Chapter 1. Farewell to England

Chapter 1. Farewell to England.

These affecting words were reprinted in the Brighton Gazette on Thursday July 29, 1852, at a time when the town was full of talk about the large number of Brightonians then about to emigrate to Australia. During the whole of the nineteenth century millions of men and women were prepared to leave their homes in Europe to seek better lives in other parts of the world. As far back as the seventeenth century, ships had crossed the Atlantic taking men, and often their families, from Britain to the Canadian and American colonies. They went as settlers to the relatively empty lands where they could establish themselves as independent farmers or businessmen, still maintaining the practices and habits of their old life but also enjoying a certain freedom to experiment in new ways of doing things. Some crossed the ocean more than once, but very few returned to settle in the homes they had left in the mother country.

Even after the Declaration of Independence in 1776, America, with its reputation for freedom and equality of opportunity, continued until modern times to be the most popular destination for European migrants. However, one result of Independence was that America would no longer be available for the reception of criminals who were sentenced by English courts to transportation. Happily, from the point of view of the penal authorities (if not the convicts) new possibilities opened up after the arrival on January 26, 1788 of the “First Fleet” in Australia, with its eleven ships bringing the first contingent of 717 transportees. Over the following 80 years there were to be some 160,000 of these involuntary emigrants to England’s Australian colonies.

A list of Sentences of Transportation compiled by the Friends of the East Sussex Record Office includes the names of nearly 250 men, and nearly 40 women from Brighton sent to Australia before transportation to New South Wales and Van Dieman’s land came to an end. (Convicts continued to go to Western Australia until 1868.) The most usual sentence was for seven years, but for some it was ten or twelve years and for a few for life. The Brighton transportees included a boy of eight in 1847 and another of eleven in 1852. Both of these were sentenced to seven years, like the majority of adult male and female convicts, though 19 of the men and three of the women received life sentences. Transportation for life meant just that. For many years (though not in fact after 1835) it was a capital offence to attempt to return to England. An important element in the plot of Great Expectations, published in 1861, was the return of Magwitch, and the danger he faced of discovery ― not to mention the danger to Pip and his friends who harboured him. Aiding and abetting was a crime, however philanthropic the intention.

Dickens was interested in emigration and it was a topic introduced into several of his (and other contemporary writers’) novels. Magwitch of course had made good during his years of banishment, and become a rich man. He had “done wonderful well” as “sheep-farmer, stock-breeder and other trades besides …. spec’lated and got rich.” The Artful Dodger who befriended Oliver Twist also made good as a drover, but the ultimate Successful Emigrant must surely have been the impecunious Mr Micawber who, with a little help from his friends, took his family to Australia to join Mr Peggoty and Emily, already prospering there. Relieved at last from his debts, he ended up ― perhaps rather improbably ― as a “much esteemed colonial magistrate.”

We do not know how the Brighton or other Sussex transportees had fared in Australia, but by 1850, when our emigrants from the Harpley arrived, a large number of convicts would have served their time and earned their freedom. Many would have settled, more or less respectably, in and around Melbourne, and there may well have been some interesting encounters between them and the new arrivals. Thomas Barnes, transported in 1819 for burglary, may or may not have had any Brighton connections, but in 1838 he had written from New South Wales to his mother, “Widow” (Margaret) Loftey, then living at Boreham Street, Wartling, East Sussex:-
1 August 1838

My dear Mother, ― I have long weighted with a painful hart expecting To heir from you. I at last received a letter from my unkell Tos Baker. I was happy to heir you was alive and I hope that this Letter will Find you and all my dear brothers and Sisters all well as it Leaves all of us at present. Thank God for it. My Unkell Stated in his letter that you thought I was Engarey with you for not wrighten be fore no no do not Think So. God forbide I should be Engarey with my own flesh and blood I did think I was Cast of ― My unkell has revived me once more My hart is fild with Joy ― It is a great comfort to hir from any of you

Since the 1820s Brighton newspapers had carried occasional advertisements for shepherds, horsemen, and stock breeders to take up jobs in New South Wales (which then included Victoria) and Western Australia. There is interesting evidence of one settler couple from these early years whose son was in Brighton in 1852. On April 19 of that year a public meeting was held in the Town Hall to discuss arrangements for chartering a ship to take the second “Brighton band” of prospective gold-seekers to Melbourne. One of the speakers was (?Henry) Franklyn who said, “When he was there in 1844, labour was in such demand that the workmen were better off than their masters, and the shepherds than the sheep-owners,” and that “if the work was not to their minds they could be sure of getting it elsewhere.” Franklyn also said that he had been born in Australia and that he intended shortly to return there. He in fact sailed on the Hebrides a few weeks later with several other Brightonians.

