Australian gold rushes of a unique national identity. Although not all diggers found riches on the goldfields, many decided to stay and integrate into these communities. In July 1851, Victoria's first gold rush began on the Clunes goldfield. In August, the gold rush had spread to include the goldfield at Buninyong (today a suburb of Ballarat) 45 km (28 m) away and, by early September 1851, to the nearby goldfield at Ballarat (then also known as Yuille's Diggings), followed in early September to the goldfield at Castlemaine (then known as Forest Creek and the Mount Alexander Goldfield) and the goldfield at Bendigo (then
Australian gold rushes week. By early September 1851 what became known as the Ballarat gold rush had begun, as reported from the field by Henry Frencham, then a reporter for the Argus. (Henry Frencham claimed in his article of 19 September 1851 to have been the first to discover gold at Ballarat [then also known as Yuille's Diggings] "and make it known to the public", a claim he was later to also make about Bendigo, and which resulted in the sitting of a Select Committee of the Victorian Legislative Assembly in 1890.) In the report of the Committee on the Claims to Original