| Sir Charles Hotham (1806-55), a naval officer, replaced La Trobe as Lieutenant-Governor of Victoria in June 1854. Acting on instructions from London to improve the colony’s finances, Hotham embarked almost immediately on drastic cost-cutting and revenue-raising measures. The public service was drastically reduced, and the already unpopular gold mining license system rigidly and ruthlessly enforced. Hotham’s autocratic temperament - a stark contrast with the liberal-minded La Trobe - is generally regarded as a significant factor in precipitating the violence at Ballarat. He resigned as Lieutenant-Governor in November 1855, a month before his death. |
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| ‘On the night of the 6th of October last, James Scobie was found
murdered on the gold field of Ballarat. As he had been last seen coming
from the Eureka Hotel, suspicion fell upon the landlord, James Bentley,
his wife, and John Farrell, all of whom had fo rmerly been convicts in Van
Diemen’s Land, and they were accordingly taken up... The magistrates... pronounced the prisoners not guilty... This decision gave great dissatisfaction to the entire digging community of Ballarat: they denounced the presiding magistrate, Mr Dewes, accused him of being connected by interest with Bentley, and broadly asserted that he had been bought over. Infuriated with rage, a vast assemblage of diggers was soon on the ground; and notwithstanding the exertions of the magistrates, police, and a small party of military, they set fire to the hotel.’ Sir Charles Hotham to Sir George Grey, 18 November 1854, Further papers relative to the recent discovery of gold in Australia: presented to both Houses of Parliament... July 1855. London, H.M.S.O., 1855, pp. 44-5. |
ImageTitle Sir Charles Hotham, Governor of Victoria 1854-55Artist Batchelder's, photographers |
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