The majority of all emigrants to the colonies ― about four fifths of them ― made their own arrangements for travel and paid their own fares, from savings or probably loans from their families and friends. The cost of fares to Australia, which had to cover at least three months at sea, was several times that of crossing the Atlantic. Employers who advertised for workers perhaps paid or helped with fares, and at times of particular shortages of labour in the colony, the government offered assisted passages to certain categories of emigrants - shepherds or drovers or house servants. The scheme started in 1838, was suspended in 1841 and then resumed in 1847.

These were years of economic hardship at home, above all in rural areas where agricultural labourers were thrown out of work. Some migrated internally to the towns which offered greater opportunities, but those left behind in the countryside were forced to seek help under the Poor Law. Ratepayers were among the most vociferous in claiming that emigration to the colonies was the ideal solution to the problem of “superfluous population.” Even so, poor families seeking (or being actively encouraged) to emigrate could not have gone without financial and practical help. Many charitable and philanthropic societies were consequently set up to help prospective emigrants. The Brighton Emigration Society started its work in the 1820s and was still active at the end of the century. In 1849 Mrs Caroline Chisholm (known as “the emigrant’s friend”) addressed a letter to the Right Honourable Lord Ashley M.P. in favour of the “Colonisation Loan Society, By the Grant of Loans for two Years or more without Interest; or, A System of Emigration to the Colonies of New South Wales, Port Phillip, and South Australia.” Mrs Chisholm stressed the need for a Society “that will tend to discourage idleness and diminish pauperism,” which would help the poor man “to obtain a passage to that Colony, not as a pauper, not as a criminal, but in the worthy position of a borrower.” This was manifestly mid-Victorian Self Help in vigorous operation.

Economic hardship at home was reason enough for many to take the enormous decision to leave, almost certainly for ever, the land of their birth, but this was not always the most important factor. There were undoubtedly a few “black sheep” trying to put their past behind them. (Even the Brighton physician, Dr Christopher Rawson Penfold, who with his wife Mary, settled in Adelaide in 1844, very probably left England because of financial trouble. Mary’s special interest was wine-making, and the development of her business was the foundation for the firm which today is one of Australia’s major wine producers.) Some emigrants wanted to escape from business failure (this was the case for at least one Brighton man) or an unhappy marriage or other personal tragedy; some were advised to go for the sake of their health. Many undoubtedly went in a spirit of adventure, and generally coupled with this was the belief that a new land offered new opportunities and the chance somehow to make a better life.

Chapter 2. Leaving Brighton: Making Plans.
There was one further important reason for people to emigrate if their political or religious situation was in some way marginal to main society. Not just from Britain, where there was by this time a slowly growing, if reluctant, tolerance of religious differences, but from mainland Europe too, thousands emigrated because of restrictions or persecution in their homeland. Their chosen destination was generally America ― “the land of the free”― but Australia increasingly offered the freedom they craved.

This was essentially the reason for the departure from Brighton in 1849 of “the Juniper and Wood party,” who were all members of, or associated with, the Ebenezer Chapel on Richmond Hill. As Particular (or Strict) Baptists they enjoyed freedom of worship and were not persecuted as were many dissenting Protestants on the Continent, but they deeply resented the imposition of compulsory church rates. This legal requirement was enforced to pay for the upkeep and repair of the parish church and “the providing of things necessary for Divine Service therein.” There had long been a strong radical and dissenting tradition in Brighton and church rates (not abolished until 1868) were a continual source of vexation to Nonconformists and Jews. Defaulters could be, and were, prosecuted for non-payment and “suffered distraint” on their goods. Nine Brighton men were summoned for non-payment early in September 1849, among them W. Samuel Tankard, Charles Robert Thatcher and the attorney Richard Mighell. They had engaged a London solicitor, Mr Boykett, to defend them. The case was adjourned until later in the month and then dismissed (probably on a technicality) but by this time Mighell had already joined the Juniper and Wood party on board the Harpley and was on his way to Australia. Tankard and Thatcher were to follow three years later with the Brightonians bound for the gold diggings.

