Rebel voices heard through song

THIS year, the Eureka Centre is keeping annual Stockade anniversary commemorations in the family.

On Friday, 3 December – the 167th anniversary of the Eureka Stockade – musician Shane Howard will perform his concert Rebel Songs on site.

Howard is the great-grandson of arrested Eureka rebel Patrick Howard, known for his work as lead singer-songwriter of the band Goanna.

He said the Eureka Day gig at 8pm will be “intimate” as he sings and plays guitar alongside pianist Richard Tankard, reflecting on a 19th century world “aflame with change,” and the “rebel voices” heard since 1854.

“I’m interested in the social and historical conditions that led to such an incident in Ballarat in 1854. It’s timely to reconsider the struggle at Eureka and the contribution the events made to Australian democracy,” he said.

“In many ways, it’s not really appropriate to refer to the diggers at the Eureka Stockade as rebels. They certainly didn’t launch an attack on government forces, nor were there any plans to do so.

“They knew that burning their licences was a provocative act in the eyes of the law, but they built a stockade to defend themselves against the authorities, and swore to protect and defend each other, and that’s what they did.”

Mr Howard said Goanna’s iconic 1982 hit, Solid Rock helped to “stoke the coals of a fire for Aboriginal rights… that hasn’t gone out.”

He is particularly interested in the local academic research of historian and teacher, Dr Fred Cahir, an associate professor in Aboriginal studies at Federation University.

“Fred has documented the Aboriginal context of the country, pre and post-gold rush.

“He once said to me that Wadawurrung people were all over the diggings but previous historians had arranged the window of our historical view in such a way that they couldn’t be seen,” Howard said.

“Historians, Ian Clark and Anne Beggs Sunter also had compelling stories of the Wadawurrung Aboriginal presence on the goldfields.”

Howard’s Irish great-grandfather was discharged because of a “lack of evidence” following his arrest at Eureka. He got married in 1855 to a fellow Irish refugee of The Great Famine.

Tickets to Rebel Songs are $40 via bit.ly/3mP5qzs.