http://www.lrrsa.org.au/LRR_SGRa.htm as at winter 2008
Australia's sugar industry
By Robert F. McKillop.
" In 1862 the new colony of Queensland passed a Coolie Act which provide conditions under which Asiatics could be indentured to work in the colony.
Through the nineties dependence on Pacific Islanders increased, however, and, by 1902 there were 9,841 in Queensland. Other non-Europeans were also employed, numbering 7,261 Chinese, 3,210 Japanese, 322 Javanese and 1,598 'others' in 1898. These numbers aroused fears that Australians were being squeezed out of the "black north". On the Herbert there were four serious riots between 1889 and 1892.
Ringbarkers (1) and market gardeners: a comparison of the rural Chinese of New South Wales and California.
Publication: Chinese America: History and Perspectives
Publication Date: 01-JAN-06 Format: Online - approximately 12936 words
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In writing about the experience of the rural Chinese in southern and western New South Wales (NSW), Australia, I am treading largely upon new ground. I seek to discuss primarily the Australian experience and also to begin to compare and contrast it with the American, or in this case the as by...
...Californian, exemplified Sucheng Chang 1986 study, This Bitter Sweet Soil: The Chinese in California Agriculture, 18601910. Other Australian historians have written comparatively on the gold-rush and post-gold-rush periods in Australia and California. In 1979 Andrew Markus wrote Fear and Hatred: Purifying Australia & California 1850-1901, in which he compared and contrasted the racial experiences in both countries, and in 1994 David Goodman wrote a comparison of gold-seeking experiences in California and Victoria in the 1850s. But my paper is the first to include comparisons of the rural Chinese in both countries, and it should be seen as an initial exploratory foray into this area. (2)
Sucheng Chan commented that the majority of Chinese in America in the period 1860 to 1910 lived in rural areas but that most scholars had assumed that the urban experience was the most relevant. In Australia, C. Y. Choi's 1975 publication, Chinese Migration and Settlement in Australia, addressed the statistical and other evidence for the overwhelming Chinese presence in rural Australia in the nineteenth century. But the first comprehensive study of the rural Chinese in Australia was, as in America, not until 1986, with Cathie May's Topsawyers: The Chinese in Cairns 1870 to 1920. In this work, May discussed the dominant role played by the Chinese in the agricultural industry in the Cairns District in North Queensland and their economic and social impact in that region. Despite the passage of time, it is still the most important study of the Chinese in Australian agriculture. (3)
Until very recently the main focus of almost all historians writing on the Chinese in Australia has been on the urban and goldfield environments and the impact and development of racism in Australia. Three exceptions were Cathie May's publication and the discussions by Bill Gammage and Geoffrey Buxton on the Chinese experience in the pastoral industry in the Riverina district of NSW. (4) The main racial discourse centred on two alternate views, perhaps best exemplified by Andrew Markus's Fear and Hatred and Kathryn Cronin's Colonial Casualties: Chinese in Early Victoria (published in 1982). Cronin's portrayal of the Chinese as hapless and defenceless victims has been for many years the dominant view, notwithstanding arguments by Markus and other historians to the contrary. (5)
Over the last five years the dominant view has been challenged to an increasing extent, and there has been a shift toward studies of the regional and rural Chinese. Of particular note was a short but pithy account in 2000 by Rod Lancashire, who discussed the Chinese involvement in the vineyards of northeast Victoria. (6) In the following year a monograph was published on the proceedings of a conference on the Chinese in Australasia, held jointly by the National Taiwan University and the Australian National University. One of the contributors, Ian Jack, remarked that there was a 'rich heritage and history, deriving from the Chinese pre-eminence in market gardening and irrigation and that this was in need of urgent synthesis and field work'. He commented critically on the historian's blind spot for archaeological and material culture. Another contributor, Maxine Darnell, discussed the experience of the Chinese as indentured labourers in the period from 1847 to 1855. (7)
The discourse progressed further in 2002 with the work of Warwick Frost, who lamented the characterisation of the Chinese as sojourners rather than settlers and the absence of any detailed consideration of the development of Chinese farming over time and of their technology, methods, labour arrangements, and interactions with Europeans. He remarked that most broad agricultural histories made no mention of any Chinese contribution at all. (8) The view of the Chinese as sojourners was popularised by Eric Rolls in his 1992 publication of the same name but questioned strongly by Shen Yuanfang in her 2001 book, Dragonseed in the Antipodes. She argued that many Chinese were of a more settled disposition and were better portrayed as pioneers. (9)
This directional shift has gathered momentum over the last eighteen months. In 2003, Henry Reynolds discussed the evolution of successful multiracial societies in North Australia prior to the introduction of the Immigration Restriction Act of 1901 in his book North of Capricorn. May had already illustrated that the Chinese were involved heavily in agriculture in this region. In Golden Threads: The Chinese in Regional New South Wales 1850-1950, published in 2004, Janis Wilton discussed the Chinese people under themes such as work, language, leisure, food, beliefs, and population movements. She also discussed objects and evidence of their culture as found in museums and family collections. (10)
Of even more recent note are two compendiums, After the Rush: Regulation, Participation, and Chinese Communities in Australia 1860-1940 and a special edition of the Journal of Australian Colonial History, 'Active Voices: Hidden Histories: The Chinese in Colonial Australia'. In the latter publication Alan Mayne has remarked that the contributions to the journal do not deny the existence of racial tensions but emphasise the inclusion of the Chinese and their active participation in the defining events of Australia's colonial past and beyond. Several articles in both publications refer to the experience of the Chinese people in rural and regional Australia, and in occupations such as market gardening. (11) Zvonkica Stanin's account of an archaeological survey of Chinese market-gardening activity on the Loddon River near Vaughan in Victoria, part of the Mount Alexander diggings, is of particular note. As only the third archaeological account of a Chinese market garden in Australia, and the most recent one at that, it will stand as a benchmark for some time. (12)
In my paper I focus on the extent and scope of Chinese involvement in agriculture and pastoralism in southern and western NSW during the period prior to 1950, but with particular emphasis on the pre-Federation experience (that is, the period prior to 1901). One of my themes concerns the significance of this involvement compared to other regional experiences, in particular, in tropical North Queensland and northeast Victoria. A second theme, notwithstanding that a large part of my focus is on the pastoral industry rather than on agriculture, is the extent to which NSW can be compared to the Californian and other Australian experiences, both in significance and character. Sucheng Chan drew upon the manuscript returns for the U.S. Census, but as Frost has commented, individual returns were not retained by the Australian Census authorities, and as a consequence Australian studies are more fragmented. The most fruitful sources are the reminiscences of early settlers, court reports in the local press, and official accounts, the most important of which was the 1883 Report into Chinese Camps. (13) Other themes include labour organisation, social and technological adaptation, economic and environmental impact, and race relationships. Particular emphasis is placed upon the material evidence of Chinese camps and market gardens.
My choice of southern and western NSW requires elaboration. It has been chosen for several reasons. First, and possibly the least commendable, it is the area with which I am most familiar. Second, there is enough archival and material evidence to allow meaningful comparisons with experiences elsewhere in Australia and in America. Third, useful comments can be made about environmental impact and the technological and social adaptability and versatility of the Chinese people, for they had to contend with a demanding and often and landscape. Fourth, although the boundaries are in part self-defined, the examples within the region are both contiguous and representative. The various regions and states (colonies) discussed in my paper are set out in Figure 1, and the towns and geographic features of southern and western NSW are set out in Figure 2. (14)
[FIGURES 1-2 OMITTED]
THE URBAN MYTH
The myth of Chinese preeminence in urban Australia is best tackled by reference to data compiled by Choi from the Australian Census, 1861 to 1901. An extract from Choi's data is set out in Table 1 on the following page.
In the 1871 Census, the Chinese population in metropolitan NSW, Victoria, and Queensland constituted a mere 4.7, 3.4, and 1.4 percent, respectively, of the total Chinese population in those colonies. By the time of Federation in 1901, the Chinese metropolitan population constituted 34 and 38.3 percent, respectively, of the total in NSW and Victoria. In Queensland only 5.3 percent of the Chinese population was in metropolitan areas. For Victoria and NSW the Chinese experience was still predominantly a rural and regional one. In Queensland it was emphatically so. (15)
Statistics on occupations are equally illustrative and emphasise strongly the shift over time from gold mining to rural, pastoral, and other activities. An extract from Choi's data is set out in Table 2. In NSW, 10.2 percent were involved in mining, 35.8 percent in market gardening, 4.7 percent in pastoral activities, 3.5 percent in other agriculture, and 5.9 percent in labouring. In Victoria at the time of Federation in 1901, 21.2 percent of Chinese were involved in mining, 33 percent in market gardening, 8.4 percent in other agriculture, and 1.5 percent in labouring. Only 0.4 percent of Chinese were involved in pastoral activities. (16) The numbers involved in pastoral work in NSW and Victoria are small in comparison with other occupations. However, as will be discussed later, the statistics are deceptive, for Chinese involvement in pastoral work in NSW appears to have peaked some time in the 1880s. Regardless of the precise occupational mix, the statistics nevertheless support the contention that there was a strong, if not overwhelming, rural presence by the Chinese people in NSW, before and at the time of Federation in 1901.
