Chinese Encampment at the Port (Adelaide)
Date Published
: Robe walk, Mining (gold fields)
: Adelaide
: Adelaide
: c.1855
Chinese Encampment at the Port (Adelaide)
While embarkation at Robe (Guichen Bay) is most remembered many thousands of Chinese goldseekers embarked at Port Adelaide and walked to the Victorian goldfields from there. Alternatively they took coastal steamers from Port Adelaide to Robe before commencing their walk. In either case doing so to avoid the Poll Tax levied at Victorian ports, but not at borders crossings.
“... the preparations necessary for the entire overland journey on foot are weighed very carefully against the cost of a steam passage to Guichen Bay’.”
South Australian Register, 8 April 1856, p.3.
Chinese encampment at the Port (Adelaide)
https://collection.sl.nsw.gov.au/record/nvg8x7Q1/zKvy0OpM4AlRM
Chinese encampment at the Port (Adelaide) 2
https://collection.sl.nsw.gov.au/record/nvg8x7Q1/Lm8V2Vp252y8b
William Anderson Cawthorne
This is a rare pictorial view at how the Chinese goldseekers organised themselves. Tents, setting up markets, carrying their equipment with shoulder poles and efficient methods for making fires are all mentioned in written descriptions.
See also: “Michael Williams, Every Requisite for a Campaign upon the Gold-fields: Organisation, Victimisation and Mythmaking of the Walk from Robe, Ashfield, NSW: ChideStudy Press, 2024.
