Peter Lalor (5 February 1827 - 9 February 1889) PARLIAMENTARIAN
Introduction:
Peter Lalor, (born Feb. 5, 1827, Tinakill, Queen’s
County, Ireland—died Feb. 9, 1889, Melbourne,
Australia), Irish-born Australian leader of the 1854 gold miners’ uprising
at the Eureka Stockade in Ballarat, Victoria, the most celebrated rebellion
in Australian history; subsequently he became a politician.
Lalor was the son of a Home Rule supporter and
landowner [Patrick], and he was trained as a civil
engineer in Ireland. In the mass migration that followed the great Irish
famine in the mid-19th century, Lalor and one of his brothers immigrated to
Australia in 1852 (three other brothers went to America).
Lalor found work on the Melbourne-Geelong railway
and then at the Eureka goldfield in 1853.
He joined the Ballarat Reform League, formed by
miners on Nov. 11, 1854, to protest high license fees, police mistreatment,
lack of representation, and shortage of land. When the league’s petition for
reform went unanswered by the government, the miners organized to fight on
November 30 and chose Lalor as their leader. (Source:
Encyclopedia
Britannica)
Did You Know?
The Eureka Stockade
Government troops and police
stormed and ransacked the Stockade
Government troops and police stormed and ransacked the Stockade on
the morning of December 3rd 1854. Image courtesy of the Art Gallery
of Ballarat.
On 30 November another mass burning of licences took place at a
meeting on Bakery Hill. Under the leadership of Peter Lalor, the
diggers then marched to the Eureka diggings (named after the 'Eureka
lead', a deep lead of gold being mined by the diggers) where they
constructed the famous stockade.
The stockade itself was a makeshift wooden barricade enclosing about
an acre of the goldfields. Inside the stockade some 500 diggers took
an oath on the Southern Cross flag, and over the following two days
gathered firearms and forged pikes to defend the stockade.
The Eureka Flag
Early in the morning of Sunday 3 December the authorities launched
an attack on the stockade. Some weeks earlier the government had
ordered the 12th and 40th Regiments to the goldfields to support the
police troopers. The diggers were outnumbered and the battle was
over in twenty minutes. Twenty-two diggers and five troops were
killed. The Southern Cross flag was pulled from the flagpole and
souvenired by the victors. Peter Lalor escaped the scene even though
his arm had been badly injured (later requiring amputation).
On 6 December martial law was declared, and the following day a
Commission into the goldfields was appointed. Thirteen diggers were
committed for trial, but all were acquitted when they came to trial
in February 1855. Peter Lalor avoided capture. The only person
imprisoned as a result of the Eureka Stockade was the Editor of the
Ballarat Times, Henry Seekamp, who was found guilty of seditious
libel.
In March 1855 the Gold Fields Commission handed down its report, and
the government adopted all of its recommendations. The Commission
resulted in all the demands of the diggers being met. A bill was
passed in 1854 to extend the franchise (the vote) to diggers
possessing a miner's right costing one pound, whereas previously a
six months residency and an eight pound yearly mining licence were
required before a digger could register to vote. The hated Gold
Commission was replaced by a system of mining wardens.
In 1855 Peter Lalor later became the first MLC (Member of the
Legislative Council) for the seat of Ballarat. The Ballarat miners
were given eight representatives on the Legislative Council.
The Eureka legacy
The Eureka rebellion is considered by some historians to be
the birthplace of Australian democracy. It is the only Australian
example of armed rebellion leading to reform of unfair laws. The
Southern Cross flag has been used as a symbol of protest by
organisations and individuals at both ends of the political
spectrum.
(Source: Australian Government)
Carlton College and Trinity College,
Dublin. Lalor trained as a civil engineer. (Source:
Parliament of Victoria)
Experiences & Work:
Lalor was one of the first goldfield
representatives, elected to the Victoria Legislative Council in 1855 and
then to the Legislative Assembly (lower house) in 1856–71 and 1875–87. He
served as postmaster general (1875), commissioner of trade and customs
(1875, 1877–80), and speaker of the Assembly from 1880 to 1887.(Source:
Encyclopedia
Britannica)
2004 $1 Coin to commemorate Peter
Lalor and the Eureka Stockade
First Day Stamp Cover celebrating 150 since the
Eureka Stockade showing the 50c and $2.45 stamp
The 50c stamp features a representation of the
Eureka fl ag, which at the time was called the
flag of the Southern Cross.
The flag has become a symbol of democratic
rights and freedoms and is identified as a flag of
the people. The original holds pride of place in
the Ballarat Fine Art Gallery.
The Eureka flag was first fl own to rally
people to Bakery Hill on 29 November 1854,
the “Monster Meeting” of the Ballarat Reform
League. The flag represents the Southern Cross,
with white stars on a dark blue background.
