The Langlands

In 1840, Robert Langlands, a young Scottish man, took a huge step for love and left his family to embark on a romantic escapade across the ocean.

He shocked his family by deciding to pursue his lady friend, who had been deported to Australia for a minor misdemeanour. After arriving in Melbourne, Robert immediately set off to Sydney to ask his girlfriend, Agnes, to marry him.

Robert's brother, George, and his wife, Betsy, during his leave, and having fallen on hard times, had become interested in an offer to start a Post Office in Western Victoria. So, they loaded their five children (including Ted's future grandmother, Margaret, at age six) on board three bullock drays and set off to find a survey peg 300 miles away on the Wimmera River marked as "A place to be called Horsham."

Robert set up a foundry in Flinders Street in 1841, which thrived, and Horsham grew around the Langlands store. The rest, as you will discover in this book, is wonderful history.