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New South Wales government permitted occupation of pastoral land vvdth an annual
licence fee and many settlers flooded in from New South Wales and overseas to take
up land. Some time after Captain Hepburn's arrival, brothers by the name of Coghill
reached the district and took up land close by where they were the first to sow wheat.
By 1850, all the Port Phillip District, apart from the Mallee Desert and the mountains,
had been occupied by squatters and their 6,000,000 sheep. Melboume had a
population of 20,000 people^ and the ports of Geelong and Portland (ref figure 6)
were well developed.
On 1 July 1851, the Colony of Victoria was proclaimed and Charles Joseph La
Trobe became its first Govemor. It was only a matter of another four days, however,
before the peacefiil pastoral aspect of the Colony was to be transformed. Gold was
discovered at Andersons Creek, east of Melboume, and at Clunes, near Creswick. Jim
Crow, with its few settled squatters, became one scene of the great gold rush of
Australia. Gold was first discovered in the region in August 1851 by John Egan, a
settler from Ireland.^ Located in the region known as Wombat Flat, which has since
become Lake Daylesford (ref figure 9), its discovery, was quickly followed by a
second find a short time later. Thomas Connell was responsible for the second
discovery which occurred west of Daylesford in an area later named Connells Gully.'
The rich alluvial gold deposits attracted miners from all over the country and the news
soon spread overseas.
In December 1851, gold was found at Spring Creek not far from the site of the
present Savoia Hotel (ref figure 10) and the mining activity extended in that direction.
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