It was the Ebenezer congregation which organized and enabled the Juniper and Wood party to emigrate. John Chandler’s Forty Years in the Wilderness begins with his childhood in Brighton, his father’s various jobs and the different houses they lived in according to how well (or badly) off the family was at the time. Their attachment to Ebenezer, the “joy and enthusiasm” of the service and the fellowship of their friends in the congregation helped to make up for the hard times suffered by the not-quite-poor in a generally thriving town but where prices were high and there was much seasonal unemployment. In 1848 many people talked of emigrating and some went off to America. Then, John Chandler tells us, “Some of the members of the Ebenezer Church met together, and after much talk and many prayers, they resolved to emigrate. They were therefore formed into a church by Mr Sedgwick (who had baptised John’s father), with Mr John Turner as minister; Mr

Juniper and Mr Wood, deacons; members, male, Tyler, Chandler, Foreman and Vincent; female, Juniper, Wood, Turner and Foreman.” Juniper and Wood were both ironmongers in the town and both had families, each of four children. There were two childless couples (the Vincents and the Dadswells), the two Newnham brothers (cousins of the Chandlers) a young man (he was 19) called Thomas Harvey, and the attorney Richard Mighell (the only professional man in the party was styled “gentleman” in the ship’s list). James Tyler was a bookseller who had once employed John Chandler’s father, Stephen, and Stephen Vincent had been in the Brighton police. Stephen Charlwood, though not a member of the Ebenezer congregation, came from a Baptist family near Brighton and joined them on the Harpley.

John Chandler tells us that the Ebenezer party “proposed taking up a large tract of country and equally dividing it into farms, and to keep themselves a separate community.” This was not to be confined to Baptists holding their own Calvinist beliefs, but would be open to “those who approved of our doctrines.” Turner, who was to act as secretary, applied (presumably through HM Colonial Land and Emigration Commission) for a grant of land from the Sydney government. They were offered an area of land for settlement near Lake Colac, not far from Melbourne.

The serious business of preparation for departure then began. There appears to be no reference to any application for financial help to any of the organisations, and state aid of any kind would in any case conflict with their nonconformist principles of independence and would have been strenuously resisted. It is possible that the congregation itself helped families in particularly difficult circumstances ― as the Chandlers had been and probably were then. Several of the men had to sell or leave their business and the Chandlers, like others in the party, sold off their furniture and “bought many things, such as tools and many kinds of seeds, guns, ammunition etc.” Fares were paid and passages booked for the whole party on board the emigrant ship Harpley.The ship left London on September 6, 1849 bound for Adelaide and Port Phillip where she arrived on January 6, 1850 with Juniper and Wood and their friends.

There was a touching optimism among the Ebenezer emigrants, supported by the strength of their faith, that men who had never worked on the land would be able to tame the wilderness that awaited them. In fact just two of the party were well suited to the task ― the brothers Frederick and William Newnham. They had “come from the country, and rather astonished us townies with their rough hats and smock frocks.” But the Juniper and Wood party said their farewells to family and friends and prepared to leave England for ever, strengthened by the thoughts and prayers of the Ebenezer faithful.

