Slide. Lansell's 105 head crushing battery (New Red, White and Blue).No.40 on bottom of slide.mine, gold, lansell's 105 stamper head battery., bendigo mines-jack hattam collection.

Abraham Roberts (1819-1897), ironfounder, was born on 13 July 1819 in Cornwall, England, son of Abraham Roberts, blacksmith, and his wife Mary, née Pentreath. Nothing is known of his education and early training but it is likely that he served an engineering apprenticeship and worked in engineering workshops in Cornwall. Undoubtedly he observed much machinery among the tin mines of Cornwall and absorbed the principles of sound engineering design and high-grade workmanship, which bore fruit in his later years in Sandhurst (Bendigo). On 19 August 1841 he married Elizabeth Tonkin at the parish church at Paul, Cornwall. Roberts arrived on Bendigo in 1853 with his family and engaged in gold-prospecting, then about 1861 opened the United Iron Works, a small engineering shop in Williamson Street, making forge and hand tools. With expansion the business moved to Mitchell Street, until by 1880 it absorbed an entire block covering three acres (1.2 ha) in the heart of the town and employed nearly two hundred men. Three of his sons, William, Abraham and Arthur, helped to run A. Roberts & Sons. As well as being a skilful and enterprising engineer, Roberts was a shrewd businessman, who anticipated that the market for machinery on the local goldfields would diminish, and widened the sphere of his activities accordingly. Though the requirements of the mining industry maintained the firm, no class of foundry work was ignored. Roberts secured orders for machinery for the two major Broken Hill mines and built steam winding engines for several Western Australian mines, as well as undertaking orders for machinery in South Africa and New Zealand. He introduced poppet-heads constructed of steel to the Bendigo goldfield and the 105-head stamp battery for Lansell's Big Blue mine was the largest quartz-crushing battery in Australia at that time. The pair of steam winding engines built by his works for the Hustler's Royal Reserve Co. were the largest on the Bendigo field. The company also carried out steamship repairs, bridgework and many important railway contracts and in 1891 supplied the largest outlet valves in Victoria at Laanecoorie weir.Two photographs in black and white of the picnic for employees of Messrs A. Roberts and Sons in 1897. Photographs are mounted on piece of red cardboard. A. Roberts and Sons owned a foundry that was established in 1865. The event was noted in the Bendigo Advertiser on 18 March 1901.'1897' in ink top right hand corner.bendigo, foundry, roberts and sons, picnic, 1897