July 2024 – Historical Ragbag

The story behind this post comes from a couple of pages of Dr Clare Wright’s excellent book The Forgotten Rebels of Eureka. It’s a fascinating read with lots of really interesting information, but there was one aside apart from the broader narrative that, when I read it a few years ago, made me go, ‘wait, what?’ It describes a night in September in 1854 when Melbournians flocked to the port with makeshift weapons at the ready, convinced that the Russians were invading.

This might seem utterly ludicrous and, spoiler alert, it turned out to be a hoax, but In 1854 the Crimean War was raging and as an outpost of the British Empire Melbourne considered itself at risk. I was officially interested enough to do some more digging. I actually wrote a short story about it a couple of years ago, but I thought a factual look at the situation was worthwhile too. Hence this blog.

So to start at the beginning. What was Melbourne like in 1854? The city was in the midst a massive boom, with the gold rush in full swing. This meant an incredible influx of people from all over the world. In 1851 the population was 77 000, by 1854 it was 237 000 and 411 000 by 1857. This was a city growing and changing rapidly, and expanding, trying to find places for all the new people to live and resources to support them.

I also want to pause the discourse to acknowledge that this mass immigration was not to an unoccupied country. The land Melbourne stands on was known as Naarm and was, and is, home to the Bunerong people and the Wurundjeri Woi Wurrung people of the Kulin Nation. The colonisers moving in were actively stealing the land from the First Nations people. They, and the government, also worked to systematically kill, oppress and stamp out both First Nations people and their culture. So while Melbourne was a fantastic melting pot of a town that was growing seemingly exponentially, it was also a city of death and oppression. Importing the history of wars half way around the world, along with disease and death, for First Nations people.

So Melbourne was growing and lot of European ‘civilisation’ was imported with all the people. This included Britain’s enemies, and this is what gave rise to panic about the possibility of Russian invasion. The furore was enough that battalions were formed. In Geelong a rifle corps was organised, and a regular half holiday was declared (it didn’t last long) for men to train to fight if needed. There was genuine concern, with newspapers publishing lists of the Russian ships that had been in the Pacific.

The situation was perfectly encapsulated by Celeste de Chabrillan who was the wife of the French Consul in Melbourne and a fascinating lady in her own right as she was a former circus performer, dancer and courtesan. She described the time as “Since the Crimean War, which is always on their minds, and because there is not a single warship in the Melbourne harbour, they are always imagining that the Russians are going to attempt an invasion to pillage the gold of the whole of Australia.”

This fear was also recorded in the papers of the time. In May 1854 The Adelaide Observer, observed that “It may be that there are no real grounds for the serious apprehensions entertained at Sydney and Melbourne of a sudden attack on these places by a Russian Force, and it may be, also, that there are good and sufficient reasons for anticipating a sudden onslaught on the gold colonies by an enemy’s force of superior power, and tempted, perhaps, by the feeling that no sufficient preparations to repel an attack have been made.”

So this was the atmosphere that reached a boiling point on the 8th of September 1854. It was a hot night, and the inhabitants of Melbourne were restless. In this already on edge city, cannon-fire was heard from the bay, and rockets were seen in the sky. The Geelong Advertiser and Intelligencer set the scene: “all sorts of conjectures were flying around as to the cause of these demonstrations, some said it was the Russians come at last and nothing short of a fight or bombardment was expected to take place.” Soon “thousands of people were hurrying from all directions down the road to Sandridge [Port Melbourne], determined to see what was up and by no means inclined to turn tail upon the Russians even if they were there. Should it ever happen that an enemy were to enter our Port the people, if armed, would fight like tigers.“

Celeste de Chabrillan’s husband Lionel was one of the men who followed Governor Hotham, who had arrived from Toorak, to the port. “They follow him, they run towards the habour. Lionel does likewise. The sky is red and all the ships in port seem to be on fire.”

But Lionel is soon back. “Drenched in perspiration. He falls into a chair and laughs so much he can’t say a word to me. It was all a practical joke.”

So what had actually happened? The ship The Great Britain had been released from quarantine that night and, either to celebrate being released from quarantine or to get back at Melbourne for being put in quarantine in the first place, the captain decided to fire his cannons and fire rockets into the air. Whether it was celebration, or a practical joke depends on which version you read. Celeste went on to say that the captain of The Great Britain “simulated naval combat” to “get his own back for having been put in quarantine.” Some of the papers reported that “the firing of rockets and guns was but a demonstration of joy and self-congratulation indulged in by the Commander of the liberated ship to gratify his passengers.”

Interestingly there was a letter to the paper about ten days after the incident saying that if the passengers had been vaccinated for smallpox in the first place they wouldn’t have had to quarantined so the ‘battle’ would never have happened. Which feels incredibly contemporary- it’s always fascinating to see how little things change sometimes.

Whatever the reason the captain decided to fire his cannons and rockets, the furore died down quickly, though Governor Hotham was not impressed. In the immediate aftermath there was a lot of commentary in the press and in Punch, and amazingly a play called “the Battle of Melbourne” written about the incident.

The play came together incredibly quickly. It was in “active preparation” by the 14th of September according to the Argus, which described the ‘battle’ as “the great public farce of Thursday last.” When it actually opened in October 1854 the Argus described the theatre as “crowded to the point of suffocation.” I haven’t been able to find a copy of the play unfortunately.

While the memory of the night Melbourne thought it was being invaded by Russia has largely faded, there is a surprisingly tangible legacy of the fear that led to it all over Victoria. Have you ever seen cannons in a public park or foreshore in Victoria? Maybe climbed on them as a child? Ever wondered why they’re there? There’s a pretty good chance they were installed out of fear of Russian invasion in the 19th century. An excellent example are the cannons currently at Hopetoun Gardens in Elsternwick. You can see them below.

Both of these cannons are from the 1860s. The Russians had lost the Crimean War by then but there was still the fear they were looking for new territories. So the Victorian Government negotiated with the Royal Arsenal in Woolwich to purchase cannons to protect Melbourne if they were needed. These are 80 pound guns, meaning they were made to fire projectiles of 80 pounds. Each weighed more the 4000 kgs and thus were mounted on moveable carriages. These two cannons were originally installed at Fort Gellibrand in Williamstown, but military machinery was moving so quickly they were soon superseded. But how did these two end up in a garden in inner suburban Melbourne? Well, in 1908, when the gardens were being built, the local council decided that obsolete military machinery would not only be a point of difference, but would inspire a sense of ‘naval spirit’ in the local boys so they would ‘learn the necessity for being prepared for the defence of the country.’

Even though the threat of Russian invasion, well land invasion anyway, now seems faintly ludicrous, it was for a time believed to be a genuine threat and for one farcical night, Melbournians massed at the port, ready to fight for their new city. And today we have the cannon to remember it by.

References:

The French Consul’s Wife: Memoirs of Celeste de Chabrillan in gold rush Australia by Patricia Clancy

https://library.pmi.net.au/fullRecord.jsp?recno=18535

The Forgotten Rebels of Eureka by Clare Wright

https://library.pmi.net.au/fullRecord.jsp?recno=1671

Geelong Advertiser and Intelligencer (Vic. : 1851 – 1856) Sat 9 Sep 1854 Page 4 :

https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/91860529

The Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 – 1957) Thu 14 Sep 1854

https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/4797645

The Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 – 1957) Tue 3 Oct 1854 Page 5

https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/4798453

The Argus (Melbourne, Vic. : 1848 – 1957) Wed 4 Oct 1854 Page 5