Women and the Eureka Stockade: Anastasia Hayes

Much has been written about the men of the Eureka Stockade but the role of women in the rebellion is less well known.

Take Anastasis Hayes (1818-1892), a teacher. Aged 34, Anastasia Hayes arrived in Melbourne in 1852, with her five children and husband Timothy. Her husband Timothy, Peter Lalor and Duncan Gilles formed a mining partnership on the Ballarat goldfields. The family lived in a tent on the goldfields where Anastasia gave birth to her sixth child.

She took a job at a nearby school to make ends meet. She was known as a firebrand on the goldfields, complaining about how the miners were treated.

In 1854 at Ballarat, she encouraged Timothy to become a leader of the rebellion. He became chairman of the Ballarat Reform League and was chairman at the monster meeting at Bakery Hill on Wednesday the 29th of November which set the scene for the Eureka rebellion.

After the rebellion was crushed, Anastasia was at the forefront of the resistance. She was disappointed that her husband was one of those arrested and when she approached the troops, she said to them: 'I wouldn't have been taken by the likes of you'.

She took her six children to court in Melbourne and sat in the court suckling her youngest whilst Timothy stood trial for high treason.

Soon after he was acquitted, their marriage disintegrated. He moved to South America for a number of years and she was left to bring up their six children alone. A difficult task at the best of times, but almost an impossible take in a society where there was no social security benefits and survivors of the Eureka stockade were shunned by a community that wanted to forget.

She continued to work as a school teacher, living in Ballarat until she died alone on the 6 of April 1892, days after her 74th birthday.

Source: Women of Eureka, researched and written by Laurel Johnson.

[This extract is from an article published in the AEU Journal October 2007. AEU website]

United we bargain - Divided we beg.

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