Eureka - The Unfinished Revolution (60 page)

Shortly thereafter, the good Father returns with Rede’s second-in-command, Sub-Inspector Taylor, complete with ‘his silver-lace cap, blue frock, and jingling sword, so precise in his movement, so Frenchman-like in his manners, such a puss-in-boots’, as Carboni would later describe him. Yet Taylor is remarkably friendly, shaking the Italian’s hand as soon as he has recognised him, saying in a forthright manner, ‘We have been always on good terms with the diggers, and I hope we may keep friends still . . .’

Taylor ushers them into the presence of ‘King Rede’, as Carboni thinks of him.

In the shadow of the moonlight, beneath a massive gum tree in front of the Police Magistrates’ Court just outside the Camp – for the Commissioner does not want the diggers’ delegation to see up close the fortifications that are being readied for the Camp’s defence – Rede momentarily looks like an antipodean Napoleon Bonaparte, with such a bearing does he stand, complete with his right hand buried deep within his military jacket. This imperial effect is exacerbated by the two men immediately behind Rede – Taylor standing silent sentinel off his right shoulder; Police Magistrate Charles Henry Hackett, who is suddenly not so friendly while in the presence of Rede, off his left shoulder. Hackett, at least, gives Carboni some sense of confidence. ‘His amiable countenance is of the cast that commands respect, not fear,’ he would record.

Speaking of whom . . .

The Commissioner begins by explaining that he could not take them to his own residence within the Camp, as his men are preparing for an attack from men looking just like them – diggers – and it would therefore not be safe. And then, after rather officiously asking their names, he advises that everything they say will be reported to his superiors in Melbourne. Black quickly makes clear, while Father Smyth hovers anxiously, that their business is firstly to express digger exasperation over that morning’s license-hunt.

‘To say the least,’ says Black pointedly, ‘it was very imprudent of you, Mr Rede, to challenge the diggers at the point of the bayonet. Englishmen will not put up with your shooting down any of our mates, because he has not got a license.’

‘Daddy Rede’, as Carboni now has him, is affronted. ‘Now Mr Black, how can you say that I ever gave such an order as to shoot down any digger for his not having a license?’

Black does not back down. Does the Commissioner not understand that the diggers were only responding to the insults of the soldiery; that, good men that they are, they simply refused to be bullied in such a fashion over their licenses, and that is how the whole thing has come to this pass?

Which brings Black to the point of their visit: ‘We demand the immediate release of those diggers who had been dragged to the lock-up in the morning hunt, for want of the license.’

‘
Demand?
’
the Commissioner bursts back in a manner that would have made Lieutenant-Governor Hotham proud. ‘First of all, I object to the word, because, myself, I am only responsible to government, and must obey them only: and secondly, were those men taken prisoners because they had not licenses? Not at all. This is the way in which the honest among the diggers are misled. Any bad character gets up a false report: it soon finds its way in certain newspapers, and the Camp officials are held up as the cause of all the mischief. Now, Mr Black, look at the case how it really stands. Those men are charged with rioting; they will be brought before the magistrate, and it is out of my power to interfere with the course of justice.’

It is at this point that Hackett utters his first words, noting in his judicial capacity that the approach of the Commissioner has his full support.

With the chance of a full release thus disappeared, Black tries a new approach. ‘Will you,’ he asks, ‘accept bail for them to any amount you please to mention?’

After a brief consultation, Rede and Hackett agree that would be acceptable. Father Smyth would bring the money on the morrow and bail would be accepted for two of the prisoners – which is at least one concession. This leads Black to his second demand.

‘We demand that you, as Commissioner, make a pledge not to come out any more for license-hunting.’

Again, the Commissioner is nonplussed and not shy about expressing it. ‘What do you think, gentlemen, Sir Charles Hotham would say to me if I were to give such a pledge? Why Sir Charles Hotham would have at once to appoint another Resident Commissioner in my place! I have a
dooty
to perform, I know my duty, I must
nolens volens
(willing or not) adhere to it.’

