Harry Selby could write. That is an extremely interesting hunt report!

Given the description provided, the hunter's misfiring rifle had to have been a Weatherby.

I cannot imagine three consecutive misfires at 40 yards on a big male lion!

Not to mention him charging the blind afterwards!

My favorite lion blind of all time was a machan fifteen feet up in a tree!

These are really good!

I’m surprised he never published them.

Hope you have a bunch more to share Saeed!

THE CHANGING FACE OF AFRICAN SAFARI

Harry Selby Final Draft. (sent to Diana)
3577


Over many years the word ‘Safari’…. that magical word which brings to mind high adventure in the wilds of Africa, immortalized by Theodore Roseveldt, Martin and Osa Johnson , Ernest Hemingway and Robert Ruark has become synonymous with a hunting / photographic expedition involving sportsmen and women from across the world.

A safari in the earliest days of East Africa, prior to the outbreak of ‘world war one’, was known as a ‘foot safari.’ It would consist of a group of a hundred or more people ….. which would include a number of visiting hunters, a professional hunter/s, local gunbearers, cooks and skinners etc… but the majority would be porters who carried loads made up of tents, camping equipment and food for the entire group.
Everyone walked, as horses, and donkeys for carrying loads, would not survive due to the dreaded disease carrying ‘tsetse fly’ infesting most of the hunting areas.

The ‘early safaris’ to which I now refer coincided with the use of motor vehicles on safari sometime about the 1920s. and would have numbered from twelve to twenty people. They were completely self-sufficient, willing and able to cope with whatever situation might crop up. The baggage truck/s carried everything required to set up camp wherever one chose, ie, staff, fuel, foodstuffs, tentage, medical chest, camping furniture, cooking utensils, as well as china table ware…much later even refrigerators were provided.

The professional hunter was truly the “captain of the ship” and the success of the entire safari, it’s well being, and even the lives of the group depended on his decisions. A competent professional hunter was of necessity knowledgeable, a pleasant companion, at times a diplomat, a doctor, mechanic, and hunting was second nature to him. Further more it required of him a very sound knowledge of the country and the local people, leadership qualities, self reliance and the ability to handle a difficult situation especially when the clients were often men controlling huge business empires and were used to giving the orders not taking them.
When a safari left Nairobi for perhaps one or two months in the field, there was no easy way to contact the Nairobi office even in an emergency.
If an accident should occur, or a member of the party became ill, recovery would follow in time… If the situation was very serious, one of the small single engine aircraft stationed in Nairobi would need to be summoned…. and even that in itself was no simple matter as in the remote centers where there might be a phone, which sometimes worked, long delays of many hours could be expected. In many cases a makeshift landing strip would have to be cleared, and then dragged with a large bush attached to the hunting vehicle in order to smooth it sufficiently for an aircraft to land.

For urgent incoming messages safaris relied on an arrangement with the local Nairobi broadcasting station that after the nine o’clock evening news an urgent message could be transmitted to a safari in the field….. an announcement prior to the news broadcast advised that there would be a message for a certain group or individual…... resulting in a very tense twenty minutes of news waiting for the message which usually was not good… and then the frustration of being unable to reply to it.
During the late fifties and early sixties ‘two way’ HF radios became available and made a tremendous difference to the isolated safari in the field, in-fact their arrival on the scene could be considered one of the two fundamental landmarks in the history of ‘Safari’… together with the advent of the four wheel drive vehicle

As all traveling was by vehicle It could take three days hard driving to reach some of the intended hunting grounds in southern Tanganyika, Western Uganda or the Southern Sudan from Nairobi, but it would be interesting….. seeing colourful people from various tribes….such as the Masai, Samburu and the Dinka, extinct volcanoes, snow capped mountains, beautiful lakes, forests of huge baobabs, historical sites such as the compound shared by Livingstone and Stanley near Tabora. If the route should cross the Serengetti after skirting the rim of wildlife rich Ngorongoro crater one would see, if the annual migration was in full swing, unbelievable numbers of wildebeest, zebra, antelope of various species and gazelles on the move…. followed by prides of lions and other predators.

Nights spent on long trips would be a bivouac beside the road in order to get going again early the next morning, and amazingly a very acceptable meal would be forthcoming from the cook within a couple of hours of having halted for the night….. and there would be a bacon and egg, toast and coffee, breakfast too the following morning before the safari got under way again.

Eventually, on reaching the hunting area, the camp would be erected by experienced hands and habitable in a matter of hours, making it possible to move very freely and rapidly, from area to area, especially as there were no concessions in existence, or blocks to be booked and quotas were unheard of. Hunting was lawful anywhere so long as the area was not a game reserve, national park or private land. If the safari moved into an area and found for whatever reason it was disappointing, it upped stakes and moved on to try elsewhere.

The number of animals allowed on license was overly generous having been formulated at a time when the early foot safari might require meat for eighty to one hundred people over several months. The slow wheels of a complacent colonial government controlled from London took a long time to initiate a reappraisal of the entire licensing system. Not until some years after world war two infact. It required a firm hand on the part of the professional hunter to prevent abuse in some cases by trigger happy individuals.