SOUTHERN NSW
I commence my discussion with the Braidwood goldfields (Araluen, Jembaicumbene, Majors Creek, and Mongarlowe), which were amongst the most prosperous and enduring in NSW The Chinese presence was most marked between 1858 and 1862. Exact numbers are not available, but from various local reports, I have estimated the Chinese population at about 2,000 at peak, although it may have been much larger. Information on Chinese participation in occupations other than mining is more difficult to obtain, for these activities were rarely mentioned in the local press. My main sources have been mining lease maps and anecdotal accounts backed up by corroborative field surveys.
The first mention of market gardening in the Braidwood District was not until 1870. On that occasion it was reported that the Chinese people at Araluen had some fine gardens. Later, in 1896, it was commented that on the outskirts of the town some Chinese had 'cultivated little patches of ground on which they grow potatoes and other vegetables'. (17) Unfortunately there is no local memory of these gardens. At Jembaicumbene, two undated but obviously very early lease maps show an area of Chinese gardens to the west of the main village with a creek frontage of about 200 metres, but the site was destroyed by subsequent gold dredging.
At Majors Creek a Chinese garden (there was probably more than one) is located well away from the main creek area, which was devoted entirely to mining. The site is still visible today. It has a creek frontage of about 150 metres and a dam, small storage ponds, a water race (a water channel, usually of earth and stone) and two possible hut sites. At several locations on the Mongarlowe field, a number of small market gardens have been identified from mining lease maps and field surveys. (18) A drawing published in the Illustrated Sydney News in 1870 shows the Mongarlowe joss house (a temple or shrine) and a number of Chinese huts just across the river from the main village. It also shows several Chinese crossing the river with merchandise, quite possibly garden produce, on their shoulders (Figure 3).
[FIGURE 3 OMITTED]
One of the largest gardens was on Mona station just outside Braidwood. This garden helped supply the Braidwood market, and several men worked on it for many years up until the 1930s (Figures 4 and 5). Water was drawn from a nearby creek by a water race, which ran along the top of the garden. The race, garden outline, and a possible storage dam are still visible. A rare account of this garden arose from the heavy rains and floods of 1898:
[FIGURES 4-5 OMITTED] [E]nterprising children spent the morning capturing pumpkins and water melons from Ah Chew's market garden.... Ah Chew's crop for the season was entirely lost. He employed two men on his garden and by the use of intensive labour and irrigation by small hand-dug canals and good gardening practices had beenable to supply fresh vegetables for some years to a ready market in the town. (19) Another garden was located on the pastoral property Glendaurel at Jembaicumbene. The water race, piping, irrigation channels, mounds, and fruit trees are still visible. More remarkable still is the existence of the farm account books, which show that the gardens were worked at least as early as 1893 and almost continually between 1899 and 1913 by several Chinese men, for instance, Ah Hing, Ah Yin, Sam Gow, Ah Moon, Ah Kit, and James Ahoy and his son and a daughter. This latter period of work coincides with the gold-dredging boom at Jembaicumbene in 1899 and suggests that the gardeners were not only supplying the property with produce, but also many of the mining fraternity. The gardeners and other Chinese employees were paid regular wages with rations by the property owners, the Hassall family. Their wages were adjusted regularly. Elsewhere in the Braidwood District three other gardens have been located, one supplied by water from a well, another from a ground soak, and a third possibly by water cart from a nearby spring. (20)
This brief sketch of market gardening in the Braidwood goldfields highlights several aspects relevant to market gardening generally in Australia: first, the frustrating paucity of contemporary archival accounts; second, and related to the above, the importance of anecdotal evidence and the process of verification by physical survey, without which the scale and diversity of operations could only be guessed at; third, the diversity of technologies used for water management; and fourth, the ubiquitousness of Chinese market gardening. The gardeners not only supplied themselves with produce, but also the farm properties and their employees, the miners, and the neighbouring towns. How much of this activity can be compared to the truck farmers of California is another matter. The scale of operations of even the larger gardens would not be comparable, for the markets were local and regional, and small by American standards. Rail transport to large urban markets in NSW was not an option, as both the railheads and markets were too distant. The nearest large market was in Sydney, which was served by its own Chinese gardeners.
There were a number of other Chinese market gardens located in the region, but only a few were related to mining activity. At Queanbeyan there were several market gardeners either in or near the town. From the obituary notices we know that some of the gardeners had worked as miners in the Braidwood District. Market gardens were also located at Yass and Murrumbateman. At Goulburn there were several gardens. One of the largest was worked by the Nomchong family, who were also prominent entrepreneurs in the Braidwood District. These gardens were substantial and still in existence in the 1950s. (21) In the 1920s and beyond, the water was pumped direct from the Mulwaree River. The garden area is still extant, as are the remains of the pump footings and several pieces of agricultural equipment, the most remarkable of which is a large clod breaker, the roller of which is adorned with discarded iron pegs from the nearby railway line (Figure 6).
[FIGURE 6 OMITTED]
Evidence of rural pursuits other than market gardening is more difficult to obtain. However, there is a strong local memory of Chinese involvement in the building of stone fences and ringbarking further to the south at the small town of Craigie. The Chinese in this area were also involved in gold mining and market gardening, and they transported much of their produce to the Delegate and Bendoc goldfields. In 1871 the Town and Country Journal described the town of Craigie as occupied mainly by the Chinese, and there remains a strong local memory of their presence in the district up to the present day: The site of the gardens is still visible, but other physical evidence, including the Chinese cemetery, has been lost. Chinese gardens were also located at the gold mining centre of Nerrigundah on the South Coast. From 1879 to 1885 the Chinese at Nerrigundah outnumbered the Europeans, for many of them had returned from the farming districts where they had been employed for several years clearing land for the settlers. As that industry was on the decline, or not offering sufficient remuneration, they resumed gold mining at the end of their contracts. Anecdotal evidence also suggests that the Chinese were engaged in land-clearing activities in the nearby Monaro District further inland and to the south of Queanbeyan. (22)
More significant perhaps was the involvement of Chinese in tenant farming on the Tumut Plains. Here they were engaged primarily in the growing of tobacco, corn, and broom millet. Fortunately, there are some local accounts of these activities. Jack Bridle, in his reminiscences, said that the original owner of one of the properties, Wermatong, 'was very happy with them as tenants as they were industrious, honest and, above all, because of their system of banking with their local storekeeper, their rents were always paid on time'. He remarked that the 1920s were the heyday of the Chinese tenant farmers on Tumut Plains. On Wermatong alone, there were twenty or more growing tobacco and maize.