Yes, Black acknowledges, the Commissioner does have a duty and many responsibilities, but a key part of those responsibilities is to act in a manner that will prevent bloodshed.

Again, Commissioner Rede is more than firm in his reply: ‘It is all nonsense to make me believe that the present agitation is intended solely to abolish the license. Do you really wish to make me believe that the diggers of Ballarat won’t pay any longer £2 for three months? The license is a mere cloak to cover a democratic revolution!’

It is true, Black acknowledges carefully, that the license fee is not all of it.

‘You yourselves very well know,’ says the Commissioner, ‘that if the license fee was abolished tomorrow you would have some other agitation.’

‘Well,’ Black replies, ‘we should agitate immediately for the franchise.’

‘Yes,’ says Rede, ‘and after the franchise what next?’

Funny he should ask. Does the catchcry ‘unlock the lands’ – so the diggers can own and work their own properties nearby the diggings – ring any bell in the good ear of the Commissioner? But, for the moment, no issue is so important as stopping the license-hunts and the ongoing brutalisation of the diggers.

Raffaello Carboni now speaks his first words: ‘Mr Rede, I beg you would allow me to state, that the immediate object of the diggers taking up arms was to resist any further license-hunting. I speak for the foreign diggers whom I here represent. We object to the Austrian rule under the British flag. If you would pledge yourself not to come out any more for the license, until you have communicated with
Son Excellence,
I would give you my pledge–’

‘Give no pledge, sir,’ Father Smyth interrupts. ‘You have no power to do so.’

Rede, noting this curious stifling of the Italian, puts his hands together as in prayer, tapping together his forefingers, and says to Carboni, ‘My dear fellow, the license is a mere watchword of the day, and they make a cat’s-paw of you.’ Smyth then chips in to Rede, ‘You must also release the prisoners.’

‘I shall not do anything of the kind,’ replies Commissioner Rede with a sense of outraged dignity at the Father’s presumption. ‘As for giving any pledges or assurances, in the face of an armed mob, that is the last thing I will do. But if the people go quietly back to their work at once . . . I will not do anything further until I have received instructions from Melbourne.’

Meeting concluded, the three visitors are escorted back to the bridge by Sub-Inspector Taylor, where the password is given and they are allowed to leave. As the disappointed group heads back, threading their way past the circus once again – now more raucous than ever – the road is busy and they are frequently stopped by groups of anxious men wanting to know the news. Will the authorities cede to their demands, or will the diggers have to fight for their cause?

Not an inflammatory man by nature, Black tells the inquirers as calmly as possible that while it appears to be out of the question that the seven men will be released, the Commissioner has at least promised to cease the license-hunts, so it is possible they are making some progress. This is wonderful news! No more license-hunts means no more confrontations, means it is highly unlikely that the government will be attacking them any time soon.

Alas, Carboni begs to differ, and says so. While he allows that the Commissioner might indeed consider holding off on the hunts, his own impression remains that ‘the Camp, choked with Redcoats, would quash Mr Rede’s “good judgment”, get the better of his sense, if he had any of either, and that he would come out license-hunting in an improved style. ‘

As the three continue to make their way back, Carboni is distracted by the fact that the good Father and Black keep whispering to each other, just as they have done on the way to the Camp, though what they are saying, he knows not. It just seems very rude.

Returning to the Stockade, where they quickly report their lack of progress to Lalor, each man heads off in search of some grub. And yet if the others are of heavy heart as they make for their tents, Lalor’s is surely heavier still. He did not ask for this. He did not seek leadership of this affair just as, back in Ireland, he stood back from the fulminations of his father and brother about the rule of Britain. There, they were more passionate and better equipped to take the lead, and he was happy to let them do so.

But here? Here the leadership had been thrust upon him, and he had simply not resiled from it. For how could he?