In those early days the time factor was not as important as it is today. ‘Safaris’ often lasted for two months or possibly three. I would estimate that a third of the entire safari would be spent traveling from one hunting area to another and many hours would be spent getting the heavily laden vehicles freed from the clutches of either tenacious mud or heavy sand
In addition to the time spent hunting, remembering too that safaris did not have four wheel drive vehicles, a lot of hunting was done on foot which took time and was hard work. It was generally agreed that one hundred miles plus or minus would be walked for every really good elephant taken… ninety pounds or more.
I can recollect a whole week at Kondoa Irangi in Tanganyika, clambering up and down steep rocky hills until a kudu was finally bagged.

More emphasis was placed by hunters in days gone by on the entire safari experience… photography and bird shooting for instance, rather than just the collecting of trophies.
Naturally, clients expected to get good trophies. It was in the collecting of them that provided the thrill and a fine trophy was the reward for a good memorable hunt… not how the trophy would rank in the book.
The record book was not the bible then as it is now. Today the burning question as soon as a trophy is bagged, often is…. ‘will it qualify for the record book’? sadly sometimes, irrespective of how it was hunted.

As hunting pressure increased in the most accessible areas some pioneering and resourceful professional hunters cut tracks, or built makeshift bridges to get into virgin country and escape the ever increasing number of safaris entering the field.
There were occasions when an entire day might be spent manhandling the two wheel drive safari vehicles over a particularly wide and soft sand river bed.. And several days might be spent erecting the makeshift bridge
If a previously used river crossing had become too deep due to rains to ford with a hunting vehicle, and one needed to hunt the opposite side, you simply removed all contents such as tools, and spares…… disconnected the battery, drained all oils and petrol, and then using the heavy rope every safari carried, your crew, possibly assisted by locals pulled it through the river sometimes completely submerged.
After a night to dry out with the drain plugs removed, the oils and fuel were refilled, the battery reconnected and the hunt continued. The hunters crossing morning and evening between camp and hunting car by dugout canoe or wading…… the hunting car stayed there until the safari was ready to leave that area, at which time it was pulled it back through the river again.

The professional hunter was at times called upon to perform near miracles mechanically and medically as a few incidents which took place on my safaris will illustrate. I remember one cold windy night on the Serengeti at one o’clock in the morning soldering the leaking radiator of the baggage truck carrying the camp equipment. The soldering iron heated in a fire made of wildebeest dung… there was no wood,…. and our supper had been prepared the same way.

I remember too another evening at Ikoma, after traveling for three days from Nairobi, one of the skinners was bitten by a snake as he opened up his bedroll.
He became hysterical so I had him rushed to the mess tent where the only bright light on the safari was kept to examine the bite. I found two fang punctures, indicating a venomous snake bite. I proceeded to administer the anti-venom shots to the protesting man oblivious to the fact that our four ‘wide eyed’ clients were watching the whole performance. Next morning he was sore, but OK….. either the anti-venom had done its job or he had received a ‘dry bite’ as I understand sometimes happens.

On one safari we were camped south of Ngorongoro in the vicinity of Lake Eyasi in Tanganyika. Our camp was situated a couple of hundred yards from a steep sided ‘donga’ (ditch) at the bottom of which flowed a small stream.
When we drove into camp at about midday after one morning’s hunt, Juma my headman informed me that the truck was in trouble at the river.
It transpired that the truck had been driven there with two of the staff in order to fill the water drums on the back. The driver walked back to camp.
When the drums were filled the men called to the driver to retrieve the truck.
He was a bit slow and a young lad, the cook’s helper, climbed into the cab and whilst fiddling with the controls he pressed the starter button.
The truck was parked in reverse gear and unfortunately the engine fired instantly and the truck rolled backward over the bank into the stream finally winding up ‘all wheels in the air. That was what met my horrified gaze when I walked to the spot. We were miles from nowhere and no radio in camp… yet.
We had to fend for ourselves, and for the next day or two whilst we were hunting the camp staff busied themselves digging down one bank sufficiently to allow the truck to be hauled up.
When this was completed we attached the big rope to the far side of the truck and to the rear of my hunting car on the opposite bank. When all was ready the hunting car assisted by our crew and a number friendly locals to whom we had given meat, hauled on the rope and fortunately were able to turn the truck back on its wheels, and finally pull it up the bank.

I will never forget one unfortunate safari: Shortly after we had crossed into Tanganyika from Kenya, the baggage truck did not arrive when I stopped for it to catch up. I had a foreboding that all was not well, and a couple of miles back found it lying on its side having rolled over after having got into a skid aggravated by the movable weight of the men perched on top of he load.
As I drove up, Juma, my headman of many years, came forward, and in reply to my question
’Is anyone dead’ he replied ‘only one’.
Two other men were badly injured and after getting the truck back on its wheels I instructed Juma to pitch a tent beside the road for the clients. I then took the two injured men and the corpse back into Kenya in the hunting car. The injured men I left at the fortunately reasonably sophisticated hospital in Narok the centre for Masailand, as traveling was very painful for them. I phoned Nairobi telling them what had happened and asked that replacements would be on hand. I then carried on to Nairobi with the body of the unfortunate skinner.
When I returned to the safari, we hastily packed up and carried on across the Serengetti to Banagi where we bivouaced, I had been without sleep for sixty hours.
.