According to Jack, the farmers would carry a large water can on a yoke, watering their plants with a long-handled homemade dipper or ladle. As a young man he worked for the Chinese in the Depression years, mainly cutting and carting wood for the tobacco kilns. Both he and his father always made a point of delivering wood to them at Chinese New Year, when they would be invited to their feast. When Wermatong was subdivided, however, not one Chinese tenant farmer bought land. The reasons for this are as yet unclear. One Chinese farmer was Percy Moy, who lived at Adelong before coming to Tumut in the early 1920s. He grew tobacco and helped the British Australian Tobacco Company develop and promote a new kiln drying system. In the 1930s he diversified into the production of broom millet. (23)
The use of tenancy arrangements has been discussed in detail by both May and Chan. In North Queensland the system was used by Europeans as a means of clearing and cultivating the land. The main crops were banana, maize, and sugar cane. May described the Chinese as the real pioneers of the district, for they formed a 'mobile land clearing machine' and they kept many farmers on the land who would otherwise have surrendered their selections because of their inability to fulfil the lease requirements'. (24) In California, tenancy arrangements were used extensively, and, unlike in Australia, many of them involved large companies rather than individuals. In both instances the Chinese were highly preferred as tenants because of their honesty. Chan also referred to the use of compradors, or commission agents, for the purchasing of produce, and entrepreneurs who sought out land for leasing. While similar purchasing arrangements existed in North Queensland, further research work is required on the marketing arrangements for the Tumut farmers and the means by which they established their tenancies. (25)
THE RIVERINA AND WESTERN NSW
But it is in the Riverina and western NSW that the most startling story emerges. Here several thousand Chinese men were employed in land clearing (scrub cutting and ringbarking), market gardening, and ancillary activities. The land was used for wheat growing and pastoral activities (in particular, sheep grazing). Some guidance regarding the number of Chinese people in the Riverina and Western NSW is provided by the 1883 Report on Chinese Camps (subsequently referred to as the Brennan report) prepared by Martin Brennan, the NSW subinspector of police, and Quong Tart, who was at that time NSW's leading Chinese entrepreneur and one of the colony's most respected citizens. In that report the total Chinese population in the five largest towns (Narrandera, Wagga Wagga, Deniliquin, Hay, and Albury) in the Riverina district totalled 869. (26)
Further guidance on the number of Chinese in the region is provided by an 1878 NSW parliamentary paper, Chinese (Information Respecting, Resident in the Colony) in which detailed statistics were provided on Chinese residents in most towns in NSW There were a total of 1,100 Chinese residents in the Riverina District of whom 571 were residents in the five largest Riverina towns, barely two-thirds of the 1883 population. These figures suggest a population of about 1,600 for the Riverina and adjacent districts in 1883. But this is an understatement for the region as a whole, for the ring-barking frontier was to move northward during the 1880s, and the number of Chinese in the area north of the Riverina was to increase sharply. The catalyst was a boom in copper mining, commencing in the early 1880s, followed by gold mining in the 1890s. Most of these new towns either did not exist in 1878 or were, like Cobar, precluded from the report. A comparison with the Cairns District is useful. It was settled much later than the Riverina and western NSW, and by 1901 had a peak Chinese population of 2,550. The number of Chinese residents in the Riverina and western NSW at peak is comparable with the Cairns District and indicative of a significant and prolonged migration that was to continue further northwards for several decades to comes. (27)
The Brennan Report was prompted by a number of concerns, not least of which were the perceived prevalence of opium smoking and the poor state of hygiene. (28) Most of the camps appear to be about the same size as those in rural California, although in America there would have been many more of them. Overall the Chinese rural population in NSW may be small compared to California, but it needs to be seen in perspective. As Geoffrey Buxton remarked, while the Chinese people were a minority group, in Narrandera in the early 1880s, every second man in town was Chinese. Sucheng Chan has made a similar point concerning the representation of the Chinese in the Californian town and country labour force. (29) The principal but certainly not the sole purpose of the camps was to supply a steady source of labour for ringbarking and land-clearing activities throughout the Riverina and western NSW.
As a historical document on the Chinese in rural Australia, the Brennan Report is invaluable, for it touches on many facets of Chinese social and economic life at the time. At Narrandera, the land was held under lease by two Chinese men, who in turn sublet the land to other Chinese. There were 340 people (Chinese and European) at the camp, of whom 12 were gardeners, 124 were labourers, and 64 were cooks, store keepers, owners of gambling or opium houses, and other related occupations.. When the men returned from their contract work on the pastoral properties, the population was much larger. The camp was surrounded by a palisade outside of which were an orchard and several hectares of vegetables. According to historian Bill Gammage, most of the camp was owned by Sam Yett. (30) The camp site is still visible today. All the buildings have been removed, but some foundations remain.
At Wagga Wagga there was a population of 223, and at Deniliquin, where the camp was partly owned by Chinese and partly leased, there was a population of 145. As at Narrandera, there were both married women and children at these camps and an array of commercial establishments. At Deniliquin the sleeping accommodation was for three times the number found on inspection, again underscoring the point that only part of the labouring workforce was domiciled in the camps at any one point in time. Generally, the sanitary condition of the camps was regarded as poor. However, favourable comments were made on the industry of the inhabitants and their concern for the education of the children. The most scathing comments were reserved for the European women, many of whom made the 'lives of their unfortunate Chinese husbands miserable', and who were deemed the principal cause of all the disturbance, robberies, and crimes in the camps. Contemporary observers were obsessed with the behaviour of these women, almost all of whom were themselves marginalised, and the implied concern that mixed marriages posed for racial purity Opium smoking and gambling were very prevalent. On the former, the Chinese made emphatic representations that they would be grateful if the government stopped the importation of opium altogether. (31)
The Chinese camps and ringbarking activities were not confined to the larger Riverina towns and their immediate environs. For instance, there is a strong local memory of a large Chinese camp on Conapaira station near Rankin Springs well to the north of Narrandera, where the Chinese were reputed to have had a fine vegetable garden, the remains of which can be seen today Water was supplied from a wood lined well built over a spring, and the garden had all the hallmarks of careful Chinese enterprise, with irrigation channels, embankments, and a wooden cover for the well. There were two hut sites and, likely, a blacksmith's forge nearby. (32) North of Rankin Springs at Euabalong there were Chinese market gardens and at least one floss house, thus suggesting that there must have been a large camp in that area. There were also camps at the towns of Mossgiel and Darlington Point further west. At Darlington Point the Chinese garden was described as 'fearfully and wonderfully irrigated', and a 'spectacular success'. It was 'washed by the Murrumbidgee River, watered by two wells, and traversed throughout by canals." (33)
A Chinese camp and numerous market gardens were also located on the banks of the Lachlan River at Hillston about 100 kilometres north of Griffith. One of the earliest accounts of these gardens resulted from the aftermath of a riot between the Chinese and Europeans on Chinese New Year in 1895. On the following day a number of Europeans visited the garden, known as Chong Lees, which adjoined a camp where thirty or forty Chinese lived. Another garden, owned by Harry Fong You, was located across the river. The visitors were well treated at Chong Lee's, but some of the more inebriated went into the garden and began pulling fruit from the trees. No notice was taken of the protestations of the Chinese and a fight ensued. The Europeans were driven from the gardens, both parties being joined by more of their compatriots and clashing on the bridge. About thirty Chinese and twenty Europeans were involved in the brawl. One Chinese man was killed and three severely wounded. Ten Europeans were brought to trial, but they were all acquitted of manslaughter. (34)
Another more recent and sedate account of the Hillston gardens can be found in the reminiscences of Tom Parr, who worked in the gardens in the school holidays for four weeks at five shillings per week. He stated that the Chinese raised the water from the river by small buckets, each holding about two litres (half a gallon), which were fastened to an endless chain driven by one horse going round and round continuously. This method of raising the water for the river was similar (without the treadmill) to that described by Franklin King in his 1911 book on farming in China, Japan, and Korea, Farmers of Forty Centuries. (35) Some of their vegetables and fruit trees were flood irrigated, but much of the water was run down a drain to small dams dug in the garden holding about 1,363 litres (300 gallons) each. The plants were watered from two large watering cans carried by the farmers on a shoulder yoke. There is no evidence of these gardens today as the area is now occupied by European orchardists. Strong anecdotal evidence suggests that Chinese ringbarkers were employed on nearby Roto station, but all that remains of an alleged Chinese market garden and camp is a partly collapsed wood-lined well and a possible house site (Figure 7). (36)
[FIGURE 7 OMITTED]
The riots at Hillston highlight one of the more painful but inevitable comparisons between California and Australia, the issue of racial violence and racism generally. Race relations in Australia during the subject period can possibly be seen in two dimensions: firstly the relationship between Europeans and the Aboriginal people and secondly between Europeans and other ethnic groups. European treatment of the Aboriginal people does not bear up well to scrutiny and presents a sorry picture of dispossession, violence, disease, and disintegration. Unlike in America, there were no treaties to break, for aboriginal possession of the land was not recognised in any shape or form, but whether the Australian Aboriginal experience was any better or worse than the American Indian one is difficult to says. (37)