He’d be damned if he would leave the iniquities of British rule in Ireland to make a new home in a new land, only to have the same oppressors follow him here. At some point a man has to make a stand, and that point has now come. And yet, he also knew what he was risking. All this and more he now tries to explain to the love of his life, Alicia Dunne, who awaits news in Geelong, where the 22-year-old is living with her uncle, Father Patrick Dunne, and continues to work as a schoolteacher:

Ballarat, November 30, 1854

My Dear,

Since my last, a most unfortunate state of things has arisen here. I mentioned that great excitement prevailed here, owing to the attempt of the magistrates to screen the murderer of a digger. That excitement has been still further increased by wicked license-hunting. The authorities have gone so far as to have had the diggers fired upon this morning, who, in self-defence, have taken up arms and are resolved to use them. In fact, my dear, to confess the truth, I am one amongst them. You must not be unhappy on this account. I would be unworthy of being called a man, I would be unworthy of myself, and, above all, I would be unworthy of you and of your love, were I base enough to desert my companions in danger. Should I fall, I beseech you by your love for me – that love which has increased in proportion to my misfortunes – to shed but a single tear on the grave of one who has died in the cause of honour and liberty, and then forget me until we meet in heaven.

Farewell, and believe me, my dear – ,

Yours until death,

PETER LALOR

———

At this time, unbeknownst to any of those inside the Stockade, a distraught Father Smyth has returned alone to the Government Camp in the dead of night to see if he can help avoid the bloodshed that he believes is now otherwise guaranteed because, as he explains to Rede, ‘There is no doubt the Camp will be attacked.’ It is the good Father’s plea once more for the Commissioner to release the prisoners and call off the license-hunts while he, as a man of the cloth, will do everything he can to get the diggers to back down, disperse and return to their diggings.

The Commissioner is tired of all the talk: as long as the diggers remain armed, he will hear none of it. He is set on his course and knows what he wants – to crush this armed mob. Good luck, good night and may your God go with you, Father.

‘I should not mention this,’ Rede later writes of the night’s meetings to his superior, ‘but I think it shews they are frightened & from the fact of Humffray & other delegates having withdrawn themselves they begin to find it is a dangerous game they are playing.’

Late evening, 30 November 1834, leaving Creswick for Ballarat

There is just something about Tom Kennedy – a man who knows how to move the masses. On this occasion he really has got them moving, marching, on the way to Ballarat, this very night! And, of course, he is at their head, wildly waving a sword as he leads the way. Not by the windy, circuitous roads – no, that would take too long – but as the kookaburra flies: through the bushes, down the gullies, up the hills, o’er the ranges.

And did someone say,
Allons, mes amis,
let
nous
storm
la Bastille?’

Not quite, but in a final bit of inspiration on what has already been an inspiring day, as the armed diggers march out of Creswick, the German band that is accompanying them strikes up the tune of the wonderful French national anthem and battle hymn,
La Marseillaise,
the most famous revolutionary song of them all. And so they go, some humming, the French among them singing,
‘
Allons enfants de la Patrie, le jour de gloire est arrive.
’

Perhaps the day of glory really has arrived – perhaps it has not – but the binding force upon these antipodean marching men is a little further along in the song:

‘Contre nous, de la tyrannie, l’etendard sanglant est leve, l’etendard sanglant est leve!’
Against us tyranny’s bloody flag is raised, the bloody flag is raised.

‘
MARCHONS! MARCHONS! Qu
’
un sangue impur, abreuve nos sillons.
’ March, march, so that their impure blood should water our fields.

On the one hand, an extraordinarily romantic scene. On the other, one that might make the heavens weep for fear of the way things are heading for all of God’s children. And, in fact . . .

Just after 10 o’clock, deep in the bush, a sudden breath of cool, moaning wind wafts over the marching diggers even as, from somewhere to their far north, they hear a menacing boom. The trees themselves shudder and sway; dark clouds suddenly obscure the moon and stars; then the wind gets colder and stronger. The boom grows louder. And then lightning! And then furious thunder all but instantly afterwards! And then the lightning and thunder coming together, cracking like a dozen drovers’ whips above their poor benighted heads.