During the 1950s hunting areas in Kenya came under increasing pressure as more clients decided to hunt Africa and more ‘occasional hunters’ took up professional hunting… some albeit with limited experience
The Game Department tried to lessen the pressure on the game populations,
especially the ‘big five’ by allowing only one of the ‘big five’ per week of safari. Should a hunter want licenses to hunt all five , the safari must last at least five weeks.
This measure helped to some extent as with the advent of the four wheel drive vehicle hunting became easier as remote areas became more accessible and some clients tried to collect huge bags in the shortest possible time.
During the late fifties the ‘Block’ system was introduced in Kenya whereby the country was divided into numbered blocks. It was necessary to reserve the chosen block sometimes, months in advance, with no idea of what would be found there when the safari finally arrived. If the game situation was really disappointing the safari had to wait until its next block booking became available before moving on
Other changes were making themselves felt as well…. East Africa was in a state of political flux….Kenya had experienced six or seven years of the Mau Mau insurrection and independence from Britain was the goal of all three East African territories, Kenya, Tanganyika and Uganda… and was being actively negotiated by their representatives with the British government. No-one had any idea what a post independence East Africa would be like especially after the Congo debacle.

In the early sixties I moved with my family to Bechuanaland ( now Botswana) and opened a branch of Ker Downey & Selby Safaris there.
Our company was granted two very large tracts of land known as ‘Concessions’ in which to conduct hunting safaris….. one adjacent to the Okavango Delta and the other in the northern Kalahari.
The distances between camps in these concessions was not great and I soon realized that a more efficient method of operation would be to have static camps fully staffed at strategic locations.
The clients together with their hunter and hunting vehicle would move from one camp to another thus reducing overheads by literally halving the camp staff which were required to pitch and break camps expeditiously during the days of the mobile safari.
One supply vehicle would do the supply rounds periodically thus eliminating the situation where a truck remained idle for long periods in each camp.
This arrangement worked very well….. and in-fact had been in operation both in Mozambique and Angola for some time, before politically motivated insurgencies erupted there.

Due to a number of factors the traditional mobile safari was gradually on its way out in the East African countries where it had originated. Border controls on individuals, vehicles and equipment, firearms, and the transfer of funds between newly independent states became a problem… although safaris flourished in Kenya for some years after Independence in 1963 often ranging as far north from Nairobi, as the Sudan.
Unexpectedly the Kenya government closed all hunting precipitously in 1977. The safaris already in the field were summoned back to Nairobi….and hunting has remained closed there ever since. …… effectively putting an end to the fabled ‘Classic East African Safari’.
After independence on December 9th December 1961 Tanzania, previously Tanganyika, created a State owned and controlled safari organization which prohibited private safari companies from conducting safaris. The venture was not a success.
For some years Botswana was one of the very few countries where no independence struggle was taking place, Rhodesia, Angola, Mozambique, and South West Africa were all coping with bush wars. Eventually as the political and security situation improved in those countries and South Africa joined the ranks of countries offering hunting safaris…. the ‘static camp’ became the only way to go
When privately owned safari companies were allowed to resume operations in Tanzania after the disastrous attempt to establish a state controlled organization, a similar system of static camps was employed there, except that a hunting car remained in each camp and aircraft were used to transfer clients and their hunter from one camp to another.
To establish a static camp, it was necessary to have an exclusive lease on the area in which it was intended to establish the camp from which to conduct hunts….. logically concessions or some form of lease on specific blocks became the norm in most countries where the land was government owned.
In some countries large privately owned ranches became ‘game farms’ where the emphasis was on breeding game animals rather than domestic stock. Static hunting camps, were established to accommodate visiting hunters.

Initially, these static camps consisted of the standard safari tents with a flush toilet and shower enclosure attached to the rear. Semi permanent structures were provided for the mess and the kitchen which was equipped with the necessary furniture and a gas stove.
As time progressed the camps in some countries became more sophisticated being erected on wooden decks, with regular furniture and in many cases electric power for lighting, ice making and refrigeration. VHF radio contact with base became standard in all camps and in many of them a satellite phone is provided. Some clients bring their own satellite phones and many camps are within easy reach of airfields and helicopters are available on call should an emergency occur..
Moving clients short distances is usually accomplished by vehicle, but where long distances are involved aircraft are used. This cuts traveling time considerably resulting in significant savings to the client and allows for more time to be spent hunting….. making it possible for hunters who previously had been unable to spare both the time and the money to undertake an African safari varying in duration from ten to twenty days, to do so.

