18th Century Australia Essay

Late 18th century Australia started to change into what it is now our modern day society. During this period many regretful things happened. Events from stealing the aboriginal land all the way to the stolen generation in early 1900’s. In 1788 a fleet of 11 ships from England, came to Australia. Half were residents and half were criminals from Britain, Africa, America and France. Aboriginals living in the Eora region were first to have their land stolen. This region is now called Botany Bay, a city located off the coast of NSW. After the European settlement a small number of Chinese immigrants came as labourers, convicts and free settlers. However, the 1850 Victoria and 1860 New South Wales gold rushes was when the Chinese people voyaged with

This meant big bucks for the discoverer of gold in NSW, Australia, Edward Hargraves. Victorian authorities were jealous and were determined to find gold over there, so they rewarded a prize to whoever could found gold within 200 miles of Melbourne, Victoria. 6 months’ later gold was found, in Ballarat and then Bendigo. In 2 years the state population had increased by 460,000. 50% of that increase were Chinese immigrants and they came to collect gold. Unfortunately, there weren’t many new sites but luckily, the Chinese targeted sites that had already been searched by the Europeans, because they admired every little speck of gold. They recognised that the Europeans would miss much of the gold hidden in the soil. The unfamiliar tools they used to mine helped them notice the little specks left behind. The cradle, the easiest method although to function properly required three people. Acted as a filter, trapped the bigger chunks in the soil wastage such as large rocks and pieces of debris to then leave them with the gold. The pan, looked like a tin bowl, this method was done more manually, they scooped up sedimentary from a creek with the pan, then the miner would swirl out the muddy water leaving the gold specks at the bottom. The miners were often men because research suggests that only 20% of the Chinese immigrants were females, I believe this is because it was a man’s job to do the dirty