new settlers for Bathurst. I have agreed to grant each 50 acres of land, a servant, a cow, four bushels (141 litres) of wheat, an allotment in the new town, and to receive into the King's Store at Bathurst all the Wheat they can grow for the first 12 months.
In the early years of settlement, Bathurst was a base for many of the early explorers of the NSW inland, including George Evans in 1815, John Oxley in 1817-1818, Allan Cunningham in 1823, and Thomas Mitchell during the 1830s.
Flecks of gold were first discovered in the Fish River in February 1823, but it was 12 February 1851 in a Bathurst Hotel when Edward Hargraves announced the discovery of payable gold. Soon, gold was found at Ophir (later Sofala) and Hill End in the 1850s. In the 1860s, the town of Bathurst began to boom. Bathurst was to become the first gold centre of Australia. The nearby gold localities would transport their gold to Bathurst then to Sydney. The mail and gold transport coaches became an obvious target for bushrangers, which became a major problem for the authorities.
The Ribbon Gang and the Bathurst Rebellion occurred in 1830, when a large group of over 80 convicts roamed the Bathurst district. They were eventually captured and charged with murder, bushranging and horse-thieving. On 2 November 1830, ten members of the Ribbon Boys were hanged in Bathurst for their crimes. The site of the first and largest public hanging in Bathurst is still marked by the laneway sign Ribbon Gang Lane in the CBD. Ben Hall, who became a notorious bushranger, was married in St Michael's Church at Bathurst in 1856. In October 1863, a gang of five (including Hall) raided Bathurst, robbing a jewellers shop, bailed up the Sportsmans Arms Hotel and tried to steal a racehorse. They returned three days later and held up more businesses. John Piesley, another bushranger, was tried and hung for murder at Bathurst Gaol in 1862.
Bathurst's economy was transformed by the discovery of gold in
