History
The distinctive shape of the mountain was used as a guiding beacon by many, largely unsuccessful, parties of escaping convicts as they attempted to struggle through the dense scrub of Western Tasmania to the settled districts further east. It was mentioned as a geographical reference in the account later dictated by convict Alexander Pearce to authorities, following his capture.
The earliest European recorded to have ascended was James Sprent and his trigonometrical party in 1853.
In 1941 the Frenchmans Cap National Park was created and its boundary was in effect the Franklin River. This park was subsumed into the Franklin-Gordon Wild Rivers National Park in the 1990s.
The country around the mountain is invariably referred to by the books and the material written about the Franklin River. Johnson Dean's book gives a graphic account with maps and pictures the nature of the country. Phil Robinson's book evocatively describes the climbing history until 1979.
Read more about this topic: Frenchmans Cap
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