In Australia the Chinese were the most significant non-Aboriginal ethnic group. Several thousand were engaged as indentured labourers between 1847 and 1855. But the main influx took place in the gold rushes in Victoria and New South Wales in the 1850s and in Queensland and the Northern Territory in the 1870s. A clear conclusion of Markus's 1979 study is that European-Chinese race relations in Australia were qualitatively different from those in America. According to Markus, the Chinese in California were 'outside the pale of the law', exploited by the government and mistreated by officials. Expulsions and prohibitions from the goldfields were far more numerous than in Australia. During the main gold rush periods the Chinese in Australia had the same legal rights as Europeans, though there was still discrimination and anti-Chinese agitation. In principle they had the full protection of the law and could seek redress through the courts, a process facilitated by British obsession with law and order and the rapid establishment of goldfield administrations. Where these forces were absent or inadequately provided, serious but usually not fatal violence occurred, the two most infamous examples of which were at Lambing Flat in NSW in 1861 and at the Buckland in Victoria in 1857. At Lambing Flat there were several violent riots in which the Chinese were hunted from the field. The government used the military to restore law and order and to reinstate the Chinese on the goldfield. This incident led to the introduction of restrictive immigration laws in NSW. (38)
These qualitative differences carried over into the agricultural and farming communities in both countries. In Australia there was an absence of the type of organised violence that beset the Chinese agricultural community in California from 1876 to 1879, in 1886, and from 1893 to 1894. In the earlier period the agitations were led by the Order of Caucasians and a breakaway group, the Laborer's and Workingmens' Association Protective Society. A number of Chinese were killed, and property was destroyed. The two latter events were less violent but still resulted in expulsions, destruction of property, and boycotts. (39) By contrast the Hillston incident was more of a one-off occurrence, unusual for an Australian rural town, and probably one over which the police had little immediate control. Otherwise most racial incidents within the region constituted the usual array of taunts, cowardly assaults, and bullying. These were often dealt with by the courts, where the magistrates and the press often reminded the townspeople that regardless of what they might think of the Chinese as a race, as individuals they were entitled to the same legal protection and incurred the same penalties as everyone else. (40)
In the colonies most legal discrimination took the form of immigration restrictions on the entry of the Chinese into Australia. Restrictive legislation was passed by all colonial authorities at various periods during the gold rushes and again in the 1880s, culminating at the time of Federation in the Immigration Restriction Act of 1901 and the notorious dictation test, known thereafter as the White Australia Policy (now abandoned). Restrictive immigration legislation was also introduced in the United States, for instance the Scott Act of 1888. Subsequently legislation was introduced requiring resident Chinese labourers to obtain certificates of residence. (41) In rural Australia, as elsewhere, racism also manifested itself in acts of preclusion, particularly where economic insecurity was an issue. For instance, John Merritt in his book on the Australian Worker's Union, The Making of the AWU, commented that the Chinese were not welcome as sheep shearers. In the early days of the pastoral unions, a very small number of Chinese were union members, but moves were soon afoot to preclude them. The pastoralist's associations followed suit, and in the long-fought and bitter shearer's disputes of the early 1890s, it was asserted that 'freedom of contract' was not meant to apply to the Chinese or other 'coloured' labour. Pastoralists ignoring this edict were expelled from the employer organisations. The preclusion clause was applied to the Chinese as shearers or shearer's cooks, but not to the Chinese as gardeners or scrub cutters. (42)
The topic of race relations in rural Australia is still in need of much research, although the general picture emerging is one predominantly of a measure of tolerance. An important ingredient to that attitude was the favourable view of the Chinese as workers compared to many Europeans and their economic importance. A correspondent for the Deniliquin Pastoral Times wrote in 1870 that while fearing for the virtue of European women isolated in the bush, he commended the majority of the Chinese for their 'sobriety and industry'. He remarked that he felt a deep sense of humiliation that our own country men (by their general misconduct, their general want of industry, sobriety and theft) should force the employer of labour to accept the services of these objectionable [sic] people, rather than put up with the laches of persons from the British Isles. (43) In Wagga Wagga the Chinese were renowned for their generous contributions to the hospital and local churches. Events such as the opening of the new joss house in 1887 and celebration of the Chinese New Year attracted many Europeans. (44)
Observations made by May, Reynolds, and Lancashire support the tolerance paradigm. May commented that in the Cairns District the Chinese were noted for their lawfulness and generosity in local causes and were an accepted part of everyday life and individually tolerated. They were not in threatening occupations and served important economic functions in opening up the land and as suppliers of goods, services, and cash flow. (45) In his study of the Chinese in northeast Victoria, many of whom worked extensively in the local vineyards and in pastoral work in NSW, Lancashire commented that there was little in the way of strong anti-Chinese sentiment. There was a considerable degree of local sympathy both in NSW and Victoria at the plight of those Chinese who were economically disadvantaged by the NSW Chinese Restriction Bill of 1888, which introduced a punitive poll tax on entry into NSW. Lancashire attributed this empathy to the close interaction between the Chinese and Europeans and the value placed upon Chinese participation in the local economy. (46)
Other points on which a comparison can be made between California and NSW concern the organization and payment of labour and the sheer physical scale of the land-clearing exercises. In NSW the Chinese men were very well organised and equipped for ringbarking. George Gow, a station manager and later a stock agent, wrote a detailed account of these activities. One of the men who helped organise the gangs was Wong Gooey. He would inspect the proposed contract and property and then bargain for terms. Gow stated that the 'contracts were sublet to a body of Chinese, who gave Gooey five percent for organising the job. Sometimes he had several jobs going at once, extending into thousands and thousands of acres, and he would move to and fro inspecting them'. After making his inspection, he would return to Narrandera and discuss the contract with Sam Yett, a Chinese storekeeper and financier who supplied the rations and took the men to the job. It being a community matter, all the men shared in the contract, working together as a team with no overlapping. Sam Yett would load up his two-horse caravan, collect the men and take to the road with their baggage and supplies. They usually set up camp behind a palisade or stockade. Gow commented that the ringbarking was shunned by most European bush labourers, who called it 'Chinamen's work'. He also commented that the Chinese were very well provided for and lived 'exceedingly well'. (47)
Gow commented that as the years passed, the contracts gradually grew smaller, the pine forests were killed by the 'merciless chopping down of the small pine scrub and the ringing of the larger timber'. The box trees were also ringed, which was often followed up by subsequent grubbing of the shoots or suckers. Seedlings also had to be dealt with again. Gooey's last large contract of any kind in the Riverina was on Barellan Station at the end of 1910. It comprised 2,428 hectares (6,000 acres) and was undertaken by a gang of eleven men. Gow also commented that some stations employed Chinese as gardeners and cooks but that these men would be moved like pawns by the ruling Chinese, such as Sam Yett, who always had other labourers to take their place. Sam Yett worked closely with Wong Gooey. Ah Sam and Ah Hem were two other local contractors who were rivals of Gooey. According to Bill Gammage, George Hock Shung succeeded Sam Yett on his death in 1903, though he may have succeeded to the business well before that. One of the Deniliquin contractors was Ah Sue. In early 1894 he had about sixty men working at Hartwood and Coree stations. He purchased his goods from a Melbourne merchant and had them sent to Sing Lee's store in town. (48)
By any measure, the size of the contracts was enormous and the environmental impact can only be guessed at for the present. In 1881 a correspondent in the Sydney Morning Herald reported that ringbarking of trees upon pastoral leases had increased 'to an alarming extent' as there were 'perfect armies of Chinamen [sic] going about ringbarking every tree at the rate of 9d per acre'. He had a particular concern with squatters who engaged Chinese labour to ringbark all trees, including the more valuable ones. They claimed the cost of ringbarking as a land improvement, thus thwarting the free selectors from going onto the land. In 1883 an official report stated that in County Townsend, 83 percent of the timber on farming and pastoral land had been ringbarked. Throughout the 1880s, newspapers advertised thousands of hectares of 'ringing and suckering'. Almost all of this work was conducted by Chinese labour (49) In 1890 a correspondent for the Sydney Morning Herald stated that the manager of Coan Downs, a property of 97,126 hectares (240,000 acres) north of Hillston, had remarked that if it had not been for the Chinese labourers, the station would never have been cleared. As a consequence he had ringbarked more land than any other station in the neighbourhood, increasing the stock-carrying capacity enormously. (50)
The effect of these activities was to remove an enormous number of trees and to increase significantly the stock that could be supported on such properties. For instance, on Brookong station the landowner, the Honorable William Halliday, a member of the NSW Legislative Council, employed Chinese labourers to such good effect that he nearly bankrupted himself with payment of their contracts. However, in the process he increased the carrying capacity of his property by the 1890s from 90,000 to 300,000 sheep. Buxton has commented that some blamed the rapid spread of pine scrub to this activity, but, more critically, the removal of trees also hastened the loss of topsoil in the dry years. In the drought-stricken years of the mid-1890s and early 1900s the consequences would have been very severe. The terrible dust storms that dumped topsoil as far away as Canberra and Sydney in more recent drought years were a solemn reminder of the environmental impact of land clearing. (51)