How much they really knew about conditions in the bush outside Melbourne we do not know. Some may have received, or at any rate read, letters home from earlier emigrants. One Brighton man, Mr Matthew Cooke, who worked at the post office received a letter in August 1850 from his brother John who had emigrated several years before, not to Melbourne but to Western Australia. Conditions there were clearly difficult and there was a certain resentment among settlers that the eastern colonies were doing much better than they were. Another letter published in Brighton at about the same time – from Henry Smith to his parents – suggests that life in New South Wales was no easier. Three months after the arrival in Melbourne of the Juniper and Wood party in January 1850, a young man with Brighton connections wrote to his parents from Sydney where he had arrived nearly two years before. He was clearly in touch with earlier emigrants from Brighton, none of them doing very well. Thomas Lambert and his family would be cheered however to learn in the not-too-far-distant future that among the passengers listed as aboard the Statesman bringing the second large party of Brightonians to Australia in 1852 were John Lambert, engineer, with his wife, and W. Lambert, carpenter, who were quite possibly relatives.

Letters received by Mr Matthew Cooke, of the post – office, from his brother [John I. Cooke] who some years ago emigrated from Brighton to Australia.

See letter to Mr Cuttress on page 26.

Under her three topsails and jib, with a stiff breeze from the North East, and a strong ebb tide, the smart ship Harpley appeared off Plymouth, on Monday morning, the 17^th instant, and notwithstanding the opposition of both elements, she, cutter like, gracefully entered the Sound, and with conscious pride took up her anchorage at the appointed station. Comparatively a few years since no one would have imagined that the far distant colonists of Van Dieman’s Land would have sent to the mother country, a fine specimen of naval architecture, so well qualified to mingle in one of her noblest ports, with the merchant shipping of the parent state. The Harpley was launched at Launceston on the 2^nd of February, 1847, and with the exception of her chain cables, was there supplied with all her materials, stores, rigging, pumps, etc. She is now, through the instrumentality of Messrs. Ford and Co. destined to convey a cargo of British merchandise, and a living freight back to Port Phillip. She is full ship-rigged, and registers 570 tons, is fitted in the ‘tween decks right fore and aft, with well ventilated cabins for four and sixes, for which accommodation each person pays £18. Her ample poop aft possesses an elegant saloon, into which

the superior cabins open. Near the rudder there is a very convenient entrance to the saloon from the poop deck, by which this part of the ship is most conveniently separated from the main deck. The Harpley has all the usual fitments for emigration, including one of Thompson’s life boats, the lockers of which are fitted with cork. Mr Thomas Buckland, a first-class master of considerable colonial experience, commands her, and he has an able crew of 10 officers and 24 seamen. Nearly 200 souls are committed to their charge. Among the passengers is a Baptist congregation of about 60 persons, who accompanied by their ordained minister, Mr Turner, have left Brighton in a body, intending to settle in one locality. An experienced surgeon, Mr Smith, takes medical charge, and a medical assistant, Mr Hays, goes out in this vessel. Few emigrants have left the Sound under more favourable auspices than those on board the Harpley. Her agents in Plymouth are Messrs Luscombe, Driscoll, and Co. and it is understood that at Melbourne she will load for England, thus assisting to maintain that happy connection between Great Britain and her colonies which it is to be hoped will continue for centuries to come. The Harpley left for her destination this (Wednesday) afternoon, with a spanking wind from the north-east.

Quoted by Rolicker Chandler in The Migrant Ship Harpley 1847-1862.

The Harpley left at last and was towed down to Gravesend, only to put back because of contrary winds. When she did set off, the weather worsened, but an even greater calamity then struck. Two men on board died of cholera. One of the great dangers for any ship at sea was the outbreak of infectious or contagious disease, and many deaths were caused by cases of typhoid, typhus or diphtheria as well as cholera. Government regulations in 1848 specified that emigrants must be certified free of infectious diseases before embarkation. There was in fact a cholera epidemic in England at the time the emigrants left (in 1849 60,000 died) and later in September 1849 all chapels and meeting houses as well as the churches took part in a Day of Humiliation and Prayer “to avert the cholera.”(At Ebenezer the Rev. Joseph Sedgwick preached a sermon on a text from the second Book of Samuel: “And David said unto God, I am in a great strait…”) The bodies of the dead men were put ashore at Deal with their families and luggage, and the Harpley again went on its way. In the English Channel they encountered very rough seas and took three days to get round Beachy Head and several more to reach Plymouth. Here some new passengers joined the ship and, John Chandler says, one or two of those already on board “lost their passage rather than go any further.” After three days in Plymouth the Harpley left on September 23 and the pilot returned to land with the last letters passengers could send back from the ship. The Brighton Gazette reported on one letter received which described the weather conditions, the sea-sickness and “the multitude of rats with which the ship was infested, and which it was impossible to keep under.”

