France and Dubbo are not places that one normally associates together, but history is a funny thing.

Many locals may already know the name Jean Emile Serisier from the local bridge, and also that of a RHINO business award, but not be aware of its origins.

Serisier is the man credited with being one of the original European founders of our wonderful city; a settler, trader, wine-maker, and magistrate, who was originally from Bordeaux in the south of France.

Local historian Patrick Bourke recently contacted Dubbo Photo News with this fascinating fact, via a link to a news article that ran in the Dubbo Liberal and Macquarie Advocate, about a direct descendant of Serisier's, in 1954.

“This year, 70 years ago, Errol Bayliss Serisier -- the grandson of Jean Emile Serisier, the founder of Dubbo -- was made a Life Member of the Dubbo RSL Sub Branch,” Patrick revealed. 

“He had been a very active member of the Dubbo RSL since its formation during 1918, being a committee member, secretary,  and president, as this newspaper news item testified, and also the mayor of Dubbo for many years,” he added.

Jean Serisier (1824-1880) himself, was the youngest son of Emile Alexander Serisier, shipping broker, and his wife Rose Marie, née Mavon. He arrived in Sydney in 1838 as a midshipman where, due to ill-health, he was placed in the care of Mr Despointes, a wealthy merchant.

In 1847, backed by Despointes and accompanied by Nicholas Hyeronimus, an inn-keeper from the Wellington Valley, Serisier travelled to the Central West to set up a store on R.V. Dulhunty's Dubbo station.

Refused permission, they ventured further west and settled on the site of the future town of Dubbo, where Hyeronimus established an inn, and Serisier a general store.

After he petitioned for a site for a village, land held by George Smith was selected and surveyed, with Serisier buying blocks at the first auctions in 1851.

He managed a general store for Despointes and, by 1855, was also acting as local postmaster, dealt in stock, and later took-out an auctioneer's licence.

On March 1, 1858 Serisier, aged 33, married Margaret (1840-1914), youngest daughter of Thomas Humphreys of Greenwich, England, in a ceremony performed first in St Mary's Cathedral, Sydney, and then repeated in St Peter's Anglican Church, Cook's River.

In 1873, Serisier sold the store, and developed a vineyard on his 4000-acre (1620 ha) property, Emulga. He planted about 40 acres (16 ha) with vines and, after initial set-backs, within the next year, produced enough red wine for a vintage, which soon began to attract the attention of connoisseurs.

From 1859, Serisier was returning officer for the Bogan electorate and was one of three guarantors for the extension of the telegraph to Dubbo. A magistrate from 1862, he was prominent in local affairs and, for a time, was visiting justice to the gaol, and “guardian of minors”.

He also represented the Dubbo Free Selectors' Association at the first and second Free Selectors' conferences. On February 10, 1880, on a return visit to France, Serisier died of smallpox, leaving goods and inheritance of £2370 for his four sons, daughter, and his wife who survived him.

“This French immigrant, one of the first Europeans to occupy the site that would become the town of Dubbo, played a central role in the pastoral economy,” Patrick added.

“He was also one of the first people with capital to anticipate the emergence of agriculture,” he concluded.

His grandson, the war hero and mayor from 1938–44, and 1947–1949, himself died on September 10, 1958, aged 66 years.