Article: Immigrant experience arriving in Melbourne, 1850s

I came across the following article in The Times and thought it might be of interest, particularly to those whose ancestors arrived in Melbourne in the 1850s. It gives an insight into what they may have experienced upon arrival.

There was discussion a few months back on possible reasons why some newly arrived immigrants may have left Melbourne and moved to regional towns. Some of the conditions and problems described in the article could have played some part.

I hope the length is not a problem - thought it worth quoting in full.

regards,

Martin Elliget Fig Tree Pocket QLD Australia

The Times, Monday, 22 Aug 1853 AUSTRALIA "The tide of immigration continues to pour into Melbourne at a rate almost alarming. Up to the end of 1852 the population of the province of Victoria had more than doubled what it was in 1851; what it will be at the close of 1853 it would be difficult to predict. The arrivals in the month of April have exceeded the maximum of any month in 1852; and on the 27th ult. more than 2,400 immigrants arrived in the bay in the course of the 24 hours. To meet this daily increasing mbutt of life there is in Melbourne little or no pre- paration; the place is fed, like a besieged city, by supplies thrown in by distant speculation, and pro- visions are, indeed, nearly at siege and famine prices. As to house-room, every nook is filled; the places of those who leave for the goldfields are instantly occupied by new comers. Only the more provident and better circumstanced arrive furnished with tents, which they can pitch at "Canvas town," or portable houses, to put up on any patch of ground that can be obtained. The first few days after his arrival must try the courage of an intending settler severely; his first impres- sions on landing can hardly be other than unfavour- able. In this respect Melbourne differs, and greatly to its disadvantage, from Sydney. The immigrant arriving at the latter place sails up a beautiful bay, locked in by well wooded hills and headlands, dotted with handsome villas. After the monotony of the long sea voyage, the landscape, with its evidences of wealth and cultivation, is quite exhilarating. The ship anchors close off the city, and in a few minutes a boat lands him on a clean and well-built quay, and he may find a lodging to put his head in, and get his baggage conveyed to it for something less than financial ruin. If his destiny is Port Phillip, after a long pbuttage up the bay, which, however good as a harbour, cannot be compared with Port Jackson for beauty, the ship anchors, probably, off a cluster of wooden houses and low stores, the beach in front of them strewn with decaying bones and refuse, called Williams- town. The boatmen of the place ply only for extortionate and fancy prices, calculated on the anxiety of the pbuttenger to get ashore and the means of transport. As nine persons out of ten cannot pay the demand, or will not submit to what appears to their as yet happy inexperience to be robbery, they wait on board, for two or three hours perhaps, till one of the Melbourne steamers makes its circuit of the bay and brings up alongside the ship for fares. With a full freight she starts for the mouth of the muddy Yarra, and glides up between flat and scrubby banks, pbutting the wreck of an iron steamboat, rusting to pieces in the show water, a few vessels taking in ballast, and an official in uniform lying on his back by a gum tree, watching the process, ready to pounce on the evasive skippers, who at times abstract portions of the Australian continent without paying for a license. Higher up, the Yarra, not very wide any- where, narrows in rapidly, and becomes evidently too small for the traffic that, as yet, has no other channel; here and there the rotting carcase of an ox or horse on the water's edge contagions the air for a considerable distance, and as the new comer begins to sight the city of Melbourne, at the very narrowest part of the river, there is a succession of wooden dissolution-houses, melting-houses, and other similar establishments, surrounded by indescribable filth, of a most patched, rickety, and makeshift construction, and yet in full activity. In the yards of the dissolution-houses pigs are revelling among the garbage, dragging about large lengths of entrails, or devouring them in a manner that makes the stranger inwardly vow to abstain from "dairy-fed" pork during his entire sojourn in the colony. Through this part of the river he had better shut his eyes, and nose, too, if possible, and reserve himself for the landing-place, where his real troubles will begin, especially if he has unsuspectingly brought any luggage with him on his first journey up. There are two landing-places, and the steamers stop at the worst, called Cole's Wharf. An enormous amount of traffic has certainly been thrown suddenly upon this spot; but, considering the re- venue derived from it by the proprietors, something might have been done to redeem it from being, as it is, a disgrace and scandal to the city. Goods are tumbled on to the bank, and the drays back up to them to be loaded through pools of black mud, in which they stand nearly axle-deep. Boxes, cases, and bags (no matter what their contents) may roll into the slush, and stay there soaking till called for. Expensive as horseflesh is, half the power of the animals is wasted in getting out of these pits and the deep ruts of the roadway, which a few loads of stones would fill and level. There is no shed to protect goods liable to be damaged by rain. Reckless indifference to everything but collecting the enor- mously high freights up the river, and the still higher rate of carriage to the city, seems to be the rule. Combined, these charges have frequently amounted to more, for a distance of six or seven miles, than the freight of the goods from England. The other landing-place, the Queen's Wharf, is a little higher up the river, and here the accommoda- tion is much superior, a proof that improving is not so impossible as represented. How the mer- cantile men of Melbourne can quietly bear the da- mage and expense such utter neglect must entail on them, without strong remonstrance, is a marvel

