Golden Victoria

The discovery of gold in Victoria created years of wealth for the young colony.

Here was a metal that could liberate servants from their masters and sometimes set those masters off to dig for gold themselves.

With little attention paid to the environment or the Indigenous custodians of the land, all Victorian soil became potential ‘paydirt’. In this section, learn about the positive and negative impacts of gold mining; many of which we can still see today.

Learn about gold's properties, uses and how it was mined.
Find out what life was like on the Victorian gold fields.
The colony of Victoria had become a magnet for the world and fortune hunters everywhere.