It was originally named Mount Stokes after John Lort Stokes, who was assistant surveyor during the second voyage of HMS "Beagle" (1831–1836) and captain of the survey ship HMS "Acheron" (1848–1851). Because of the prior naming of Mount Stokes in Nelson, the mountain was renamed La Perouse in honour of the French explorer Jean-François de Galaup, comte de Lapérouse (also spelt comte de La Pérouse) whose expedition foundered on Vanikoro in the Santa Cruz Islands of the Solomon Islands in 1788.