Roderick O'Hargan

“ There is no other example in the history of mining such a succession of great nuggets. One expert has made a calculation of the world’s famous nuggets, one hundred and fifty in number. Of these one hundred and nineteen were found in Australia, the United States trailing along a poor second with only nine.
The “Welcome Stranger” nugget, found at Dunolly, only a few inches below the surface, was a block of gold twenty-four inches long and ten inches thick and yielded two thousand, two hundred and forty-eight ounces of pure gold, valued at just under forty-nine thousand dollars. ”

“ Mount Alexander, for instance, produced more than ten thousand ounces of gold in the first fifteen days of existence. Any man with a spade and tin dish could be a successful miner. Indeed, few knew anything of mining, shown by the fact that many claims were abandoned and re-abandoned only to yield fortunes to second and third comers. One such abandoned claim, the “Poor Boy” at Eureka, yielded a nugget of pure gold weighing over six hundred ounces. In another instance, a pillar of earth, left as a support in a deserted claim at Bendigo, calved a nugget weighing more than five hundred ounces. ”

“ During this time passenger traffic between Australia and San Francisco was greater than it has ever been since—Australians stampeding to California and Californians rushing to Australia. In five months eleven thousand immigrants passed through the principal Australian ports. In the next four years over four hundred thousand immigrants arrived, almost all drawn there by the lure of gold. ”

“ At Canadian Valley, in the same district, the wash and rubble yielded an average of about thirty-five pounds weight of gold per claim. At Blacksmith’s Hole, on the Canadian River, one party of mates in one day obtained over fifteen hundred dollars per man, the average of the claim being one ounce of gold to every bucket of earth. ”

“ Then when the miners began to take their vacations from the diggings, these Australian cities, formerly quiet sheep towns, experienced their first period of rushing business and wild extravagance.
The lucky diggers became the outstanding figures of local society. Their wagerings at the race track or gaming table put former plungers into the shade. ”

“ The officials saw in it only a possible uprising of the convicts and demoralization of the laboring classes. The Commissioner of Lands at Bathurst, hearing of Hargraves’ activities, sent a special message to the governor advising “that steps be taken to prevent the working classes from deserting their regular employment for the goldfields.” Gold, to the masses, spelled quick fortunes and trade revival.
Australia had been passing through a period of great commercial depression. People were drifting away, especially to California. The gold strike was a lifesaver. ”