ANTI-CHINESE RIOTS

Ill will towards the Chinese often spilled into violence.

Bullying and harrassment of Chinese migrants was common on most goldfields and so were acts of petty violence. In 1854 a group of Chinese arriving at Melbourne wharf were beaten and abused, and over the next three years anti-Chinese violence by small mobs of Europeans broke out in Bendigo, Castlemaine, Ballarat, Diamond Gully, Maryborough, Campbell's Creek/Guildford, Creswick, Smythes Creek, Tarrengower, Peg Leg Gully, Spring Creek and Mount Blackwood.

The worst outbreak in Victoria occurred on the Buckland River in the Ovens Valley area of northeastern Victoria. The Ovens Valley gold rush had attracted several thousand Chinese miners. In July 1857 a violent mob of about ninety Europeans tore through the Chinese camp on the Buckland, burning tents and buildings, including a beautiful and recently built Chinese temple. The mob drove around 2,500 Chinese people from their tents, wrecking belongings, beating Chinese people with sticks and stones and killing and wounding an unknown number. The victims fled terrified through the cold winter rain, camping in a state of shock and confusion along the roadside between Buckland and Beechworth, unsure whether to return to Buckland or seek safety in Beechworth.

At least three Chinese men were found dead after the riot, but it is not known how many drowned in the Buckland River whilst fleeing, nor how many died later from wounds or from exposure to the cold. An inquest was held but few charges were laid.

By the 1860s the Chinese had again ventured out along the Buckland Valley. Chinese miners and market gardeners were a presence there until the early 20th century and rows of Chinese hut sites were still visible up to the 1970s.

DISCRIMINATION

Chinese residents faced institutionalised discrimination and daily racism.

Chinese miners were harassed by elements of the European community. Violence, bullying, bashings, name-calling and cruel practical jokes were common. Claim-jumping, where a group of miners would take over someone else's profitable claim, was considered the worst of poor form in the European community. However claim-jumping of Chinese mines was almost encouraged in some quarters, making Chinese miners vulnerable and exposed to theft.

Institutional discrimination took the form a series of punitive taxes on entering Victoria and then on taking up residence, while restrictive legal requirements impinged on where Chinese could stay.

From 1855 the Chinese were taxed a ten pound fee to arrive in Victoria by ship, and from 1857 additional annual residents' fees of between 4 and 6 pounds were imposed on Chinese on top of the poll tax.

These taxes were heavy, particularly when we consider the 1854 Eureka rebellion took place over the cost of a monthly 1 pound 10 shillings tax which was then considered exorbitant.

As the nineteenth century wore on the public expression of anti-Chinese sentiment was commonplace.

Taxes, social segregation and publicly-sanctioned racism had a direct effect on Chinese entrepreneurs, limiting their capacity to earn a living wage. By the 1870s when gold was becoming harder to find many Chinese immigrants lived in poverty and distress. There were high rates of suicide and mental illness amongst the Chinese population.

Ultimately in 1901 a federated Australia would form on the basis of a White Australia policy, excluding Chinese immigration and in some instances refusing naturalisation to those who had made a life here.

The image above from Melbourne Punch is a classic expression of anti-Chinese stereotyping. It was created around the time of the introduction of a new, additional tax on Chinese walking overland into Victoria. Chinese at this point were already taxed on arrival into Victoria by ship and taxed to reside in Victoria. They were the only nationality required to pay such taxes. Chinese Victorians mounted a sustained campaign against the taxes. The Melbourne Punch illustration portrays a villainous-looking miner in Chinese costume with pick saying 'we want pay the tax', satirically comparing the miner to the famous English peasant revolt leader Wat Tyler.

PATHWAYS TO DEMOCRACY

Chinese communities argued for their rights, putting them at the forefront of innovations in sustained, peaceful protest.

Chinese communities organised campaigns of resistance to the unfair taxes imposed upon them.

They sent petitions to those in authority, resisted the discriminatory taxes, wrote books arguing their cause, fought legal test cases on the constitutional right of the colony to exclude Chinese citizens, and organised civil disobedience campaigns. In 1859 in Bendigo and Castlemaine thousands of Chinese men offered themselves up for arrest for being unlicenced in a mass protest against the unjust laws.

Pictured above is a detail of the front page of a petition to Governor Barkly which was signed at a meeting of over 800 Ballarat residents who opposed the Act to Regulate the Chinese Population in Victoria.

Six months later they sent another, revealing the impact the Act was having on their lives.

According to newspaper reports, the petition was signed by seven Chinese in English and about 1,400 individuals in Chinese characters. Forty-five influential Ballarat Europeans, including Ballarat’s Chinese Protector, William Henry Foster, supported the Chinese petition with a testimonial to their good character.

