Francis Louis Barrallier (bornLouis François Barrallier, 19 October 1773 – 11 June 1853) was a French military officer in theBritish Army. Born to a monarchist family inToulon, he was a cartographer, explorer of Australia, and a surveyor.

Francis Barrallier was born in Toulon, France, on 19 October 1773, andbaptised Louis François Barralier.^[1] François Barrallier was a president and his father a vice president of commissioners of different districts of the counter-revolutionary royalist authorities of Toulon.^[2] He was the eldest son of Jean-Louis Barrallier, a marine engineer andmonarchist, and Marie-Antoinette-Francoise Hernandez. The family fled to the United Kingdom in 1793 during theSiege of Toulon by therepublicans.^[3] They lived for a time atMilford Haven, in Pembrokeshire, where Jean was employed designing the new port. Francis was trained by his father in engineering and surveying.^[3]

Having acquired the patronage of the politicianCharles Francis Greville, Francis arrived inNew South Wales in November 1799 with hopes of employment.^[4] At first he was given miscellaneous tasks including the design of a proposed orphanage atParramatta.^[5] In July 1800 the outgoing Governor of NSW,John Hunter,  appointed him an ensign in theNew South Wales Corps.^[6]

In March 1801, GovernorPhilip Gidley King sent him with LieutenantJames Grant inHMS Lady Nelson to further explore, survey and mapBass Strait.^[7] Barrallier's resulting maps ofJervis Bay,Western Port^[8] and some of Bass Strait^[9] were recognised by Governor King, who made him the Colony's engineer and artillery officer.^[10]

Again in the role of surveyor, in June 1801 he sailed to theHunter River in an expedition led byColonel William Paterson.^[4] He made a survey of Coal Harbour (nowNewcastle) and part of the Hunter andWilliams Rivers.^[11] Later that year he made a second trip there with surveyorCharles Grimes, and with him surveyed part of thePaterson River.^[4]

In October–November 1802 Governor King engaged Barrallier as his personalaide-de-camp, and in that capacity he was directed to try to find a way over theBlue Mountains to the west of Sydney.^[4] After a preliminary reconnaissance in September-October, he mounted a major expedition in November, employing abullock cart to take provisions to a depot that he set up northwest of today's town ofPicton. From there he made three incursions into the mountains, accompanied by soldiers, convicts and Aboriginal assistants. The first terminated prematurely in theBurragorang Valley when his principal guide, theDharawal man Gogy,^[12] found himself unwelcome amongst theGundungurra people whose country they had entered. On the second incursion, with two different Aboriginal assistants, Badbury (Boodbury)^[13] and Le Tonsure, he penetrated further west but eventually turned around at Johnston Falls in Wheengee Whungee Creek, six kilometres southwest of Kanangra Walls.^[14] The party was short of supplies and low on morale and was far short of crossing the mountains. After a third unsuccessful incursion, which involved an attempt to follow the Wollondilly River upstream, Barrallier returned to Sydney. The expedition had taken 51 days altogether.^[4]  

During the expedition Barrallier wrote letters to Governor King,^[4][15] and subsequently wrote a long journal, in French.^[16] These documents provide an important record of his encounters with the First Nations people he met or who accompanied him, and reveal that Barrallier had an uncommon understanding of their ownership of country. It is likely that his attitudes were influenced in part by his encounters with members of the FrenchBaudin expedition, which visited Sydney in the months before the expedition.^[4]

Barrallier made the first record of thebrush-tailed rock-wallaby (Petrogale penicillata), which he encountered while trying to scale Tonalli Peak in the Burragorang Valley. He also displayed some knowledge of the science of geology.^[4] He also reported the traditional “coo-ee” call, though he was not the first to do so, as the call had been reported by CaptainJohn Hunter in 1789, while on theHawkesbury River.^[17]

In May 1803 Barrallier fell victim of the feuding between Governor King and the New South Wales Corps, and was dismissed as aide-de-camp. He submitted his resignation from the army and left for England. His resignation was never accepted, probably due to the support of CaptainJohn Macarthur and SirJoseph Banks. He undertook further training in the hope he would return to NSW as surveyor general, but was disappointed in that ambition.^[4]

In 1805 he was appointed a lieutenant in the90th Regiment and the following year joined the regiment atSt Vincent in theWest Indies, where he was engaged as engineer in charge of building fortifications.^[18][19][20] In 1809 he earned a silver medal for his role in theinvasion of Martinique, and was made a captain in the101st Regiment. He was then appointed aide-de-camp to GeneralSir George Beckwith, commander of the English forces in the West Indies, and in 1810 earned another silver medal for his role in theinvasion of Guadalupe.^[18][21]

In 1812 Barrallier was instructed to make a survey ofBarbados, a task which occupied several years during which he was appointed surveyor general of the island.^[18]

He returned to England in 1816 after theNapoleonic Wars concluded, and spent most of the rest of his life on half-pay, gradually advancing to Brevet Lieutenant Colonel.^[22] He lived mainly in England, but also in France, having married Isobel Skyrme atLambeth in 1819.^[23]

In 1827 he published his map of Barbados.^[24][25] This map has been significant as it lists the names of all the English owners of the plantations of the time.^[26]

Francis Barrallier died in London on 11 June 1853, aged nearly eighty.^[27]Barrallier Island, a tiny islet that he would have visited in Western Port, was named after him. Several places in the Blue Mountains also carry his name.^[4]

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