Once clear of Cole's Wharf, things being to mend; you ascend into the city, and in the course of a walk of an hour or two a better impression is produced. The main streets of Melbourne are well planned, wide, and regular. The houses are, of course, very dissimilar - a good stone or brick build- ing often having a mean little wooden shed for its neighbour. There are many vacant plots of ground for building, and in good situations they command fabulous prices, far more that would be given for ground in the heart of London; it is difficult to believe that these prices represent the real values. Many lots have been bought over and over again, not to build on - the only thing that could make them profitable - but to sell as a specu- lation. The original owners, or the first purchasers, of them have netted enormous sums, but those who bought late, calculating that such sites must continually rise in price, may find themselves disappointed. The most rapid progress will not for some generations make Melbourne a London or Paris, and the most valuable business sites in the most populous and wealthy capitals of the world can be purchased for less than has been given for the same surface in Melbourne. Yet, in Europe, labour is at hand to convert such barren spots at once into sources of income; here they must long remain what they are at present, mere city wastes, deposits of rubbish, or pools of stagnant water. The prices of land are symptomatic of a touch of mania in this branch of speculation, and a reaction would surprise no one but the speculators.

Of public enterprise, even to guard against im- pending social perils, there is none; the rains of heaven are the only scavengers of the city, and, out of the main streets, the filth of the alleys and back premises is excessive, there being no drains of any kind. Much alarm, indeed, begins to be felt for the health of the place, and with good reason, when 4,000 souls are being added to the population weekly. But in this, as in everything else, gold paralyzes effective exertion on a large scale, and the very wealth of the land seems to be condemning its capital to disease and pestilence.

The great error in the plan of Melbourne is the disproportion between the main streets and the lateral communications. The last have been made much too narrow, little better than alleys. The inconvenience is already apparent, and will be felt more and more every year. Land has become so valuable that it is feared the evil is now beyond remedy. For all defects of drainage, for the bad supply of water, the peril of a fire of Californian magnitude without an engine in the place, the Government, the corporation, the police, and the authorities generally are abused; but the people themselves, who might do so much in all these matters, have attempted nothing. All are too busy in the one pursuit - money-making; nor can any improvement be expected till the place becomes less of a camp and more of a community. The feeling of citizenship has yet to grow up; the merchants and shopkeepers are rather suttlers to an immense army, suddenly thrown into the province, then patriotic burghers. The mbutt of the people are strangers to the place and to each other; the "diggings" are not a home to any one, and the spirit that takes men there is almost as visible at Melbourne. No common action for a future and general benefit can yet be organized; and it is useless to complain of an evil that lies in the very structure of society; time only, and the subsiding of the present feverish excitement of the search for gold into a steady and regular trade, can remove it. There are already in- dications that such a change is approaching.

Some few months ago the city was far less safe than now; but those who have resided there any length of time do now, even at present, trust wholly to the police. Many of them always carry arms, if they have to be out after dark, avoid certain locali- ties, keep the centre of the street, and answer any inquirer of the hour, or applicant for a light to a cigar, by the click of a pistol, and an in- junction to the parties to keep their distance. I cannot say I have found any precautions of the kind necessary; but the experience of others may as well be cited. The fact is, so completely are the relations of society reversed here, that the garb of a gentleman (or "swell" in the colonial vernacular) is in itself a protection, being the badge of poverty; he is not worth robbing; he either has no money, or, being sober and discreet, leaves what he may have at home. But the drunken digger, just down from the mines with his golddust in his belt, reeling from pothouse to pothouse, is a rich and easy prey. He is marked out, followed, and robbed in a systematic manner. Many a better "pocket" of gold is picked out of a kennel in the city than cept to this clbutt, I should say the place is safe enough, and quieter than could be expected.

The true gold mines are the publichouses at Melbourne and the several diggings; the publicans make large and rapid fortunes, and thousands of pounds are freely given for the goodwill of a house of the lowest clbutt, the lower indeed the better, for in them greater profits are made than in the respect- able hotels. The diggers frequently give their gold to the landlord, drink it out, and go back to the fields as poor as they came. If they deposit it in a bank the simplest forms of business are a puzzle to them; in some case, the proffered pbuttbook has been indignantly refused, under an impression that it is something equivalent to a convict's ticket-of- leave. It is calculated that a large amount of gold in the Melbourne banks will never be claimed, the depositors having drunk themselves to rest, or died by accident or disease at the mines, where casualties are by no means rare. Those who save their earnings, to invest in land or business here- after, are the minority, the prudent or educated; but fortune is capricious, and the luckiest are not always the most deserving.

