Eureka Flag

The original Eureka Flag

The Eureka Flag is a design which features: a dark blue field 260 x 400 cm (2:3.08 ratio); a horizontal stripe 37 cm wide and a vertical line crossing it of 36 cm wide; and 5 eight pointed stars, the central star being 65 cm tall (point to point) and the other stars 60 cm tall, representing the Crux Australis constellation.

The design was first used for the war flag of the Eureka Rebellion of 1854 at Ballarat in Victoria, Australia. Rebels swore an oath to the flag as a symbol of defiance at its first flying at Bakery Hill and 22 were killed at the Eureka Stockade defending the original flag (now held at the Ballarat Fine Art Gallery).

The flag design has gained wider notability in Australian culture due to its adoption by radicals as a symbol of democracy, and general purpose symbol of protest , mainly in relation to a variety of anti-establishment, non-conformist causes. It is listed as an object of state heritage significance on the Victorian Heritage Register and was named as a Victorian Icon by the National Trust in 2006.

History

Design and composition

It was designed by Canadian miner "Captain" Henry Ross, a member of the Ballarat Reform League, with the central feature being the Southern Cross. According to some historians, Ross was inspired by the design of the Australian Federation Flag and incorporated the eight star cross which was a symbol of the Reform League.

According to Frank Cayley's book, Flag of Stars, the flag's five stars represent the Southern Cross, and the white cross joining the stars represents unity in defiance. Professor Geoffrey Blainey has advanced the view, though, that the white cross behind the stars "really [is] an Irish cross rather than being [a] configuration of the Southern Cross". The design of the flag was taken by Captain Henry Ross, one of Eureka's miners and a Canadian expatriate, to three women, Anastasia Withers, Anne Duke and Anastasia Hayes, to sew up in time for a large rally at Bakery Hill, at 2.00 pm on 29 November 1854. There is no evidence on who exactly designed the flag, although Ross was known on the diggings as the 'bridegroom' of the miners flag.

"The flag is silk, blue ground with large silver cross; no device or arms, but all exceedingly chaste and natural."

Oath swearing at Bakery Hill

Swearing Allegiance to the Southern Cross on 1 December 1854 – watercolour by Charles Doudiet

It flew for the first time on Bakery Hill as a symbol of the resistance of the gold miners during the Eureka Stockade rebellion in the year 1854. Beneath this flag, Peter Lalor, leader of the Ballarat Reform League, swore this oath to the affirmation of his fellow demonstrators: "We swear by the Southern Cross to stand truly by each other and fight to defend our rights and liberties." According to the Ballarat Times, at "about eleven o'clock the 'Southern Cross' was hoisted, and its maiden appearance was a fascinating object to behold."

At the Eureka Stockade Battle

File:Union Jack at the Eureka Stockade.jpg

Ray Wenban, "The Revolt at Eureka", Pictorial Social Studies, Vol. 16, pp. 25.

The Eureka flag was flown at the centre of the stockade enclosure at the battle of the Eureka Stockade on 3 December 1854. During the battle Henry Ross was mortally wounded near the flagpole. Following the battle, it was torn down, trampled, hacked with swords and peppered with bullets by colonial troops.

When the first reports of the clash appeared in Melbourne the next day, readers of the Argus newspaper were told:

"The flag of the diggers, "The Southern Cross," as well as the "Union Jack," which they had to hoist underneath, were captured by the foot police."

There is some debate over whether this sole contemporaneous report of an otherwise unaccounted for Union Jack being present is accurate.

Post-battle preservation

Trooper John King retained the flag and it was held by his family for forty years until it was lent to the Ballarat Fine Art Gallery in 1895, where it remained in continued obscurity "under a cloud of skepticism and conservative disapproval"; bits of the flag were cut off and given to visiting dignitaries. Approximately 31% of the original specimen is missing.

The flag was "re-discovered" by Len Fox during the 1940's, but it took decades to convince authorities to properly authenticate the flag. it was found after World War II in a drawer at the gallery, discovered by members of the Australian Communist Party. The final irrefutable validation of its authentication occurred when sketchbooks of Canadian Charles Doudiet were put up for sale at a Christies auction in 1996. Two sketches in particular show the flag design as contained in the tattered remains of the flag at the Ballarat Fine Art Gallery. The remnant of the original Eureka Flag remains today, preserved for public display in Ballarat Fine Art Gallery, along with Doudiet's sketches.

In 2001, legal ownership of the flag was transferred to the Ballarat Fine Art Gallery, which expects the King family and the gallery to be acknowledged every time a replica of the original flag is displayed. It is listed as an object of state heritage significance on the Victorian Heritage Register and was named as an icon by the National Trust in 2006.

File:Eureka-restored.jpg

The restored original Eureka Flag (December 2011)

Symbolism, notability, and controversy

Since the original miners revolt at Eureka, the flag, born out of adversity, continues to be regarded by some as a symbol of nationalism closely associated with this struggle for democracy and unity.

In the event the design of the Australian National Flag is ever reviewed some republicans support the Eureka Flag being one of the options in a plebiscite.