The adverse environmental impact of land clearing differs enormously from the environmental benefits associated with Chinese land reclamation and flood mitigation in California, in particular in the Sacramento-San Joaquin deltas. Chan has stated that from the early 1850s to the early 1880s the reclamation work and levee building was done mainly by 'wheelbarrow brigades' of Chinese labourers employed by both individual landowners and land-reclamation corporations. In some instances these projects were 'thousands and thousands of acres' in extent but are unlikely to have matched in area the land-clearing exercises in NSW. These different activities are a reflection of the different physical environments and economic opportunities in California and NSW and the varied ways in which Chinese labour was used. (52)
North and west of the Riverina, or more specifically Hillston, the farming was (and still is) almost wholly pastoral and the country is predominantly arid. The copper- and gold-mining booms gave rise to new towns such as South Mount Hope, Mount Hope, Nymagee, Mount Allen, Shuttleton, Gilgunnia, Mount Drysdale, and, the largest of them all, Cobar. A correspondent for the Town and Country. Journal in 1888 stated that the population of Nymagee included about 1,200 Europeans and a large number of Chinese, of whom there were between 800 and 1,000 in the district. They had about a dozen bark houses and huts in the eastern part of the town and were engaged primarily in scrub cutting and ringbarking, although they also had several market gardens around the town. It was stated that they were generally under the control of two or three headmen, who took contracts on the various stations at prices that 'literally defy competition." (53)
The correspondent stated that there were about 200 Chinese cutting and burning scrub on Coan Downs, while 24,280 hectares (60,000 acres) were to be cleared at Yathong, and large contracts had been let on various other runs. The price for clearing scrub and ringbarking the old pines ranged from 1s.7d to 2s.9d an acre, according to the density and growth of the scrub, and the work for the second and third cuttings took a correspondingly low rate. The three cuttings necessary to clear the run of scrub cost upwards of 4s.6d an acre. One squatter had commented that Europeans were no good at that type of work: They can't do it at the price, and if they take a contract they only do so to get a draw of rations and then clear out and take the tools with them. It's quite different with the Chinese; we only deal with the head man, and whatever price he accepts the work is always done, even when they can't earn tucker at it, and then they don't get drunk, and kick up rows. (54) The Sydney Morning Herald correspondent, referred to earlier, stated that in 1890 nearly all the pastoralists to whom he had spoken had the same opinion of the Chinese. It was not so much that they were cheaper, for in many cases the Chinese received the same wages or even more than the Europeans; it was because they were steadier and more reliable. He stated that as cooks and gardeners they were invaluable and produced nearly all the vegetables grown in the bush. They also turned their hand to rabbiting in some cases and were found ready to do nearly all the rough work on the stations. (55)
Similar observations were made by Lancashire in his study of the Chinese in northeast Victoria. He argued that it was not so much the cheapness of the Chinese labour that was attractive to employers, but their greater reliability. In 1888 the Chinese were described by one correspondent as 'sober, persevering, industrious and trustworthy', whereas the Europeans were 'very apt to go upon a spree or to strike for higher wages at the very moment it is most essential that the operations of the vineyards should be pursued without an hour's intermission'. The wages paid to the Chinese were generally lower than those paid to Europeans but not significantly so and could be more a result of expectations by the Chinese labourers rather than oppressive bargaining by the wine producers. (56)
Lancashire also refers to the employment of the Wahgunyah Chinese in the Riverina and northern Victorian pastoral properties in land clearing, dam building, and fencing, and occasionally as shearers during the 1890s shearer's strikes. He takes both Gammage and Buxton to task for implying that the Chinese were preferred because they could be exploited by the landowners for low wages. As already noted, the men were employed under contract, which involved a bargaining process with the employer--the rates were mutually agreed upon, not imposed. Chinese entrepreneurs in Wahgunyah also acted as contractors for these men.
The organisation and payment of Chinese rural labour in California was very similar to the system applying in NSW. Chan refers to the existence of pseudo labour organisations as a type of employment agency for the recruiting and hiring of Chinese labour for seasonal jobs. The extent to which formal organisations were used is less clear in NSW, although Lancashire and Gammage state that the Narrandera Chinese were members of the See Yap Society, which operated as a cooperative and was particularly strong in Victoria. Lancashire comments that there is evidence of organised networking of the Chinese into the Riverina from Victoria. However, the need for large and immediate labour recruitment was less likely than in California, for land clearing was less seasonal in nature and less immediate in its labour demands.
In California, as in NSW, much of the recruitment took place in the local Chinatowns or Chinese camps, although labourers were also recruited from the cities. The labour contractors were often the local merchants, who charged a fee for their service but probably made most of their money by provisioning the men. All payments were made through the contractors rather than to individual Chinese labourers. Chinese labour was only slightly cheaper than European labour, for the Chinese had a firm idea of what was an acceptable wage. Contract rates were determined by a form of collective bargaining, and occasionally strikes were resorted to. (57) The similarities in labour organisation for Chinese workers in the Australian pastoral industry and the Californian agricultural industry are striking.
Chinese involvement in market gardening was an important activity in most areas of NSW, including the and far west. At the Chinese camps it was conducted on land leased from either Europeans or other Chinese. Gardens were also established on many pastoral stations. Sucheng Chan has commented that the Californian Chinese have left behind them few visible marks on the landscape. This is not the case in NSW The remains of some camps and a large number of market gardens are still visible today. Those in the Braidwood District have already been mentioned. But perhaps more impressive are the gardens in the arid far west. The reasons for their preservation are not hard to find: their location on pastoral land that is rarely if ever cultivated and the massive rural depopulation that has accompanied farm amalgamation and mechanisation throughout Australia during the twentieth century Between Hillston and Cobar, but not including those two towns, there was a peak population between 1890 and 1910 of at least 10,000, courtesy of the mining industry. Now there would barely be 200.
At the former gold-mining town of Gilgunnia, a market garden was established by Charley Chin, who conveyed water to the garden by a water race from the gold battery dam (a dam used to store water for the gold-crushing plant). The water was held at the garden in another smaller dam and carried to the plants in two large buckets (holding between eighteen and twenty litres in each (between four and six gallons) on either end of a shoulder yoke. Remains of his garden can still be seen today and include the water race, internal dam, parts of a wooden, iron, and wire fence mounted on an embankment that surrounded the garden, and two live quince trees (Figure 8). At the former gold-mining town of Mount Allen, the mine tank or dam was built by Chinese labour and is marked on survey maps as the 'Chinaman's dam'. It covered an area of several acres. A similar dam or tank is reputed to have been built by Chinese labour at the now abandoned copper-mining town of Shuttleton near Nymagee. Allegedly, Chinese market gardens were located at Mount Hope and on Coan Downs station. (58)
[FIGURE 8 OMITTED]
A market garden was also located on Bedooba Station north of Mount Hope. Remains include a dam, a fruit tree, household items such as cast iron stoves, and an array of improvised agricultural items, one of which is a single-blade plough and seeder (Figure 9). Gardens also existed at Nymagee and at Nymagee station. The former is now the site of a new town dam, but part of the Chinese camp and a few mulberry and quince trees remain. More remarkable still are the gardens on Nymagee station. Water was diverted to the garden from a soakage and overflow area by a wing dam (a dam which channels water flows) and a small water race. The remains of the garden are still in existence today and include the embankments, beds, parts of the fences, internal channels, reservoirs or pits, countless mulberry, fig, quince, and other fruit trees, and a slab hut (Figure 10). (59)
[FIGURES 9-10 OMITTED]
Further north is the much larger and more resilient mining town of Cobar. Here there were several large Chinese gardens. My information on the Chinese people at Cobar has been gleaned from the reminiscences of a local resident, Alan Delaney, who went to school at Cobar in the 1940s and 1950s. According to Alan there were two market gardens in the town. The main one was owned by Mah Mong and existed into the 1940s until a disastrous fire levelled his large two-story building, which was located on the garden. It is today the site of a housing development and motel. According to Alan there were upwards of 500 Chinese in the town, almost all of whom worked for Mah Mong either on the gardens or as contract labourers on pastoral stations. The siting of the market gardens shows an ingenious attention to the harnessing of scarce water resources, for although the fall of land is not large, the stormwater flows were captured from several directions via large eroded gullies on the edge of the roads. During storms, the water and silt were channelled into stone and wooden sluice gates and then conveyed into two large dams in the gardens. From the dams, the water was pumped into a tall water tower and from there reticulated into the gardens.
The second garden also utilised storm-water flows. It was located at the other end of town and used storm-water flows through the railway culverts. The water was channelled into two large dams and from thence pumped to the gardens and a large tank. Remarkably, part of the gardens, including the two dams, the tank, pipes, and remains of the petrol-powered pump can still be seen today. Cobar's large Chinese population in the 1940s is testament to the resilience and perseverance of the Chinese in rural NSW. The use of stormwater flows and accompanying silt deposits is similar to the methods utilised in the more fertile and heavily populated areas of China, as recounted by Franklin King in 1911. (60) The same practice must have been used in the more arid areas of China as well, though King did not visit them.