Air travel today is so available and quick that within a couple of days of leaving home the clients, are in the hunting camp, and as they have possibly read all about safaris or been to one or more conventions, they arrive with their wish list in one hand and possibly the record book in the other…. ready to get rifles sighted in and begin hunting.
The hunting, of necessity due to the time factor, will be intensive and any mishap such as the hunting vehicle getting badly bogged down or due to a malfunction might be regarded by the clients as time wasted. In some cases they might even expect a refund.
The professional hunter will be under considerable pressure to ‘produce’. and
greatly to the credit of the present day hunters, successful hunts and very fine trophies are being brought in.

The clients unless camped in tribal areas will see very little of Africa or it’s people……. other than a few hanging around the airport where they landed before leaving by vehicle or aircraft on the way to the camp.
On arrival in camp they will be greeted by the staff all lined up with big smiles to welcome them on Safari…. and when they have collected their game the staff will again line up to say goodbye.
I realize that the only way game will survive in Africa is to pay very handsomely for its existence, and the only way that can be achieved is by bringing in more hunters, photographers and general tourists … all attracted by Africa’s magnificent wildlife, all bringing money into the country, thus demonstrating to the local people that the wildlife is more valuable on the hoof than in their bellies.

To achieve that situation, permanent camps and air transport are essential to make it affordable to the client both in time and cost.
It was inevitable that ‘safari’ had to change, and will continue to change in order to exist, Africa itself has changed out of all recognition both physically and politically, and the old time self contained safari would have no place to go in today’s Africa.
Conceivably there are hunters today who would prefer to have experienced the sense of freedom of an old time safari , as I am sure that there were those who did go on safari many years ago who would have preferred something along the lines of what is offered today. The two ‘Safaris’ are as different as night is from day, the only feature common to both is the name……. ‘Safari’.

quote:

Originally posted by Michael Robinson:


Given the description provided, the hunter's misfiring rifle had to have been a Weatherby.

I cannot imagine three consecutive misfires at 40 yards on a big male lion!

Could it have been another eccentric client with a cleanliness mania for dismantling bolts in the field?

I imagine not too many people have seen these bits of Ker Downey and Selby Ephemera - a cup from the safari-ware in Botswana and a grill badge and camp airmail stationery from Kenya:

VERY COOL!!

Those lapel pins must have been popular maybe a tradition. I have a couple from other Safari Companies. Hunters Africa is one...

Another wonderful piece of writing by the late, great Harry Selby.

This one is worthy of a first rate historian.

Thanks so much, Saeed, for posting these!

I don't get here often, but gems like this oh my!
Thank you Saeed

The Kwaheri Safari.

By Harry Selby

ROUGH DRAFT (EDITED BY JOE) X 3


“Haraka, how about one last East African safari together? I don’t know how long the local politicos will continue welcome me here in Kenya, and you have pretty well decided to head for pastures anew further south,” Bob Ruark suggested to me shortly before Kenya’s independence, back in 1962. “It will be a sort of Kwaheri Safari (farewell safari),” he added.

“Sounds good to me. And incidentally, the game department have decided to open up a large area of the Northern Game Reserve to safari hunting up in the Northern Frontier District (NFD). It’s an immense tract of bush, and there’s been no legal hunting there since the turn of the century,” I said. “There’s reputed to be some big tuskers roaming that country. However, it will be safari hunting with a difference—no vehicles allowed in the hunting area, so it will be a ‘horse-and-camel safari’. Maybe we should give it a try—could be a lot of fun!! Have you ever ridden a horse?”

“Lets do it, just the two of us, no damn photographers, or women, and lets make the whole purpose of the safari a big elephant—a hundred-pounder or better,” Bob replied enthusiastically. “And that bit about riding a horse….I’m as at home in the saddle as I would be on a bar stool at the Twenty-One Club.”

“Safaris going into the “horse-and-camel” area will be allowed to use vehicles to get to a designated base camp, but from then on all hunting will be done on foot, or from horseback. If we move camp to another site, all our camping equipment will be carried by camels.” I explained to Bob. “I think it’s a splendid idea, and something that neither of us has experienced before.”

I lost no time in booking the vast area east of the Mathews Mountain range for a month. The camels and horses, together with their handlers, were available for hire from the local native council. We’d begin hunting on the very first day the area opened to safari hunting, making us the first safari party ever to hunt in that area. Bob and I both became more and more enthusiastic at the thought of hunting through that vast wilderness on horseback, with our camel caravan following behind.

The plan was for me to set up a base camp, which I could get to by vehicle, a few days before Bob’s arrival to ensure that the horses and camels had been brought in and were in good shape. Bob would fly in to a small bush airstrip not far from base camp, where I would meet him—we’d be ready to start hunting the next day, when the area opened.

When I arrived in our hunting area, I found that ten days previously exceptionally heavy, unseasonal rains had swept through the country. Many roads and tracks had been washed away, pools of water were everywhere and the bush was so green and thick that you could barely see through it.