In spite of a series of government regulations which produced improvements over time, it was difficult to maintain hygienic conditions at sea. Wooden ships often became water-logged and worms invaded the rotten wood. There was a set dietary to be provided for passengers and this was increased in 1849 from a weekly 7lbs of bread, flour, biscuits or rice (or the equivalent in potatoes ― all supplied uncooked) to include also oatmeal, tea, sugar and molasses (given out twice a week). Passengers still had to buy (and cook) their own food, and the smell of their stores in the cabins must have encouraged the rats.

The 1849 dietary ought to have been operating when the Harpley sailed, but John Chandler remembered that “Our ship was very badly provisioned. First, potatoes were all done and then other things ran short. The biscuits were very bad, and nothing but downright starvation made us eat them. Our water ran short, and they had to boil our plum duff in salt water, which spoilt it.” The ship carried a good deal of livestock ― sheep and pigs, chickens, ducks and geese ― which no doubt added to noise as well as smell. All these were running short when the voyage was only half way, but rations could be added to by catching the occasional fish, shark or albatross. A few pigs and sheep were kept to fatten up for Christmas.

Once the passengers had got over their sea-sickness they were able to settle into some kind of routine on board. There was no shortage of advice for intending emigrants and the Brightonians may just have seen a copy of Sidney’s Emigrant’s Journal, which was published in 1849. Much emphasis was placed on physical exercise and “self improvement”: reading, handicrafts, knitting and keeping diaries. Children might be organised into classes for daily lessons. The Ebenezer emigrants had plenty to occupy them, for they kept together as a community. As members of a Particular Baptist congregation they met regularly for worship and John Turner preached twice on Sundays. The Wesleyans and Church of England also held services but the Baptists were especially marked for good singing. Under the direction of Edward Wood, they were invited several times by the captain to give choral concerts on the poop for passengers in the first class cabins. John Turner carried with him a solemn printed Declaration of the Faith and Practice of the Church of Christ which was to guide the building up of the new church in Australia. Dated July 5^th 1849, its Article Xll stated “We believe that singing of psalms, hymns and spiritual songs, is an ordinance of the gospel, to be performed by believers; but as to time, place and manner, every one ought to be left to his liberty in using it.” The Declaration has nothing to say about dancing, and we do not know whether the Baptists took part with the other “intermediates” in the dances held by them on two nights a week, with music provided by the two fiddlers on board. Passengers were urged to take exercise and drill, and skipping would not demand much of the limited space available.

The tensions of living so long in crowded conditions were bound sometimes to lead to quarrels and fisticuffs. One of the Baptist party, Thomas Harvey, proved himself on one occasion as a hero and John Chandler clearly enjoyed recalling the incident in Forty Years in the Wilderness.

The Ebenezer congregation might have passed a tolerably happy voyage if it had not been for the illness of John Juniper. His letter and that of his friend and fellow passenger, Edward Wood, tell of his treatment for severe inflammation of the bowels which brought him close to death. He finally recovered, as Edward Wood recorded, “by the blessing of God,” for although he was attended by the ship’s surgeon, Dr James D. Smith, the medical man seems not to have been a great help, except in the matter of bleeding and mustard plasters. Ships’ surgeons at this time did not enjoy very good reputations. They might be young and inexperienced, or older men whose standards had gone down with the years. Having personal control of supplies of drugs and liquid “comforts” for the treatment of patients, many became addicts or alcoholics. According to John Chandler, the doctor on the Harpley used to drink all day, “and drank all the medical comforts himself.” At any rate, John Juniper survived, though sadly one of the (?three) deaths on board was that of the baby delivered to Naomi Dadswell at the end of November. Generally there would be a funeral service before the body was committed to the sea.