The Victoria goldfields continue to produce the greatest quanbreasty of the metal, and have drawn away most of the diggers from the northern province. There is a sameness in the accounts from all the fields; reports of the greater productiveness of certain spots, and the invariable rush to them from others, complaints of the enormous prices of provi- sions and forage, and the non-arrival of the post, form the staple of news. The roads are in a terrible state, and will be worse as the winter comes on; in the same season last year 100 l. per tone was paid for the carriage of goods from Melbourne to the goldfields, and even the diggers regard with apprehension the prices provisions are likely to be there within the next few months. The Government escort brought down to Melbourne for the week ending the 30th of April 31,830 ounces of gold; the average produce of what may be called the Sydney goldfields is scarcely a fourth of this quanbreasty. It is alleged that the regulations of the Sydney Government are more restrictive than those in force in Victoria, and that they have tended to drive people to the diggings of the latter province. It is not certainly ascertained that the fields of New South Wales are less rich, but fewer hands are at work on them. The regulations in question are to be modified in the present session of the Council, in consequence of the representations made against them. In his last official report to the Government Mr. Hargreaves states his belief, that "the whole of New South Wales is auriferous, or nearly so," and that "the question in the colony is rather where is gold not to be found, than where it is." He admits that the Victoria fields are more productive, but thinks those of New South Wales are the most extensive. He, too, complains that the gold "has unhinged every industrial pursuit," and that at the diggings money has almost lost its value. At the date of his report the Government was paying, at Bendigo, 10 1-2 d. for every pound of hay for the horses of the escort and police; oats were 3l.5s. a-bushel; bran, 16s. the 20 lb.; 40s. was the cost of shoeing a horse, and 35s. a-night was charged for livery.

In the last week of April 4,000 immigrants landed at Port Phillip, and before that the influx for the month had reached the maximum of any previous month; 2,400 were landed in one day. Melbourne, already crowded, has no adequate house accommo- dation for these mulbreastudes, and the last accounts describe the condition of those who land without means as most distressing; a low fever has made its appearance, and alarm is felt for the health of the city. Those who arrive later in the season will suffer still more. Those who have but a small stock of cash will find it absorbed in a very short time indeed. If determined to try their chance at the diggings, they had better leave the city as soon as possible. When they arrive at the mines, if they can work very hard and have good luck, they may have a bare subsistence. Mr. Hardy, the late chief gold commissioner, states, from his own experience, and that of many others conversant with the whole system, that the average earnings of the diggers do not exceed one ounce of gold a-week; in proportion to the thousands engaged in the pursuit those who make large sums are few; those who succeed are men who have had some knowledge of mining or been used to the roughest labour. To do any- thing, more experience is necessary than most new comers possess. The holes are now sunk to greater depths than when the workings began, and are rather mines in miniature than mere excava- tions. A hole, 70 or 80 feet deep, or even 100, may be called a shaft; when the vein is found, side galleries are driven under it, and the bed con- taining the gold is removed by working from be- neath it. These veins are followed, if rich in metal, as far as it can be done with safety, without regard to the limits of the claim on the surface. It is often a keen compebreastion between the parties in two neighbour- ing holes which can sink to the gold vein first, so as to undermine the other completely. and clear out the precious deposit before his rival gets down to it. It may be imagined what chance a party of London shopmen or clerks have against neighbours of the hard-handed sort to whom the work is familiar. In works of this depth some rough kind of machinery is also required, - boarding for the shaft and sup- ports for the side galleries. For anything but surface work some skill and a little capital are necessary; the best organized parties now generally include a carpenter and blacksmith; and those who come out thinking that mere digging, as the term is generally understood, will do, will be grievously disappointed. But when a great "find" is made, the brilliancy of the result blinds those at a distance to the laborious nature of the process, and the rush to the goldfields con- tinues. A little experience cools the ardour of the new comers considerably, and both in Melbourne and Sydney numbers of persons are to be found who have returned in despair to do what they had better have done at first, - resort to ordinary labour for a living. Those who know a trade, the send work- man or mechanic, will make high wages, and un- less he takes to drinking - the great peril - will do well. But the condition of the many edu- cated men, the weak gentilities, clerks, accountants, shopmen, and those of half or no professions, who, having no other resources, have failed at the dig- gings, is pitiable in the extreme. There are Uni- versity graduates in the colony breaking stones on the road, and dashing "men upon town" driving drays. If extremely lucky, they may get appointed to the police; but, if they cannot descend to actual work, they are in danger of starvation.

The following may be regarded as a sufficient approximation to the influx and efflux of shipping and population since the 2d of April :- Influx, - total ships from all extra-colonial ports, 100 ships; of tonnage, about 35,154; with pbuttengers, about 3,472. Efflux, - total ships to all ports out of the colony, about 96 ships; of tonnage, about 27,799; with about 2,263 pbuttengers. The balance of pas- sengers has thus been more than 1,200 in favour of New South Wales. But between this and Victoria the balance has been in favour of the latter colony since the beginning of April by 600 or 700, the pro- bability being that with the whole of the difference Sydney was, intentionally, merely a port of pbuttage. The above is to be understood as only an approxi- mation, as some of the data are wanting in authen- ticity. It may, however, aid in forming a general estimate. In the meantime the internal transitions from colony to colony are incessantly going on."