Elephant sign, however, was everywhere. It was mostly from breeding herds, but I figured with so many jumbos in the vicinity there must surely be some bulls too. At least, I fervently hoped so, because unless we struck it lucky early, I realized that with the present conditions it could be a hard hunt, indeed.

The crew set up the base camp with everything in good order. Our horses and camels, together with their handlers, had arrived at the camp site and looked to be in fine shape—although the horses were clearly not thoroughbreds. I now awaited Bob’s arrival while gleaning all the information I could about any elephant with big tusks from the local Samburu people. The Samburu are a nomadic tribe, related and in many ways similar to the Masai, who roam throughout this stretch of country tending their livestock.

Bob flew in on schedule, and we spent the rest of the day settling in, checking equipment, and test firing the rifles to make sure all was well, and finally a short scurry into the bush on horseback to try out our mounts and procure some meat for ourselves and rather large retinue of staff. We would start serious elephant hunting on the morrow.

Our choice of weapons had been influenced by the fact that they would have to be carried in scabbards attached to the saddles of our horses, so the number of weapons would of necessity be limited. We decided to take only four rifles and Bob’s 12 guage shotgun which he always took with him on any hunt.

Bob would use the delightful little Jeffrey 450/400 Nitro Express he had purchased many years previously from Westley Richards of London and presented to our firstborn and his godson Mark Selby then two years old. On this safari we carried only 400 grain Kynoch solids for the 450/400
The rifle had been previously owned by ‘Karamoja’ W.D.M. Bell and was part of his estate after his death.

The 450/400 is a fine caliber and was very popular in India, it is lightweight, handy and mild mannered, whilst launching a four hundred grain bullet at 2100f/s with a striking energy of approximately four thousand ft/lbs …in the hands of an experienced hunter it will do anything required of it. However the early African hunters regarded it as a bit light for Africa’s dangerous game under difficult conditions and it lost popularity in favour of the larger calibers. It would be an excellent choice for any lady hunter who might hanker after a double
This particular rifle had certainly been around and used by some very well known hunters…. imagine the situations it might have been in when Bell had used it in Africa.
Bob used it in East Africa on various safaris to collect a hundred and ten pound elephant a rhino, and a number of buffalos . A friend of his who accompanied him on one safari also killed a hundred pound elephant with it , and we fervently hoped it would now add another hundred pounder to its credit.……Bob also used it in India where it accounted for a very large tiger.
When my son Mark later became a professional hunter he used it very successfully for years as his back up rifle, and it is now owned by my very valued and long standing friend John Mecom Jnr.of Texas.


I would be carrying my treasured .416 Rigby which I had acquired almost by accident when towards the end of a safari in Northern Tanganyika with Donald Ker and Chris Aschan my fine Rigby double .470 had been accidentally damaged beyond repair.
I needed another heavy rifle in a hurry for my next safari and was looking for another double, preferably a .470. The only rifle I could find was a .416 Rigby at a gun shop in Nairobi which someone had ordered and not taken delivery of.

The rifle was built on a standard Mauser action and I was skeptical about that as the long Mauser action was generally used to accommodate the large .416 cartridge.
However it appeared to feed flawlessly when cartridges were repeatedly cycled rapidly and forcefully through the action as might happen in a dangerous situation.
I was also concerned about the bullet weight of 410 grains as opposed to the .470’s 500 grains, albeit the .416s 410 grainer had significantly more velocity, resulting in a striking energy similar to the .450, 470, 475 doubles.
I had no option. I bought it…with the intention of replacing it with another double .470 as soon as possible.
I might add here that over many years and many hundreds of rounds fired through it, that standard action never gave the slightest hint of trouble

I knew the .416 Rigby rifle and cartridge by reputation, but nothing prepared me for the performance which became apparent as soon as I began using it as a few incidents which took place on the first couple of safaris I carried it will illustrate.

On the first safari, we were following the tracks of a large elephant through thick palm scrub on the Kom Lugga in Kenya’s NFD, when with a loud snort and crash a rhino charged straight at us from very close range.
Gunbearer Matheke who was in front tracking flung himself sideways into the palm, allowing me a clear shot. I placed a bullet passing to the left of its horn into the area where the neck joins the shoulder.. The rhino virtually collapsed in its tracks no more that ten feet from me as if hit by a locomotive. Obviously the spine had been smashed.

On the same safari, we tracked and came up on a very good elephant in the thick bush bordering the Tana river in Kenya’s Northern Province (NFD)
We decided to take him and when my client fired the elephant took off headlong through the bush….. I caught a glimpse of his rapidly retreating stern as he passed through a gap in the bush and as his head swung sideways I tried Karamoja Bell’s rear brain shot.. The bull collapsed with a crash in a cloud of dust.…then absolute silence.
We hurried forward and found him dead in the kneeling position with all four legs facing backwards and his tusks, fortunately undamaged, thrust into the soft ground in front of him. He had been polaxed whilst in full flight.