One ceremony everyone looked forward to was “crossing the line.” The Harpley crossed the equator at 4pm on October 25. Water on board was very short, so there was no ducking or shaving of “first timers.” Neptune however decreed an allowance of grog to all passengers “to return thanks”, the usual tar barrel was set on fire and thrown overboard and the evening finished with music and a dance on the poop. The weather by now was hot and some of the passengers and crew swam round the ship. One non-swimmer put on a lifebelt and joined them. As the ship drifted the distance between them increased and once more it was Tom Harvey who came to the rescue. He jumped overboard, swam to the man and pushed him to the side of the ship.

After more than two months at sea the ship was rounding the Cape when it ran into a severe storm which soon became a hurricane. John Chandler remembered that all night he lay on a table “with a strap around me, fastened to one of the uprights to keep me from rolling off.” The passengers had good reason to be alarmed. One of the crew, Jim the sail-maker, was lost overboard when he was blown off the yardarm during the night. The mountainous seas swept over the sides and flooded into the cabins, drenching beds and clothing. Men had to be lashed to the pumps and the wheel to keep the ship going. At last the winds and the sea died down for the last part of the voyage.

The Harpley was to call en route in South Australia, and the handful of passengers leaving the ship were transferred to a small boat for the remaining fourteen miles into port. Some of the Juniper and Wood party, longing to set foot on land after more than three months on board, decided to make the trip into Adelaide and their letters describe their first impressions of aspects of the voyage and of Southern Australia.
Brighton Gazette 25^th April 1850
Early last September Messrs Juniper and Wood and their families, together with a large party of emigrants from this town, sailed from the Downs in the emigrant ship, Harpley, for Australia, where they arrived safe and well

on the evening of Christmas Day, as we learn from letters received in Brighton on Tuesday evening by their friends. We have been favoured with extracts from these letters, which will be read with interest. The following was received by Mr Juniper, of the Western Road, from his brother. The Australian post mark is dated 2^nd January 1850.

Subjoined is an extract from a letter received by Mrs Gillam, of Russell Street, from her son-in-law Mr Wood, the partner of Mr Juniper:-

John Chandler retained vivid memories of his introduction to Melbourne. He was left alone, with a hot wind blowing, to mind the luggage while Mr Foreman went in search of a house in the town. It was four hours before he returned with a horse and dray, to the great relief of the lonely and anxious boy. Stephen Chandler had found a house for his family in Little Lonsdale Street the day before. It had two rooms but only one door.

First impressions of Melbourne were “anything but delightful.” John recalled that there were no roads made, and stumps and logs of trees lay about in the dusty streets. The shops were mostly one-storied, with canvas verandahs. The footpaths were all gravel and there were no kerbs.

There were already Baptists in Melbourne, and they met for worship at the house of the first Baptist minister in the town, John Joseph Mouritz. The Ebenezer congregation joined them on their first Sunday in Australia, and Mr Turner preached. The following week they went to hear him preach at the Collins Street Baptist Chapel, but after that they took a room for themselves at the Mechanics’ Institute for worship. The land at Colac was still waiting for the Ebenezer Baptists to take up their settlement but disappointment was in store for them. Mr Turner showed no inclination to lead them to their own promised land, and instead bought a house in the town where he lived for 46 years, ministering to the earlier settlers and introducing a new doctrine - “that the Holy Spirit should not be addressed in prayer” – which was opposed by most of his Brighton flock. The familiar Ebenezer ways were re-established among them and new members were attracted, and baptised in the Yarra River.

We have received the following letter from Mr Juniper (of the firm Juniper and Wood, ironmongers, North-St), who lately emigrated from Brighton with a large party of their fellow townsmen. It will be read with interest by Mr Juniper’s many friends.

A letter has been received by Mr Cuttress, miller, 3 Clifton Terrace from Mr Wood, of the firm Juniper and Wood who left this town towards the close of 1849 for Australia.