Another market garden is located on Mount Drysdale station, about thirty-four kilometres north of Cobar. The station was the site of important gold-mining activity in the 1890s and 1930s, which gave rise to two towns, Mount Drysdale and West Drysdale. These gardens are largely intact and include wooden, iron, and wire-netting fences, a gateway, a pipe that took water from the base of a large mine dam to a small holding tank sunk in the middle of the garden, irrigation channels, and stockyards. According to the owners of Mount Drysdale, Michael and Shirley Mitchell, several hundred Chinese men were engaged in ringbarking on an adjoining property.There was a large Chinese camp and several Chinese market gardens at Bourke further north toward the Queensland border. A large garden was located near the weir on the Darling River, and there are indications that water was raised in a similar manner to that described by Franklin King in China in 1911, although in later years a petrol-powered pump was used. Water was channelled into open 900-litre (about 200-gallon) tanks and taken from the tanks by watering cans on shoulder yokes. The garden was abandoned in the 1920s. There were three other gardens in town, the largest of which covered 2.4 hectares (six acres) and employed eleven men. Water was obtained by wells and distributed originally by hand; pumps were introduced later. Bourke was one of the few towns in western NSW where there were also European gardeners. There were Chinese employment agencies and contractors in Bourke for gardeners, cooks, and ringbarkers. One local recalled his invitation to a feast by sixteen such workers in about 1910. The ringbarking frontier had obviously spread well north of Cobar by the 1890s and by the turn of the century possibly into Queensland as well. (61)
Market gardens were also located at the mining towns of Broken Hill, Silverton, and Milparinka near the South Australian border. At the former locale, a garden is located on Clevedale station, about five kilometres east of the town. The embankments for the garden and some internal galvanised fencing similar to that at Mount Drysdale still remain together with two ship's tanks for storing water, a large boiler, and the remains of an elderly motor vehicle. Water was obtained from a nearby well, now the site of a windmill. At Silverton, the precursor to Broken Hill, the Chinese gardeners were amongst the first business people to arrive in the town and by May 1884 had commenced work on the establishment of a garden. (62)
Chinese market gardeners also played a very important part in the sustenance of the then typhoid-stricken gold-mining town of Milparinka, located in the arid and remote northwest of NSW. The gardens were situated on the floodplain of Evelyn Creek, which is more often dry than running, and were watered from a fifteen-metre well. (63) In 1881 the Warden commented that the improvement in the general health of the inhabitants was 'in some degree ... attributable to the good supply of vegetables raised by the Chinese gardeners', of whom there were eight employed on two gardens. The following year he commented that the gardeners had been very successful in supplying vegetables at reasonable prices. They had grown potatoes, and the following year they expected to have peaches, pears, and grapes in bearing. (64)
CONCLUSIONS
The Chinese presence in southern and western NSW was significant, both demographically and economically, and was evidence of an important pattern of migration from the goldfields and gold mining to other rural areas and rural occupations. In the Riverina and western NSW the shift can be seen in terms of a large and sustained migratory movement across the landscape, spanning a period of well over fifty years. From a settlement viewpoint this demographic shift was highly significant and in numbers comparable with the Chinese presence in the Cairns district of North Queensland. Outside the more familiar gold rushes (and the tin-mining boom in northern NSW) they constitute perhaps the most significant examples of intranational ethnic migration movements in Australia. They involved the opening up of large tracts of land, in one instance primarily for agriculture and the other for pastoralism. Both also had important social and other economic consequences for their regions. These characteristics were shared by Chinese agriculturists and farm labourers in California. The similarities do not end there but also include the establishment of Chinatowns or camps, the type of labour organisation, and contract bargaining. There were differences in racial attitudes and outcomes, but generally the Chinese who were involved in agriculture and pastoralism fared better than their colleagues on the mining fields in both NSW and California.
Depiction of the Chinese in rural and regional Australia and California as downtrodden and exploited peasant workers is inaccurate. The Chinese labourers and gardeners were very much in charge of their own destiny. They could bargain for their rates and provided a labour source that was highly sought after by their employers. Their social system was very highly organised, and they utilised networks of contractors and suppliers, most of whom were men of considerable standing within the predominantly European towns. In Australia it would appear that there was a greater percentage of married Chinese in rural and regional Australia than on the goldfields. There is, however, much that we do not know about their social organisation, for instance, the degree of separateness or assimilation by the Chinese people into the wider Australian community, the importance of family and gender, and the dynamics of race relations. Neither do we know for certain their provenance or their ultimate destination, that is, what proportion returned to China, settled in other rural areas or in cities such as Sydney, and what occupations they then followed.
In Australia the market gardens provide an excellent and persuasive example of environmental and technological adaptation, particularly in the use of scarce water resources. Clearly the Chinese market gardeners were very skilled and innovative workers, and many rural and outback communities were dependent upon them for the provision of fresh fruit and vegetables. At this stage I would suggest that it is possible to develop a typology of Chinese market gardens in rural and regional Australia, but of course more examples are needed. The spread of the ringbarking frontier had perhaps even more important implications, namely the dramatic changes wrought upon the rural landscape through the wholesale removal of forests. High levels of skill and application by the Chinese contract gangs made the environmental impact of these activities all the more significant, but the full import of these developments has yet to be assessed.
Material evidence such as the remains of camps and market gardens is of significant heritage value. Finding any garden in Australia that is over 100 years old is remarkable enough, but even more so where the gardens are in much the same condition as they were when abandoned. The secrets that the Chinese market gardens are yielding in water management techniques, adaptability, and inventiveness are even more revealing. Whether the material evidence in California is of a similar order is another matter. Chan suggests otherwise, but perhaps this too is a matter for further consideration.
NOTES
(1.) Ringbarking was used extensively to remove unwanted trees. The tree was incised at a depth of several inches around its girth by a small axe used at about shoulder height. In due course the tree would die. Smaller scrub would also have been cut and in both instances the suckers and new shoots grubbed out.
(2.) Sucheng Chan, This Bitter Sweet Soil: The Chinese in California Agriculture, 1860-1910 (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1986); Andrew Markus, Fear and Hatred: Purifying Australia & California 1850-1901 (Sydney: Hale & Ire-monger, 1979); David Goodman, Gold Seeking: Victoria and California in the 1850s (St. Leonards: Allen & Unwin, 1994). Markus also comments on race relations in rural California and Australia.
(3.) Sucheng Chan, This Bittersweet Soil, 403; C. Y. Choi, Chinese Migration and Settlement in Australia (Sydney: Sydney University Press, 1975), 28-33. Choi was not the first to discuss the varied occupations of the Chinese. That honour belongs to Ann Curthoys in her unpublished PhD thesis, 'Race & Ethnicity: A Study of the Response of British Colonists to Aborigines, Chinese and NonBritish Europeans in New South Wales, 1856-1881', PhD (Macquarie University, Sydney: Ann Curthoys, 1973): Cathie May, Topsawyers: The Chinese in Cairns 1870 to 1920, Studies in North Queensland History no.6 (Townsville: History Department, James Cook University, 1984). Another important regional study was Timothy Jones, The Chinese in the Northern Territory (Darwin: Northern Territory University Press, 1990), though this dealt mainly with the Chinese role in mining.
(4.) On the urban Chinese see Shirley Fitzgerald, Red Tape, Gold Scissors--The Story of Sydney's Chinese (Sydney: State Library of New South Wales Press in association with the City of Sydney, 1996) and Jane Lydon, 'Many Inventions: Historical Archaeology and the Chinese in the Rocks, Sydney 1890-1930', MA (Canberra: Australian National University, 1996). On the Riverina studies see Bill Gammage, Narrandera Shire (Narrandera: Narrandera Shire Council, 1986) and Geoffrey Buxton, The Riverina, 1861-1891 (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1967).
(5.) Andrew Markus, 'Chinese in Australian History', Meanjin 42, no. 1 (1983): 85-93; Kathryn Cronin, Colonial Casualties: Chinese in Early Victoria (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 1982). I have commented upon the race debate in a recent article, "Reconsidering Race: The Chinese Experience on the Goldfields of Southern New South Wales', Australian Historical Studies 36, no. 124 (October 2004): 312-332. 'White' and European' were interchangeable terms, with the latter predominant, particularly in official documents such as mining reports.
