Louis de Rougemont

Louis De Rougemont (12 November 1847 – 9 June 1921) was a would-be explorer who claimed to have had adventures in Australasia.

Personal history

"De Rougemont" was born Henri Louis Grin in 1847 in Gressy, Vaud, Switzerland. He left home at the age of sixteen. He became a footman to the actress Fanny Kemble, servant to a Swiss banker de Mieville in 1870 and a butler for the Governor of Western Australia, Sir William Robinson. In the latter job he lasted less than a year.

He tried various ventures with very little success. He worked as a doctor, a "spirit photographer" and an inventor. He also married and abandoned a wife in Australia.

In 1898 he began to write about his invented adventures in the British periodical "The Wide World Magazine" under the name Louis De Rougemont. He described his alleged exploits in search of pearls and gold in New Guinea, and claimed to have spent thirty years living with Indigenous Australians in the outback. He claimed that the tribe with whom he had lived had worshipped him as a god. He also claimed to have encountered the Gibson expedition of 1874.