On another safari my lady client wounded a leopard in Kenya’s Rift Valley Lake Magadi area, it jumped out of the tree and made for a clump of bush in a small gully about a hundred yards distant.
When sitting in a leopard blind I always carried my heavy rifle , as one could never tell what might come along which required something more that a twelve guage shotgun and on this occasion it was the Rigby .416.
After hearing the shot my two trackers arrived and the four of us approached the small patch of bush in the gully cautiously.
When still about thirty yards distant the leopard did a very strange thing, instead of waiting silently in ambush as a wounded leopard usually will, it shot out of the bush on the other side of the gully and streaked up a slight stony incline towards a rocky kopjie .
It must have been about ninety yards away when I fired at it with the .416 knocking it head over heels….. Fluke in may well have been but a very impressive performance to all who saw it.
Had I been carrying a shotgun loaded with buckshot the pellets would hardly have reached him.

On a safari in the Ikoma area in Tanganyika with a client with whom I had hunted previously we came across a very fine and large bodied lion. We decided to take him and my client fired from a distance of about fifty yards. The lion reared up on its hind legs growling furiously, then regained itself and took off for some very heavy bush.
Not relishing following him in such stuff I fired at his fast disappearing rear end. I have never seen such instant death, he didn’t even quiver. On examination we found that my .416 bullet had entered at the root of his tail and exited in the middle of his forehead.
This impressed the trackers enormously, Africans generally look upon the lion with a mixture of dread and respect, and here was a gun which could send a bullet right through the length of his body. This bunduki (gun) must have dawa (medicine) was their conclusion and after a number of safaris my gunbearers regarded it with awe; they called it the ‘Skitini’ unable to pronounce ‘four sixteen’. they wanted to know if I had paid extra money for the ‘dawa’!!
I am sure they attributed my success in bowling over all kinds of wounded dangerous game either ‘coming or going’ entirely to the ‘Skitini’ and that I merely pointed it in the general direction of whatever needed to be laid low…the ‘Skitini’ would do the rest.
The striking ‘knock down’ power, the incredible penetration with Rigby’s excellent solids, and the flat trajectory with pin point accuracy all combined to make this in my opinion, the perfect Professional Hunters rifle, it literally became an extension of my arm, and I must admit that I really got to appreciate the confidence those extra cartridges nestling in the deepened magazine box provided. There was no way I would now replace it with another double
In time I abandoned carrying soft nose bullets for the .416…. the ones available by Kynoch tended to break up and the only possible use for a soft nose bullet would be lion…. and I found that the .416 rolled lions over with a solid pretty well anyway.

Leaving camp next morning, Bob and I were mounted on horseback, while our gunbearers guided by Salee, the head camel handler, walked ahead of us. We plunged into a sea of green bush, and right away came upon a breeding herd of elephants accompanied by a couple of young bulls carrying no more than 30 pounds of ivory a side. We looked over several more breeding herds that first day with similar results. On one occasion a very angry cow made a furious demonstration in our direction, charging right up to us and then stopping dead in her tracks and slamming her ears together in front of her head. She stood stock still staring directly at us for what seemed like hours, but was in fact seconds before wheeling round to rejoin her herd. For those few brief, but intense seconds, I thought I would have to shoot her. I also realized that if we carried on messing around with the breeding herds, inevitably in self-defense, we’d have to shoot an elephant that we didn’t want.

We found tracking to be a waste of time owing to the movement of so many elephants throughout the area—any interesting tracks we tried to follow were soon obliterated by elephant herds walking on top of them. I soon realized that our best chance of locating a big bull would be by glassing with powerful binoculars. The summits of numerous kopjies (hills), some of which were several hundred feet high and towering above the sea of green bush, would make excellent places from which to spot.

Early next morning found us perched on top of the nearest kopje, with our nags, in the care of a groom, cropping the green grass below us. The kopje was fairly high, and we marveled at the show of elephants we could see all around us in the surrounding bush. There were literally many hundreds of elephants, mostly breeding herds, from which we could easily pick out the bulls by their larger size. It became a matter of patiently watching and waiting for the bull to lift his head and hoping to get a glimpse of the ivory.

For the next ten days we spent many hours sitting atop various kopjies in the broiling sun, but we saw new elephants daily and hoped that a big bull might suddenly appear upon the scene. Then one day I was focused on a particularly large-bodied bull about a mile away. When he lifted his head, I caught a glimpse of a long, very white tusk. I pointed out the animal to the gunbearers and Salee and we noted that the bull stood near an unusually-shaped tree at the base of which we could discern a splash of scarlet… obviously a beautiful desert rose…. we would use those two landmarks to orient ourselves when we climbed down into that ocean of bush to go have a closer look.

Clambering down from the rocks, we set off in the direction we’d fixed in our minds, but it was very different once we were in the thick stuff from the way it had appeared from our lofty perch. Heaps of elephant dung were everywhere and the buzz of many dung beetles flying to and fro in search of the aromatic piles was constant. Several times it was necessary to detour around cows and calves and we nearly ran afoul of a rhino that fortunately only snorted loudly at us and then took off blowing with indidgnation.

