Jason and Alan,

thank you so much for your support. I regret to hear that he has been having health problems. I don't want to press him with this if it is detrimental to him.

Anyway, if you two can get through to him and he is OK with checking for some info, than I'll be very thankful to the three of you. And Jason, you can use my first post on this thread and quote it in an email to Harold, since for now I don't have much to add.

Thank you very much to you all,
Pedro

Pedro,

Harald had a couple of bad luck incidents last year which put him flat on his back. He was splitting wood and a piece of metal broke off the chisel, hitting him in the leg. It drove in deeply and barely missed the iliac artery. That was bad enough, but then he got a staph infection while at the hospital, which really complicated the recovery process.

The second thing was a ruptured disk in his back which required surgery. The last time I talked to him, which was six or eight months ago, he was going to start rehab soon. The doctors were telling him that they were confident in a full recovery, but I don't know what his current health status is at the moment.

As soon as I hear something from him, I will let you know. If he takes an interest in this, and is physically able to help, he will probably be your best chance to find the Belgium records for your grandfather's grandfather.

That was bad luck indeed. Thank you for the info, Alan.

Pedro

Pedro,

This is the best resource on old elephant hunters from portugal, angola and particularly moçambique.

This is a really great blog!!!!! Celestino was the guardkeeper of the famous Gorongoza park.

http://faunabraviademocambique...0_05_01_archive.html

Today I had a SUPERB dinner with Jorge Alves de Lima. He did not know your GGF, but he started hunting in the Congo, Sudan and French Equatorial Africa much latter, in the 40's.

I will post some pictures of the tusks and rhino horns latter.

Best, Dante

Hi,

thanks for the info Dante. I'll check the blog out. It's unfortunate he didn't know anything about my GGF. I'm starting to feel I'm not going to get any info unless I'm going to Congo myself and bother some civil servants!

Best regards,
Pedro

Hello all,

I've got some new information from my grandmother this weekend. Not much, but it helps the search, I think.

First, by looking at the death certificate of one of his daughters, which we know was aroud 5 years old when he went to Congo, puts his move around 1910.

Second, it seems he was about 30 years old at the time (1910), give or take a few years.

Third, the streets where he had his businesses were named Lazala and Acata. I didn't find those stree names on google and I don't know if it's old stree names from Leopoldville or not. My grandmother may be spelling them out in the wrong way too, in fact I'm surprised she even remembers such info!

I may have to check out old city maps(hopefully there's something on the webs)to see if I find the streets. One of the streets was owned almost totally by him (in terms of shops/commerce) and the other was only parcially his. My grandmother doesn't know which.

Anyway, that's all I was abble to find for now.

Best wishes,
Pedro