He received his commission in the Royal Engineers in 1825.[1] He was involved in the Rideau Canal construction in Canada in 1827 to 1833.[1]
In September 1839 Frome arrived in South Australia on the ship Recovery to take up an appointment as the colony's third Surveyor General.[1] He was also a member of the South Australian Legislative Council (2 October 1839 to 14 June 1843).[2] He made an important contribution in surveying large areas of South Australia for new immigrants to settle upon.[1]
He was also a competent artist and made many sketches and paintings of landscapes on his surveying expeditions.[1] In one of his sketchbooks, there is a sketch of a Milmenrura village in the south-east of South Australia consisting of a cluster of about twelve established Aboriginal homes. It is annotated with the note "burnt by me, October 1840". This was apparently part of the retribution for the Maria massacre of shipwrecked survivors a few months earlier.[3]
In 1843 he led an expedition to the mid-north of South Australia and was the first to accurately map Lake Frome.[1]
After his ten-year term expired he returned to England and was subsequently stationed in Mauritius, Scotland and Gibraltar. Between 1869 and 1874 he served as Lieutenant Governor of Guernsey.[1]
Later life and legacy
He retired in 1877 with the army rank of general, and died on 2 November 1890 at Ewell in Surrey.[1]
The South Australian Electoral district of Frome, named after him, has existed in several incarnations since 1884. The latest incarnation has existed since 1991, but in 2024 the Electoral Districts Boundaries Commission announced that at the 2026 state election its name would be changed to Ngadjuri, due to concerns over Frome's involvement in acts of retribution following the Maria massacre.[5]