Whilst some Australians view the Eureka Flag as a symbol of nationality (see Australian flag debate), it is more often employed by historical societies and re-enactors and by political radicals as a general purpose symbol of protest for a wide variety of anti-establishment non-conformist causes. The flag has been used as a symbol of rebellion by groups on both sides of the political spectrum, such as noted nationalistic group National Action and neo-Nazis, who see it as representative of the efforts of the miners to free themselves from what they view, depending on their political persuasion, as either political or economic oppression, and by white supremacists at flashpoints for racial confrontation. Along these lines, some also believe that the flag used during the Lambing Flat riots was a derivative of the Eureka Flag.

Usage

Post Eureka

A modern variation is central to the landmark architecture of the Eureka Centre.

ALP policy launch before a huge crowd in the Sydney Domain on 24 November 1975. Eureka flags can be seen in the crowd and on tribune

A similar flag was flown prominently above the Barcaldine strike camp of the 1891 Australian shearers' strike, and thus has had a strong association with the Australian labour movement from this time. Construction unions such as the Builders Labourers' Federation in particular adopted the Eureka flag, and it is one of the flags that flies permanently over the Melbourne Trades Hall.

Eureka flag was also used by supporters of William Gough Whitlam after he was dismissed as Prime Minister.

NSW Parliament Building, Macquarie Street, Sydney, 3 December 2004

The sesquicentenary of the Eureka Stockade occurred in December 2004, and the Eureka Flag was used extensively during the events that were organised to promote awareness of the occasion. It was flown within each State Parliament building in Australia, the Federal Senate, and most prominently atop the Sydney Harbour Bridge.

Deputy Prime Minister John Anderson made the Eureka flag a federal election campaign issue in 2004 saying "I think people have tried to make too much of the Eureka Stockade... trying to give it a credibility and standing that it probably doesn't enjoy."

The men and women of HMAS Ballarat, the second Royal Australian Navy ship to bear the name, wear Eureka Flag insignia on their uniforms.

Specifications

The dimensions of the Eureka flag are 260 cm × 400 cm (100 in × 160 in) (2:3.08 ratio). The horizontal cross is 37 cm wide and the vertical cross 36 cm wide. The central star is slightly larger than the others and is 65 cm tall (point to point) and the other stars 60 cm tall.

Standardised design

Standardised design

The modern design of the Eureka flag is an enhanced and different version from the 1854 original with blue key lines around each of five equal stars. It is frequently made in the proportions of 20:13. Although the flag is designed as a representation of the Southern Cross, a constellation located in southern skies and thus only visible to viewers in the southern hemisphere, the stars are arranged differently to the arrangement of stars in the constellation itself. The "middle" star (Epsilon Crucis) in the constellation is off-centre, and near to the edge of the "diamond", while the Eureka flag shows it in the centre. The Eureka flag is only a stylised version of the more widely known pattern.

Derivatives and popular culture

During the Lambing Flat riots in 1861, a series of violent anti-Chinese demonstrations that took place in the Burrangong region, in New South Wales, Australia, on the goldfields at Spring Creek, Stoney Creek, Back Creek, Wombat, Blackguard Gully, Tipperary Gully, and Lambing Flat (now Young, New South Wales), the Lambing Flat Banner was painted on a tent-flap, now on display at the Lambing Flat museum, bearing a Southern Cross superimposed over a St. Andrew's Cross with the inscription, 'Roll Up – No Chinese'; the banner has been claimed by some as a variant of the Eureka Flag, which served as an advertisement for a public meeting that presaged the Lambing Flat riots.

According to John Vaughan, vexillographer and former CEO of the Royal Australian Historical Society:

"It is a myth that the Eureka flag flown at the stockade rebellion in 1854 was the first Southern Cross emblem. The acknowledged designer, Henry Ross of Toronto, Canada, would have been influenced by the popularity of already existing starry flags and the 1831 design had its colours reversed to a blue field and white cross and the Union Jack deleted.

"The Eureka flag was lost to general public imagination until after WW2 when, for mainly political reasons it was re-discovered and promoted as a ‘rebel’ symbol."

In the 1949 motion picture, Eureka Stockade, the stars of the Eureka Flag featured were free floating as per the Australian National Flag, and not arrayed on a white cross.

Today the Eureka Flag has been adopted by a variety of groups, including the Builders Labourers Federation and the Australia First Party. The City of Ballarat and University of Ballarat, for instance have used stylised versions of the 'Southern Cross' in their official logo along with several trade unions and other associated groups.

Sporting clubs have also used the flag as a symbol including the Melbourne Victory and Melbourne Rebels. Melbourne Victory supporters adopted it as a club flag for its foundation year in 2004, however it was subsequently briefly banned at A-League games by the Football Federation of Australia, but rescinded in the face of criticism from the Victorian general public. The Football Federation of Australia claimed that the ban was 'unintentional'.

A Red Eureka Flag was used by Pro-Stalinists during the late 1970s early 1980s.As the design was little seen and the group using it was on fringe of the communist movement the Red Eureka flag soon disappeared from view. The Red Eureka flag has since been adopted by the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union. The AMWU, however, has no links to communism and is instead affiliated with the Australian Labor Party.

See also

• Silver fern flag
• Southern Cross Flag

External links

• Ballarat Fine Art Gallery
• He Found and Raised Eureka's Trampled Flag: a Tribute to Len Fox R.D. Walshe.
• Eureka Flag Information