Victorian gold rush in the Melbourne "Argus" on 8 September 1851, leading to a rush to the Mount Alexander or Forest Creek diggings, centred on present-day Castlemaine, claimed as the richest shallow alluvial goldfield in the world. These discoveries were soon surpassed by Ballarat and Bendigo. Further discoveries including Beechworth in 1852, Bright, Omeo, Chiltern (1858–59) and Walhalla followed. The population of Melbourne grew swiftly as the gold fever took hold. The total number of people in Victoria also rose. By 1851 it was 75,000 people. Ten years later this rose to over 500,000. Surface alluvial gold was the first to be exploited.
Australian gold rushes Bayley and William Ford's discovery of gold at Fly Flat, Coolgardie was declared a town site, with an estimated population of 4,000 (with many more mining out in the field). The Coolgardie goldrush was the beginning of what has been described as "the greatest gold rush in West Australian history". It has also been described as "the greatest movement of people in Australia's history", but this is an exaggeration. The greatest movement of people in Australia's history was in the period 1851 to 1861 during the gold-rushes to the Eastern states when the recorded population of Australia rose by 730,484