The Ballarat Times reported that “there is no
flag in Europe, or in the civilised world half so
beautiful”.
The flag is constructed of very fine blue
woollen fabric with a high sheen that gives a
silk-like appearance. The cross is made of pieces
of cotton twill and the stars of fine cotton lawn.(Source: Auspost)
The $2.45
stamp uses an image of Peter
Lalor, the man who led the diggers at the
stockade (La Trobe Collection/State Library
of Victoria).
Peter Lalor (1827 – 1889) was born in Ireland
and trained as an engineer before emigrating to
Victoria in 1852. In 1853 he left Melbourne for
the Ovens gold diggings, and in 1854 moved to
Ballarat. He joined the Ballarat Reform League
when political tension on the fields was high,
and later emerged as the leader of the diggers.
At Bakery Hill, Lalor called on the men to
swear loyalty to their new flag. He was seriously
wounded in the attack at the stockade.
He was in hiding in Geelong for a time,
but within a year he returned to Ballarat and
was elected unopposed as a Member of the
Legislative Assembly for North Grenville, a
Ballarat seat.
The stamp design also uses Lalor’s signature
and a sketch by Charles Alphonse Doudiet
(ca.1832 – 1872), a Swiss-born Canadian who
participated in the Eureka rebellion. The sketch,
Swearing allegiance to the Southern Cross 1854,
shows the diggers taking the oath on Bakery
Hill on 30 November 1854. (Source: Auspost)
2. Select "Are these
primary or secondary sources?" and complete the Biography of Peter Lalor.
Eureka
Stockade: Let's Draw from Song, Story and Poetry
Primary,
Middle
&
Secondary
Australian
Curriculum General Capability:
Literacy
Australian
Curriculum General Capability:Critical & Creative Thinking
1.
Go to the eurekaSydney
website and view the listing there of many songs, poems and
stories about the Eureka Stockade.
2. Select one song or poem
or story - with a group of 6 - 10 students who you can work with.
3. Divide up each line of the
poem etc - for example Henry Lawson's Eureka has 75 lines. If
there are 10 students in your group - each person is to look at
7 lines; and, five students are to take on another line.
4. Once you have your lines, you are to draw the scene described
in each line so that in the end, the poem, song or story will be
illustrated visually.
Tax
Revolt or a Fight for Democracy?
Secondary
Australian
Curriculum General Capability:
Literacy
Australian
Curriculum General Capability:Critical & Creative Thinking
The Eureka Stockade in 1854 is celebrated today, 3 December. Yet this
is a tale of a group of gold diggers who defied the legitimate authority of
govern-ment. They broke the law. They refused to pay taxes. They hoisted a
rebel flag over a stockade. They resisted, with arms, a body of the Queen's
troops sent by the lawful government. They were defeated in the assault. In
fact it was all over in a matter of minutes. Three soldiers and more than 30
diggers were killed. The leaders of the rising were tried for treason,
though even in this there was an element of fiasco as each accused was
acquitted.... (p4)
The Facts about Eureka
..."The dispute
which broke out in the goldfields has been blamed by some upon the
dishonesty of the colonial judiciary and by others on the indifference of
the unelected colonial administration.
So far as the judiciary is concerned, it is said that a magistrate named
Dewes wrongly, and to the outrage of the gold diggers, acquitted the owner
of the Eureka Hotel of the charge of murdering a popular miner named Robie.
The community denounced the magistrate Dewes. It accused him of having a
financial interest in the Eureka Hotel which led him dishonestly to protect
his friend the publican. The discontent of the community at the injustice of
the magis-trate's action led, on 19 October 1854, to a large assembly
burning the Eureka Hotel to the ground. Later, Mr Dewes was removed from
office and his conduct criticised as
tending to
subvert public confidence in the integrity and impartiality of the Bench.
...The
hotel proprietor was also charged and convicted of the manslaughter of
Scobie, the digger. In a sense, the law responded to the community's demand
that its procedures should be impartial and just and that guilty men should
be brought to trial and punished.
The unrest which arose out of the Scobie murder on 6 October lasted to the
Stockade itself. The flames of the Eureka Hotel were easily rekindled at the
Stockade. The gold diggers were inflamed by an attempt of the Governor to
enforce a licence fee resented as unjust, unequal and unfairly imposed.
The injustice of the fee was that it fell equally on miners, whether or not
they discovered gold. The inequality of the fee was that it fell heavily on
miners whilst the landed squatters paid little or no tax. It was unfairly
imposed because English liberties had been founded on the constitutional
principle that there should be no taxation without Parliamentary
representation."(p6)
Listen to this audio from ABC's Radio National where Dr Anne
Beggs-Sunter, historian, discusses the Bakery Hill speech.