This petition in Chinese and in English was sent to Governor Sir Henry Barkly in January 1860, with names of signatories given in Chinese and in English.

The Chinese community organised Victoria-wide protests against unfair taxes that targeted Chinese residents. Many petitions against discriminatory treatment were sent to the colonial government.

The petition pointed out that "the special tax upon the Chinese is expected to produce in this year fifty thousand pounds…” and asked that some of this money could be used for Chinese language printing equipment for the government to print laws and regulations in Chinese as well as in English. The petition also requested that “Chinese teachers who are fit persons, should be employed to open Evening Schools near the various Chinese Camps…” to teach English.

Pictured above are Chinese signatures on the petition, and below is the preface written in English from the English section of the petition.

Text by Elizabeth Denny.

In 1879 Lowe Kong Meng, Cheok Hong Cheong and Louis Ah Mouy published a booklet arguing against unjust and discriminatory laws.

The booklet argued that anti-Chinese immigration laws violated the British Government's Peking Treaty which provided British citizens rights to enter China without restriction, and made the case that Chinese migrants had made a valuable and positive contribution to Victoria.

Lowe Kong Meng was a Melbourne-based business man and Chinese community leader who was born in Penang to wealthy parents. He speculated in mining, owning a venture in Majorca, central Victoria, and was an importer of international goods and wares.

Cheok Hong Cheong was a Presbyterian Christian missionary and social reformer born in the See Yup district who worked in Ballarat in the 1850s before moving to Melbourne.

Louis Ah Mouy was a Melbourne-based merchant and Chinese community leader who made his fortune on the goldfields near Yea in the 1850s and speculated in mining and trade ventures.

ASSOCIATIONS

Chinese associations formed a crucial mutual aid network.

The presence of Chinese associations, clubs or lodges were a well known feature of Chinese goldfield communities.

The clubs were sometimes feared by non-Chinese onlookers as mysterious entities, but they formed important self-help and mutual aid functions for Chinese miners.

Chinese associations were founded for the mutual assistance of family, clan, or regional countrymen.

One of the largest and most powerful associations was the See Yup Society, for residents of the See Yup 'Four Counties' area of Guangdong Province, expats from which location were the most populous group of Chinese on the goldfields. Other powerful societies were the Sam Yup, Kong-Chew, Heang-San and Amoy associations.

These mutual self-help organisations also fulfilled semi-diplomatic functions. All Chinese immigrants were expected to join an association. It was association members who would meet arriving Chinese at wharves and show them to lodgings. The associations built places of worship, raised funds for charity and benevolence to members, and arranged funerals for impoverished members. Associations had rules which advised miners on how to minimise friction with white settlers in the manner of dress and social customs.

The societies also performed a political function. In 1859 the See Yup Society formed the 'United Confederacy' to fight the immigration taxes through legal means.

After further restrictions to Chinese immigration and naturalisation were introduced post-Federation in 1901, the societies helped members who were residents of Victoria with immigration issues.

The illustration above depicts the opening of the See Yup Temple in Emerald Hill, South Melbourne, in 1866. The first temple was built in 1856 and was then enlarged and reopened in 1866. The See Yup Temple contains altars for worship and memorial halls, but also served as a meeting place for members.

The temple cost over four thousand pounds to construct and was funded by compulsory donations from Society members. The names of more than a thousand donors are inscribed on two stone tablets at the Temple. The memorial halls hold over 13,000 tablets in commemoration of members who died and are buried somewhere in Victoria between 1850 to the present day.

It still stands today.

Text on See Yup Temple courtesy of Chinese-Australian Historical Images in Australia, Chinese Museum and LaTrobe University.

GETTING ON WITH IT, LIVING TOGETHER

Although there was conflict, intermingling and sharing of cultures also took place on the goldfields.

Petitions and letters to newspaper show that some Europeans, at least, objected to the unfair way Chinese people were treated on the goldfields.

'The Chinese', wrote one journalist in the Argus newspaper in 1862, 'are a valuable addition to our labourers on the gold-fields.'

In regional Victoria the descendents of Donald Chisholm tell an interesting story of how his family came to own two magnificent Japanese Satsuma vases.

Chisholm opened a drapery and tobacco store in 1866 in Ararat where his business prospered off the back of the gold rush.

Ararat was founded in 1857 after Chinese walking overland to the goldfields discovered a promising lead and started a gold rush. Members of Ararat's Chinese community remained living there up to the early 20th century.

Family legend has it that the vases were given to Donald by Chinese miners returning to China as a 'thank you' for the assistance he had given them in hard times, particularly by providing credit in his store when none was available to them elsewhere in town.