A Scottish Chartist and founding member of the Ballarat Reform League, Tom Kennedy spoke at meetings in the lead-up to the Eureka Stockade conflict and was part of the delegation sent to Governor Hotham with a set of digger demands. While some of the reform leaders were committed to moral persuasion (at least until all peaceful means had failed), Kennedy was an advocate of physical force. His quoting of a pithy Scots saying became well-known: ‘Moral persuasion’s all humbug, there’s nothing convinces like a lick in the lug!’. He was, however, absent from the stockade when it was stormed.