As if directed by radar Salee led us to the tree we’d marked from the kopje, and nearby we found the large tracks of a big bull—undoubtedly, the one we’d spotted from the hill. The tracks were fresh and not difficult to follow as the bull hadn’t gone far, but he’d chosen a particularly thick patch, in which to enjoy his mid-day siesta. There was very little wind as we crept in on him as quietly as possible. Eventually I saw his outline through the leafy curtain between us—he was very close. We moved a little to one side, and I could vaguely make out the one fine long white tusk. “Was there a second tusk?” became the burning question in my mind. Just then he moved his head and I glimpsed the other tusk, long and unbroken—a perfect match to the other one. The pair appeared, however, to not be overly thick and tapered quickly to a point. Clearly, they would make a superb pair of trophy tusks, but would they make our self-imposed target of a hundred-pounds per tusk?

The heart/lung area was clear, and I was aware that Bob had raised his double rifle and was aiming at the bull. I put my hand on his barrels and whispered, “Wait, I can’t be sure he’ll go a hundred pounds.” I could see that the bull was not an old animal and could possibly provide an unpleasant surprise if a large nerve was removed from the tusk—the larger the nerve, the bigger the nerve cavity, which means less ivory, weight wise.

Turning around, I whispered to Bob, “Let’s leave him. I can’t be sure.”

We crept out of the thicket for a short distance and stood looking back at where the bull was standing. Whether he heard us, or possibly got a whiff of us, I don’t know, but he started moving forward. As he crossed a gap in the bush, and his tusks became clearly visible, they looked wonderful. Again, I considered whether he would perhaps make the magic “hundred-pound” mark.

He settled down again not far away, and back we went creeping right up to within a few yards of him. Again, I could not bring myself to say to Bob, “Go ahead, take him.” The possibility of yard-long nerve cavities haunted me. After several minutes, which seemed like ages, while I peered intently at what I could see of the tusks, and weighing them in my mind on the scales of many years experience, I felt a nudge and an urgent whisper in my ear from Bob—“Damn it, Haraka (My Swahili nickname meaning ‘the one in a hurry’), lets sh*t, or get off the pot.” In spite of the tense circumstances, Bob’s way of putting it amused me, and it broke the spell.

“Okay, Let’s leave him,” I said. “We’ve still got time on our hands.”

After many more days of glassing from our elevated lookout spots, I felt pretty sure we’d seen every elephant in the area, and there was no sign of the grand old bull groups we’d hoped to find. They were obviously somewhere else and so we returned to camp to make another plan. I felt the time had come to move on to new country, and gave instructions to the staff to assemble a light fly camp along with some provisions to last a couple of weeks away from our base camp.

Early the next morning, after loading camp equipment and provisions on the camels, we bid farewell to the men who would remain at base camp and set off into the unknown. The hunting party, comprising of Bob and myself together with the trackers and grooms mounted up while the rest of the crew walked with the camels some distance in the rear. Setting off for new country we felt as free as the wind.

We skirted the foothills of the brooding Matthews range for most of that day trying to steer clear of thick bush as much as possible in order to avoid disturbing any rhinos that might be layed up in the shade—to draw the charge of an enraged rhino was the last thing we wanted to do. Leaving the shady bush to the rhinos, the sun beat down on us mercilessly. We saw few elephant, but marveled at how trusting other game were of our caravan.
Dainty little Dik Dik darted from one shrub to another sometimes passing between our line of animals. Oryx Beisa, Gerenuk, Grants Gazelle, Grevy’s Zebra, Lesser Kudu and Reticuated Giraffe were merely curios, obviously at ease with the Samburu livestock.
We potted a few vulturine guinea fowl and spur-fowl with the .22 rifle that I’d brought along for that purpose, and when passing through an area where elephant were unlikely to be, Bob shot a Grants gazelle for the staff. To avoid disturbing the area while hunting elephant, we limited the firing of guns to only when necessary for collecting camp meat, or to contribute a few birds for our diet

The rifles we decided on for this purpose was a Winchester .375 H&H. fitted with a removable scope, which I had acquired in 1950 as a gift from a father and son with whom I had been on a three month safari.

The .375 H&H would be used for procuring camp meat although unnecessarily powerful for that purpose, it would also act as a substitute should either of our heavy rifles be rendered unusable for whatever reason. We carried 270 grain expanding bullets for collecting camp meat, and three hundred grain solids in case the .375 was called upon in an emergency.
This rifle had seen a lot of use since it came into my possession, as hunters in those days often brought along a 30-06 or other light rifle planning to hire a heavy double from the outfitter.

I generally encouraged a hunter unless he had previous experience in handling a heavy double to use my .375 instead, as it takes a lot of practice to shoot a heavy double with open sights well.
Many took my advice and benefited from the increased accuracy and additional effective range the .376 H&H provided resulting in a very noticeable reduction of wounded animal follow-ups.
I must emphasize that in my opinion the .375 H&H is possibly the greatest and most versatile cartridge ever invented. It has adequate power, good accuracy, and the recoil is very manageable.