Back in England, Brighton continued to expand and enjoy its reputation as the premier seaside resort on the south coast, and was by now the well-established “Queen of Watering Places.” By the end of 1850 however the focus shifted to London where the Prince Consort had begun to chair meetings of the committee formed to plan for a great exhibition to be held the following year. In May 1851 people all over Britain shared in the excitement as Queen Victoria, accompanied by her husband Prince Albert opened the “Crystal Palace” in Hyde Park. It took 18 acres to house this first truly international exhibition. Special excursions brought thousands from every part of the country to wonder at the marvellous collections of objects, many of them made in Britain but also displaying ingenious inventions and manufactures from other parts of the world. Early in June the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway Company was offering its workmen free excursions, each man given two tickets to see the exhibition. One Monday morning a special train left Brighton station “at a quarter before seven o’clock….with the engine gaily decorated with flags and evergreens, and the railway band playing appropriate airs.” On that day two trains were needed to carry 1155 persons to London. In July the Gazette, under the heading “The Poor and the Great Exhibition,” reported on a trip being arranged for the “bathers of the town” (women who were employed to “dip” visitors in the sea) and another for over 300 children from Charity Schools in Brighton.

Meanwhile, at the other side of the world, there was excitement for quite a different reason. There had often been rumours that shepherds in the Blue Mountains close to Sydney had found small pieces of gold washed down in the streams. Little was made of this talk, and the attention of the world was focused on the discovery of gold in California. Between 1848 and 1850 the population of San Francisco increased from 1500 to 15,000. In 1850 two hundred ships left Sydney for California. One man spent little time there digging for gold, but was intent on seeing exactly where and how the discoveries were made. From his observations he believed that similar terrain in Australia might be gold country. In January 1851 Edward Hargreaves arrived back in Sydney and made for the Blue Mountains. He soon struck gold. By April operations had begun at Ophir and in May on the Turon river, earning him a reward from Governor Fitzroy of £10,000. (The sad death of “poor Henry Roberts” took place on the Turon. See page 40.)

As these discoveries were being made in the Blue Mountains, not far from Sydney, preparations were under way in Melbourne for the formal separation of the Port Phillip area from the rest of New South Wales. The year had begun badly, with a great and terrible bush fire in February, known ever after as Black Thursday. It was experienced by John Chandler when he took his horses to water at the river and was engulfed by dust, smoke and ashes. A few months later these events were almost forgotten as Charles Joseph La Trobe, appointed in 1838 as Superintendent of the Port Phillip province (he took up his duties in 1839) prepared to assume his new title of Lieutenant-Governor of the sixth independent colony in Australia, named Victoria for the queen. With a new constitution he could now exercise his powers without reference to the Government in Sydney. There was general rejoicing in Melbourne, with a grand procession, flags, illuminations and bonfires. Elections followed for the new parliament. The discovery of gold in New South Wales suggested that it might be worth prospecting in Victoria. A meeting was held at the Mechanics’ Institute in Melbourne on June 9,1851 and a reward of 200 guineas was offered for the discovery of gold in profitable quantities within 200 miles. In July gold was found at Clunes, in August at Buninyong, in September at Ballarat, in October at Castlemaine (Mount Alexandra) and Forest Creek and in December at Bendigo. Shipping across the Pacific now reversed direction and the “army of ants” all over the colony heralded the beginning of the great Australian gold rush.

When news of the first discoveries at Buninyong and Ballarat reached the Chandlers, John and his father were loading stores at a quarry. One of the other men said “No more stone, Chandler, we are off to the diggings tomorrow.” The two Chandlers formed a party with their Baptist friends – Messrs. Juniper, Wood, Tyler, Allen, Vincent, Dadswell and Fairhall. In his memoirs, John Chandler remembered that “they all got tents, stores, tools, cradles, ropes, tin dishes, buckets and everything they thought was necessary” and off they went. The going was very difficult and on their first night they held a meeting round the camp fire, and “hymns were sung and prayer was offered up.” They were among the first parties on the road, but already there were “all sorts” going – “doctors, lawyers, tradesmen, farmers, sailors and policemen,” some with possessions carried in carts, or by horses or bullocks, and others pushing wheelbarrows. They all had a bad time going through Bacchus Marsh, then up and over hills, only to find another marshy area, Blow’s Flat, ahead of them. The drays were bogged down more than once and had to be lifted up with levers while logs were put down, and then pulled out with ropes. After travelling over 80 miles, they arrived at Golden Point, and made their camp. In John’s words, “There were about 200 tents there, but no stores; most people had brought their own. The next day was the Sabbath, and as it was raining we fixed up a tarpaulin, tied to four saplings, and under this was preached the first sermon that was preached on Ballarat. A

true, simple Gospel sermon by Mr D.Allen, and the forest rang with the praise of the Lord. We had some good singers, and many came round attracted by the singing…”

