John Palliser (1817 - 87) was born in Dublin and raised in Waterford. His family was descended from William Palliser, a late 17th-century bishop of Cashel. Despite being multilingual, a product of his family's continental European travels, Palliser did not succeed in academia, leaving Trinity College without a degree and opting instead for a military career as a lieutenant with the Waterford Artillery Militia.
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In 1847, Palliser, visited America on a hunting and traveling expedition. That journey became the subject of a book published in 1853 which in turn formed the basis of an appointment as expedition leader to the 1857-1859 Royal Geographical Society exploration of the Canadian Southern Prairies and Rocky Mountains. Over a four year period Palliser explored the area between Lake Superior and the West Coast of Canada identifying the extraordinary difficult of creating a commercial route through the rugged landcapse. The subsequent expedition reports were used to establish the border between the United States and Canada.
Following his Canadian explorations, Palliser's travels continued, including trips to the Carribean and in 1869 the icy wilderess that is Novaya Zemlya in the Arctic. Sadly his later life was not easy, the family estates that he had inherited on the death of his father had been neglected and he was reliant on the financial assistance of family members during the later stage of his life. Palliser died in Waterford on August 18th 1887. He was a member of the extraorinary class of Victorian explorers whose exploits entranced a generation.
You can read more of Palliser’s life at his entry on the Dictionary of Irish Biography
