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The meeting at Bentley’s hotel marked a turning point in the relationship between government and diggers on the Ballarat goldfields. Whilst the trials of Bentley and those accused of burning down his establishment were being held in Melbourne, and with the Board of Enquiry investigating the conduct of the local magistracy in Ballarat, the Resident Gold Fields Commissioner Robert Rede, pursued a more obstinate program of licence hunting. Also putting on a bold front, the diggers began to organise and protest on a grander scale. What began as open-air meetings would by the end of the month lead to the arming of volunteers and the construction of a stockade.

The Ballarat Reform League

The Ballarat Reform League Charter, a document produced after the first large diggers’ meeting on 11 November, and taken to an interview with Lieutenant Governor Hotham on 27 November, was the major production of this group. Enlarging on the committee for the defence of the Eureka Hotel rioters – McIntyre, Westerby and Fletcher – it had the input of two diggers-cum-newspaper proprietors: George Black (The Diggers’ Advocate) and J.B. Humffray (The Leader), as well as others of a communal turn of mind. The principles endorsed by the meeting of 11 November marked a shift of emphasis on the part of the diggers, from complaints about immediate grievances to suggestions of more general remedies.

Several thousand miners assembled on 11 November and elected Humffray as President of the League, and Black as its Secretary. In this capacity, together with George Kennedy, they presented the Charter together with a demand for Hotham to release the Eureka hotel rioters, gaoled on 20 November.

Lieutenant Governor Hotham took exception to the use of the word ‘demand’. This point can be appreciated if one compares the wording of the Charter to that of any of the other petitions on this website. The interview with Lieutenant Governor Hotham never really got past this point.

The delegation communicated the news of the unproductive interview at another large open-air meeting, on Bakery Hill, on 29 November. The later discussion concerned the future direction of the Reform League as the advocates of direct action, with strategies such as the burning of licences as a first step, coming to the fore. A further meeting was scheduled for the afternoon of 3 December, to elect a new central committee. This meeting never took place.

The arming of the Government Camp

Emotions were inflamed at the 29 November meeting. Not only had Hotham refused the diggers’ demand to release the prisoners charged with riot, but askirmish had broken out the night before between diggers and troops as soldiers of the12th Regiment were on their way to reinforce the Government Camp. The regimental drummer boy was wounded in the affray.

All of this provided grist for another despatch to Melbourne by Resident Commissioner Rede, who had been growing increasingly uneasy in his position. His fears could only have been made worse by the sort of information he was receiving – even before the Monster meeting of 29 November – about what was happening on the goldfields. His response to the agitation was first of all to muster troops and make plans for the defence of the Camp. By 30 November, Rede had available a force of over four hundred men under the command of Captain John Thomas.

Alongside these plans was an insistence by the Camp that licence hunts should be prosecuted, to signal the government’s resolve. In this spirit, a hunt was conducted in the Gravel Pits on the morning of 30 November. Bolstered by the declaration of resistance the day before, the miners turned out in numbers, and the ensuing riot saw injuries and several arrests. In the fullness of time those arrested –Benjamin Ewins, George Goddard, Duncan McIntyre, William Bryan, Donald Campbell and John Chapman – were tried, and acquitted. They were charged under the Riot Act, and the prosecution was concerned to show that the Act had been read (signalling that a riot formally existed) before arrests were made.

The Southern Cross

The clash between the government forces and the diggers on the morning of 30 November pushed both sides to point of no return. After the riot, a second meeting was called on Bakery Hill, and the Southern Cross flag was raised. After some discussion, calls were made for volunteers, and Peter Lalor administered an oath to

‘stand truly by each other and fight to defend [your] rights and liberties’.

The meeting adjourned to the Eureka diggings, where the flag was set up again, and on the afternoon of the following day, 1 December, a stockade was constructed. These events are described in an open letter Lalor sent the following year, on 10 April 1855, to the Argus newspaper. Lalor is concerned to establish the point that the final step to rebellion was taken only after the government forces had demonstrated their own lawlessness by firing on diggers in the Gravel Pits before the Riot Act had been read. It was this demonstration, Lalor concludes, that led the diggers to adopt measures for their own defence.

Whether or not these formalities were being observed in the Gravel Pits on the day, the documents show that by this time both sides had articulated the terms of their respective causes and were prepared to defend these against their opponent. Rede’s final few despatches to the Governor, before the battle at Eureka, are increasingly strident in their determination to crush the incipient revolt, matching perfectly the diggers’ own determination to resist whatever force was thrown at them.