The most significant event in the development of Victoria began just days after the new colony was born.

On 5 July 1851 Irishman James Edmond showed gold he had found at Clunes near Ballarat to a journalist at the Geelong Advertiser.
On the same day, English-born Louis Michel reported that he had discovered gold at Anderson’s Creek in the town of Warrandyte.

Goldfields soon sprung up at Mount Alexander (present day Castlemaine), Ballarat and Bendigo. When eight tonnes of Victorian gold arrived in London in 1852, The Times of London declared: ‘…this is California all over again, but, it would appear, California on a larger scale.

The Gold Rush was on.

In the space of just ten years (1851-1861) Victoria’s population exploded from 75,000 to over 500,000 representing almost half of the total Australian population at the time.

Image: Canvas Town, between Princess Bridge and South Melbourne in 1850’s, De Gruchy & Leigh (1850-1860), State Library of Victoria