(6.) Rod Lancashire, 'European-Chinese Economic Interaction. A Pre-Federation Rural Australian Setting', Rural Society 10, no. 2 (2000): 229-241.
(7.) Ian Jack, 'Some Less Familiar Aspects of the Chinese in 19th-century Australia', in The Overseas Chinese in Australasia: History Settlement and Interactions, eds. Henry Chan, Ann Curthoys, and Nora Chiang, Monograph 3 (Canberra: National Taiwan University and Australian National University, 2001), 44-54; Maxine Darnell, 'Law and the Regulation of Life: The Case of Indentured Chinese Labourers', in The Overseas Chinese in Australasia, eds. Chan, et al., 54-69. See also Ian Jack, 'The Contribution of Archaeology, to the History of the Overseas Chinese', in Chinese in Australia and New Zealand, ed. Jan Ryan (New Delhi: New Age International, 1995).
(8.) Warwick Frost, 'Migrants and Technological Transfer: Chinese Farming in Australia, 1850-1920', Australian Economic History Review 42, no. 2 (2002): 113-131.
(9.) Eric Rolls, The Sojourners: The Epic Story of China's Century-Old Relationship with Australia (Brisbane: University of Queensland Press, 1992); Shen Yuanfang, Dragonseed in the Antipodes (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2001): 48-49.
(10.) Henry Reynolds, North of Capricorn (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 2003); Janis Wilton, Golden Threads, The Chinese in Regional New South Wales 1850-1950 (Armidale: New England Regional Art Museum in association with Powerhouse Publishing, 2004).
(11.) Journal of Australian Colonial History. 'Active Voices: Hidden Histories: The Chinese in Colonial Australia', Special Issue 6 (2004); Sophie Couchman, John Fitzgerald, and Paul Macgregor, eds., After the Rush. Regulation, Participation, and Chinese Communities in Australia 1860-1940 (Melbourne: Otherland, 2004).
(12.) Zvonka, Stanin, 'From Li Chun to Yong Kit: A Market Garden on the Loddon, 1851-1912', Journal of Australian Colonial History (2004), 15-34. In the same journal I refer in some detail to Chinese market-gardening activities on the Braidwood goldfields in NSW, and Keir Reeves has commented on Chinese market gardens in the Castlemaine (Mount Alexander) area. Barry McGowan, 'The Chinese on the Braidwood Goldfields: Historical and Archaeological Opportunities', 35-58; Keir Reeves, 'A Songster, a Sketcher and the Chinese on Central Victoria's Mount Alexander Diggings: Case Studies in Cultural Complexity during the Second Half of the Nineteenth Century', 175-192. Recent accounts of Chinese market gardens in urban areas include Colleen Morris, 'Chinese Market Gardens in Sydney', Australian Garden History 12, no.5 (March/April 2001): 4-7; Sandra Pullman, 'Along Melbourne's Rivers and Creeks', Australian Garden History 12, no.5 (March/April 2001): 9-10; and Karla Whitmore, Willoughby's 'Chinese Market Gardens,' unpublished paper, January, 2004.
(13.) Frost, 'Migrants and Technological Transfer', 116; Martin Brennan, 'Chinese Camps', Votes and Proceedings New South Wales Legislative Assembly, 1883-1884, vol.2 (Sydney).
(14.) I have defined southern NSW to include the Goulburn district in the north, the Braidwood and coastal districts in the east, south to the Victorian border (part of which includes the Murray River), and to the west, Australia's main arterial road, the Hume Highway. Western NSW includes the Riverina district, which is bordered by the Murray and Murrumbidgee rivers, the districts north of the Murrumbidgee River toward Cobar and the Queensland border, and west toward the South Australian border.
(15.) Choi, Chinese Migration and Settlement, 28.
(16.) Choi, Chinese Migration and Settlement, 30-31.
(17.) Town and Country Journal, 5 February 1870; J. E. Hodghin in Australia, 1896, Book 8 (place of publication unknown: Jonathon Edward Hodgkin, 1896).
(18.) Barry McGowan, 'Dust and Dreams: A Mining and Social History of Southern New South Wales, 1850-1914', PhD (Australian National University, Canberra: Barry McGowan, 2001): 126, 133.
(19.) Mary Anne Bunn, The Lonely Pioneer, William Bunn, Diarist, 1830-1901 (Braidwood: St Omer Pastoral Co, 2002): 735. Photographs courtesy of Ms Rosslyn Maddrell, Braidwood.
(20.) Account books, Glendaurel, provided by Geoff Hassall.
(21.) Oral account by Rachel Burgess, October 2002.
(22.) On Craigie see Town and Country Journal, 18 February 1871; Sydney Morning Herald, 17 November 1860, 18 July 1871; Bombala & District Historical Society, Craigie Excursion on Saturday 31 October 1998 (Bomhala, Bombala & District historical Society. 1998). On Nerrigundah see M.J. Burdett, Nerrigundah: An Anecdotal History (Nerrigundah, J.D & M.J. Burdett): 21-28; Lindsay Smith, Archaeological Excavations at Nerrigundah, NSW, May/June 2000 (Canberra: Lindsay Smith, 2000): 9-10; NSW Department of Mines, Annual Report (Sydney, NSW Department of Mines, 1879): 53; (1880): 63; (1881); (1882): 32.
(23.) Jack Bridle, 'Memories and Information of the Chinese', Memories of Tumut Plains, residents and ex residents (Tumut, Wilkie Watson, 1993): 12-14; Kerry Kell, 'Agriculture at Tumut Plains', Memories of Tumut Plains, 24-25; Malcolm Moy, 'The Moy Family', Memories of Tumut Plains, 64. Discussions with Bill Moy, 2000-2001. Jack recalled the following: a farmer known as Hing, who farmed on Frank Bourke's property at Blowering; Bo Long who farmed on property owned in the 1980s by Ray Binks; a row of huts at Bromley's Lagoon, now part of Wunelli, where two of the men were Dang Gow and Ah Won; a little further down toward the Washpen Lagoon lived Ping Kee, who was married to a European; Wu Ming, who lived on Atkinson's property; two more on George Sturt's property; a further two at Frank Malone's, one of whom was called We Hip; Tun Li and Sun Yet at Little River; another small colony on the Tumut side of the Junction bridge, one of whom was Ah Chee; and Ah Kim, who lived on Bombowlee.
(24.) May, Topsawyers, 9-20, 48, 162-184.
(25.) Chan, This Bitter Sweet Soil, 203-263,340-360.
(26.) 'Chinese (Information Respecting, Resident in the Colony)', Votes and Proceedings, New South Wales Legislative Assembly 7 (Sydney:, New South Wales Legislative Assembly, 1878-1879): 2-3. The total population of the camps was 942, of whom 800 were Chinese men, 68 were children, and 36 were European women married to Chinese. There were 37 European female prostitutes.
(27.) May, Topsawyers, 13-14.
(28.) Martin Brennan, 'Chinese Camps', Votes and Proceedings New South Wales Legislative Assembly, 1883-1884, vol.2.
(29.) Buxton, The Riverina, 224; Chan, This Bitter Sweet Soil, 305, 351-355.
(30.) Brennan, 'Chinese Camps', 1; Gammage, Narrandera Shire, 141-144.
(31.) Brennan, 'Chinese Camps', 2-5. Almost all of the camps were located on low-lying, poorly drained ground, an inevitability given their location on or near the river banks, and while there were houses of a good standard, many were in a poor state of repair, often poorly ventilated and with inadequate toilet facilities. A good proportion of the European women were prostitutes. The development of mixed race communities was a source of strong concern for many Europeans in colonial Australia. John Hirst has argued that the theme of purity and whiteness was evident in the celebrations for federation and that the Chinese were seen as a threat to that national ideal. These concerns were given formal expression in the introduction of the Immigration Restriction Act of 1901 and the White Australia Policy John Hirst, 'The Chinese and Federation', in After the Rush, eds. Couchman, et al., 18-19. Successful multiracial societies had been developed in many parts of north Australia, and these were seen as a particular threat. Reynolds provides an excellent account of these communities in his book, North of Capricorn: Attitudes to European Women Cohabiting with Chinese Men. Chinese men can be seen in the same light. Pauline Rule has argued that many of these women were seen as 'beyond the margins of so-called 'respectable society' because of desertion, poverty, alcoholism, birth of an illegitimate child, or prostitution'. Pauline Rule, 'The Chinese Camps in Colonial Victoria. Their Role as Contact Zones', in After the Rush, eds. Couchman, et al., 126-129. Dinah Hale has argued that the contemporary stereotype of these women as 'lazy, mostly Irish, prostitutes, opium addicts, degraded creatures' was misplaced and not supported by the evidence. Dinah Hales, 'Lost Histories: Chinese-European Families of Central Western New South Wales, 1850-1880, Active Voices, Hidden Histories, 93-112. Heather Hoist has commented that 'European women lost their racial privileges by their association with the Chinese, faring worse in court than their Chinese husbands or other European women'. Heather Hoist, 'Equal before the Law? The Chinese in the Nineteenth-Century Castlemaine Police Courts', Active Voices, Hidden Histories, 135. However, as Rule has commented, there were certainly some unruly elements among them and the Chinese men were often the victims, a point also made in the Brennan report. It should also be noted that mixed-race communities did not just involve the Chinese and Europeans but also other ethnic groups such as Pacific Islanders, the Aboriginal people, and other Asian peoples, for instance, Japanese and Malays. On this point see Penny Edwards and Shen Yuanfang, Lost in the Whitewash, Aboriginal-Asian Encounters in Australia, 1901-2001 (Canberra: Humanities Research Centre, Australian National University, 2003).
