Why go
Ballarat's Eureka story is easier to understand in its wider colonial setting: gold brought people from Britain, Europe, North America and China, then exposed tensions over how the diggings were governed. This period also shaped a distinct visual culture in paintings of the Australian bush.
The full story
Gold discoveries near Bathurst in New South Wales and across Victoria set off major rushes from 1851. Migrants arrived from the British Isles, continental Europe, North America and China. Victoria grew rapidly as people moved to the fields, while disputes arose over licences and the colonial administration of mining. At Ballarat in December 1854, troops and police attacked a stockade built by protesting diggers at Eureka. The clash was brief and deadly. A royal commission subsequently recommended changes to goldfields administration, including an end to the licence system and voting rights for holders of a Miner's Right. Later writers and politicians have disagreed over Eureka's wider meaning, so its flag is best read as a contested symbol rather than a simple origin story for Australian democracy. Gold rushes continued later in Queensland and Western Australia, and conflict between Chinese and European miners formed another part of the era. By the 1880s and 1890s, painters associated with the Heidelberg School, including Arthur Streeton, Frederick McCubbin and Tom Roberts, were depicting the colour and light of Australian landscapes.