas Lenox Napier Sturt, a puisne judge in Bengal for the British East India Company, and Jeanette or Jeannette, née Wilson. One of his older brothers was the Australian explorer Charles Sturt.
Bakery Hill is an inner city suburb of Ballarat in Victoria, Australia. It is the smallest suburb in the city of Ballarat in terms of both area and population, which at the 2021 census was just 180 people. The area is a mix of residential and commercial, as it has been since it came into existence at the beginning of the gold rush. In the present time it is mainly known for its restaurants and pubs, as well as fast food. The suburb boundaries are that of Mair, East, Barkly, Steinfield and Peel Streets.
Robert William Rede was a member of Victoria's volunteer militia, who was remembered for his part in the Eureka Rebellion.
The Battle of the Eureka Stockade was fought in Ballarat, Victoria, on 3 December 1854, between gold miners and the colonial forces of Australia. It was the culmination of the 1851-1854 Eureka Rebellion during the Victorian gold rush. The fighting resulted in an official total of 27 deaths and many injuries, the majority of casualties being rebels. The miners had various grievances, chiefly the cost of mining permits and the officious way the system was enforced.
Thomas Burr (1813–1866), surveyor and mine manager, was a British explorer and Deputy Surveyor General of South Australia 1839–46.
George Threlfall (1819–1897) was an Australian engineer and entrepreneur who founded the mining company that later became the Phoenix Foundry.
The following bibliography includes notable sources concerning the Eureka Rebellion. This article is currently being expanded and revised.
The 1854 mining revolt in Australia, Eureka Rebellion inspired numerous novels, poems, films, songs, plays and artworks. Much of Eureka folklore relies heavily on Raffaello Carboni's 1855 book, The Eureka Stockade, which was the first and only comprehensive eyewitness account of the Eureka rebellion. Henry Lawson wrote a number of poems about Eureka, as have many novelists.
The following is a timeline of the Eureka Rebellion.