(32.) No Chinese artifacts have yet been found, although this could be explained by subsequent European occupation and the deposition of topsoil drift.
(33.) The Riverine Grazier, 4 May, 8 June 1881; The Dusts of Time, Lake Cargelligo And District 1873-1973 (author and place of publication unknown: publisher unknown, 1973): 54.
(34.) Hillston Spectator, 2 February 1895; The Riverine Grazier, 5, 8, 19 February, 5 April 1895.
(35.) Franklin Hiram King, Farmers of Forty Centuries, Organic Farming in China, Korea and Japan (New York: Dover Publications, 2004): 115. This is a reprint of the 1911 edition.
(36.) Tom E. Parr, Reminiscences of a NSW South West Settler (New York: A Hearthstone Book, Carlton Press, Inc, 1977): 14-16, Michelle Grattan, Back on the Wool Track (Sydney: Random House, 2004): 296-297.
(37.) The topic of European-Aboriginal relations in Australia has been discussed and debated intensely for many years and is ongoing. It is the most contested area of history in Australia. For a good account of the current debate see Stuart Macintyre and Anna Clark, The History Wars (Melbourne: Melbourne University Press, 2003).
(38.) Other large ethnic groups included the Japanese and Malays, most of whom worked in the pearling industry, and Pacific Islanders, who worked on sugar plantations in North Queensland. On the Californian comparison, see Markus, Fear and Hatred, 1-34. Goodman, Gold Seeking, 64-104. For a thorough account of the Lambing Flat riots see Ann Curthoys, '"Men of All Nations, except Chinamen": Europeans and Chinese on the Goldfields of New South Wales', in Gold: Forgotten Histories and Lost Objects of Australia, eds., Iain McCalman, Alexander Cook, and Andrew Reeves (Melbourne: University of Cambridge Press, 2001): 103-123. On the Buckland, the expulsions resulted in the deaths of several Chinese from wounds and exposure and the formation of anti-Chinese leagues (after the event). The police intervened, restoring a measure of order, reinstating some Chinese, and arresting the main European culprits, several of whom were convicted and jailed. A formal Chinese protectorate was established; henceforth the Chinese on the Buckland and nearby Beechworth fields were to reside in separate camps as far as possible from the Europeans. For a detailed account of the Buckland riots see Carole Woods, Beechworth: A Titan's Field (North Melbourne: Hargreen Publishing Company, 1985): 61-65.
(39.) Chan, This Bitter Sweet Soil, 370-396; Markus, Feat And Hatred, 50-52.
(40.) The Riverine Grazier, 1 June, 13 August 1881, 18 January, 14 June 1882.
(41.) A brief account of the American legislation is contained in Markus, Feat and Hatred, 157-159. The 1901 legislation created a class of people entitled to remain in Australia but who could not become citizens unless they had already been naturalised. They were known as 'domiciles'. Each time a domicile travelled outside Australia they were issued with a Certificate Exempting from Dictation Test (CEDT). The dictation test was used to exclude new arrivals and was not abolished until 1958. Chinese and those from other ethnic groups could be admitted temporarily as merchants, students, and tourists or as assistant or substitute workers. The 1901 legislation was not just aimed at the Chinese but all ethnic groups. On pre-and post-Federation immigration restrictions, see John Hirst, 'The Chinese and Federation', in After the Rush, eds. Couchman, et al., 11-21, Michael Williams, 'Would This Not Help Your Federation?', in After the Rush, eds. Couchman, et al., 35-51; Andrew Markus, 'Reflections on the Administration of the 'White Australia' Immigration Policy', in After the Rush, eds. Couchman, et al., 51-59,
(42.) John Merritt, The Making of the AWU (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1986): 144-149,176, 186-187, 199-205.
(43.) Deniliquin Pastoral Times, July 16 1870, quoted in William E. Mulham, The Best Crossing Place (place of publication and publisher unknown: 1994): 9-10.
(44.) Sherry Morris, 'The Chinese Quarter in Wagga Wagga in the 1889s', Newsletter of the Wagga Wagga and District Historical Society Inc, no. 276 (June-July 1992): 5-6.
(45.) May, Topsawyers, 143-168.
(46.) Lancashire, 'European-Chinese Economic Interaction', 238.
(47.) Barellan Progress Association and Improvement Society, Early DWs in Barellan and District (Barellan: publisher unknown, 1975): 35-40.
(48.) Barellan Progress Association and Improvement Society, Early Days in Barellan and District, 20-23, 50-54; Buxton, The Riverina, 262-3,280; Deniliquin Pastoral Times, 19 January 1894.
(49.) Buxton, The Riverina, 247-248; The Sydney Morning Herald in The Riverine Grazier, 11 June 1881.
(50.) Sydney Morning Herald, 30 December 1890.
(51.) Peter Freeman, The Homestead: A Riverina Anthology (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1982), 150; Buxton, The Riverina, 248.
(52.) Chan, This Bittersweet Soil, 158-189
(53.) Ibid.
(54.) Town and Country Journal, 19 May 1888.
(55.) Sydney Morning Herald, 30 December 1890. (56.) Lancashire, 'European-Chinese Economic Interaction', 232-235.
(57.) Chan, This Bitter Sweet Soil, .292-350.
(58.) The 'Chinaman's dam' is marked on the Mount Allen 1:100,000 topographic map; other information is from local residents.
(59.) Leila Alderdyce, Gilgunnia. A Special Place (Young: Leila Alderdyce, 1994) 24-25, 28-29; 22, Dolly Betts, Out Outback Home. Memories of Nymagee (Dubbo, Nymagee CWA, 2003): 30.
(60.) Franklin Hiram King, Farmers of Forty Centuries. Organic-Farming in China, Korea and Japan (New York, Dover Publications, 2004): 173-175.
(61.) Information provided by Barbara Hickson, March 2005: Western Herald, 13 April 1973; Bourke Banner, 1 March 1899.
(62.) Adelaide Observer, 17 May 1884.
(63.) G. Svenson, 'Marginal People: The Archaeology and History of the Chinese at Milparinka', MA (University of Sydney, Sydney: G. Svenson, 1994): 131.
(64.) NSW Department of Mines, Annual Report (Sydney: NSW Department of Mines, 1882): 98-99; (1883): 115-116.
TABLE 1. CHINESE POPULATION IN METROPOLITAN AREAS OF AUSTRALIA (AFTER CHOI, 1975, P.30) Metropolitan area 1871 1901 Colony (State) Number Percent Number Percent Sydney (NSW) 336 4.65 3,474 33.98 Melbourne (Victoria) 614 3.44 2,431 38.30 Brisbane (Queensland) 14 1.42 258 5.32 TABLE 2. CHINESE MALES IN MAJOR OCCUPATIONS NSW and Victoria, 1901 (after Choi, 1975, p.31) Occupations NSW Victoria Number Percent * Number Percent Miners 1,019 10.22 1,296 21.17 Market gardeners 3,564 35.76 2,022 33.02 Pastoral workers 469 4.71 27 0.44 Other agriculture 353 3.54 515 8.41 Labourers 586 5.88 89 1.45 Domestic servants 593 5.95 100 1.63 Hotel workers ** 293 2.94 121 1.97 Merchants *** 1,376 13.80 753 12.31 Others 956 9.59 940 15.35 Total 9,209 92.39 5,863 95.75 * The percentage of total breadwinners includes other minor occupations not listed here. ** This category includes boarding-house workers. *** This category includes greengrocers, storekeepers, and hawkers.
NOTE: All illustrations and photos have been removed from this article.