It is sad to record that the following day Stephen Chandler was ill with dysentery and quickly became worse. Stephen Vincent also became ill, and young John, though “much disappointed for I wanted some gold,” accompanied the two men on their return journey back to Melbourne. Here he found his mother unwell too. For a time John stayed in Melbourne, where the work was still hard, buy generally wages were good as so many of the men were away at the diggings. Many stayed at the diggings in the hope of making their fortunes. The Brighton Gazette published a letter as early as January 22, 1852, received by Mr J.O.N. Rutter, Superintendent of Black Rock Gas Works, and written from Sydney on August 23 of the previous year. His correspondent (who may or may not have originated in Brighton) wrote “You will ere now have heard of our wonderful discovery. This is the land of Gold! Here I have been residing more than thirty years in the very midst of aurifluous treasures; and never knew, or suspected the fact, until about three months ago.” He continued his letter on September 10 from Rocky Point, George’s River, near Sydney, relating the tale of “a person of the name of Hargreaves” who had rightly guessed that “the Bathurst district (of New South Wales) possessed gold as abundantly as California.” By the middle of 1851 however the new colony of Victoria was already showing promise of an even greater abundance of those “aurifluous treasures.”

At last, in June there was one letter in the Gazette from a member of the Juniper and Wood party – Louisa Vincent. This adds more immediate impressions to John Chandler’s account, written many years later. Its tone is positive and optimistic, and shows how the Ebenezer Baptists stuck together and sensibly shared their time between the diggings and other necessary work (cutting the hay and the corn) and temporary jobs (particularly carting) which enabled them to make a reasonable living, with just a chance of finding a golden fortune.

Already, in April, the Gazette had published extracts from two letters “just received in Brighton” from “Elizabeth” to her brother and father. Accompanied by “George”- presumably her husband – she had travelled out to Australia independently some time in 1851. From her account it seems that they were first class passengers on the ship and the mention of titled friends suggests that they were socially superior to, and certainly had no connection with, the Ebenezer Baptists of the Juniper and Wood party or the “mechanics and tradesmen’s sons” who were to follow them in 1852. George’s intention was to “take a (sheep?) station” – an occupation considered suitable for a gentleman. Anthony Trollope, whose son Frederic was to do just this a dozen or so years later, referred to their status as akin to “colonial aristocracy, what the lords and the county gentlemen are at home.” Unfortunately the acquisition of vast acres of grazing land was an expensive business even at a time of economic depression and George had not got enough money “so his friends persuaded him to go to the diggings.” George was lucky in that this was the year that gold had been discovered in Victoria and the early arrivals at the diggings had the advantage of the best pickings on or near the surface. We do not know what happened to George or Elizabeth, though by November 25 (the date of the second letter,) she was at least temporarily established in Brighton, one of Melbourne’s new suburbs facing Port Phillip Bay, and had already acquired from colonial “old hands” a shaky understanding of aboriginal beliefs and practices. Unfortunately there is no clue to the identity of Elizabeth.

One other letter published in the Gazette in 1852 came from a Brighton man that we do know about. It was sent by William James Palgrave to his sister, Mrs Kitchner, of East Street. He had arrived independently in Australia in 1849 – that is, before the Juniper and Wood party. He does not seem to have had any connection with the Brighton Baptists, and John Chandler never mentions him in Forty Years. Palgrave brought with him his wife’s nephew, Alfred Nye, then aged two. When gold was discovered he was among the first at the diggings. Unfortunately his earlier letter to his sister was not published, but that of August 1852 records that he had already experienced both success and failure as a gold seeker. (His first wife died in Australia in 1859 and he returned to England with his three girls, leaving behind Alfred, then about thirteen years old. His name appears, with a new family, in the 1881 census, when he was a boarding-house keeper in Brighton.)

Brighton Gazette 15^th April 1852

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