Today there is a vast range of very fine premium bullets available making it suitable in the hands of a good marksman for just about any hunting situation. My advice to any visiting hunter who will be accompanied by a professional with a backup heavy caliber, to choose a good .375 H&H rifle fitted with a 1.5 x 5 removable scope using mounts proved to return to zero.
He or she will make more precise shots at a greater effective range than they would using some very powerful and heavy recoiling cartridge.

Lastly we took along my little Browning single shot .22 which had been given to me by my parents for my eighth birthday...it was small…. almost a toy…but was very accurate and could be tucked in anywhere or carried by one of the men … Ideal for collecting birds for the pot without making a noise.
Bob’s shotgun, he never went anywhere without it, would only be used when we were sure there were no elephants within earshot.

It was with this little rifle that I learned to shoot, and for a while my targets were pidgeons, guinea fowl, spurfowl, hares and the occasional hawk and small predators such as jackal and wild cats after the farm chickens.
As I grew older I began to carry the little Browning further afield, hunting larger game such as Impalla, Grants and Thomson’s gazelle, Bushbuck, and Duiker over the vast unfenced wildlife rich country surrounding our home accompanied of an elderly Dorobo farm employee with an unpronounceable name.. so he was known to all respectfully as ‘Mzee’ (old man) . The family and staff never lacked venison.
The Dorobo are not a tribe as such, but rather small clans who live amongst other tribes whilst retaining their Dorobo identity and customs… they exist entirely by hunting and gathering and their skill is in this field is unsurpassed.
‘Mzee’ taught me how to track and stalk game…. and how, due to the limited effective range of the little .22 to make use by belly crawling, of even the most meager cover in order to get in close to the quarry, enabling me to try for neck shots and hits just behind the shoulder where there would be little resistance to the limited power of the little bullet

He taught me to use my ears and nose as well as my eyes, he taught me patience, to remain in one position for long periods totally motionless waiting for an animal to come within range…… and the old trick of surprise.. when impossible to get close enough for a shot, a sudden dash from concealment could often place one within range before the unsuspecting quarry realized what was afoot.
He taught me to watch the interactions of different creatures, especially birds as their behaviour can often indicate the presence of other animals…and through him, slowly, almost unaware of it, I began at times to experience a strange tension or alertness which I could not at first understand. I soon realized that I only experienced these feelings when we were unknowingly in the proximity of wild animals or maybe a snake, and this was the first glimmer of a sixth sense which would later develop very strongly in my professional hunting career when following dangerous animals wounded or otherwise in very thick bush.

As a hunter I have always thought of old ‘Mzee’ as my mentor, but I was given an earlier lesson which I have never forgotten. It happened thus,
One day when I was about ten years old our pack of farm dogs chased a mature waterbuck bull weighing about four hundred pounds into a fairly deep pool in the river which ran close by our home , waterbuck will do this to defend themselves against shorter legged predators who have to swim to get at them.

My mother, two sisters and myself carrying the little Browning ran down to see what all the fuss was about… the dogs barking furiously were swimming around the animal which would lunge with it’s horns at any dog getting too close, whilst we stood on the bank about twenty yards from the action.
My mother who was standing behind me told me to take careful aim at the waterbuck and shoot, but my aim wasn’t that good and I missed it completely.
I got a smart cuff on the ear from her with the command ‘shoot straight’.
The next bullet hit the animal behind the ear and killed it. Lesson learned and never forgotten!!!

As the years advanced and the war years were upon us I acquired other rifles, fist a British army .303 then a very long barreled Italian Carcano 6.5m/m which was very accurate.
Sadly the little Browning for many years saw less and less use, but now I was taking it out again into real wild country and I looked forward to hearing its sharp crack again, and I knew the larder would not be bare.

By mid-afternoon our caravan reached Irere, a dry river bed reputed by the Samburu to be favoured by old elephant bulls, and there the men cut bush and built a strong boma (thorn-bush fence), more to keep our animals from straying at night than to keep any predators out. Our little fly camp was very basic and set up next to the boma. It was amazing how comfortable the camp was, but skilled safari hands knew how to pack only the essentials, due of having to be transported on the backs of camels. We remained at Irere for seveal days without finding even an old track of the huge tuskers reputed to live there. It was the same old story... mostly breeding herds, and not even that many of them in this new area.

But, the nights under a canopy of stars were absolutely enchanting. Occasionally you’d wake to the sound of contented camels chewing their cudd, or the odd protesting snarl from one of them. Sometimes we’d hear the giggles of prowling hyenas, occasionally the raucous bray of a Grevy’s zebra stallion announcing to every lion within hearing distance where to find him, or the scream of an elephant somewhere out in the bush, occasionally the distant roar of a lion, and my Lord, how some of our retinue could snore.

Given the lack of fresh bull sign, within a day or so, we decided to move on to Ngoronit, another watering place located further along the mountain range. As our caravan moved single-file along a high bank with a sharp drop to the surface of a dry sandy river bed below, a sudden scream came from the bush on the opposite side. An enraged young elephant bull charged straight at us from across the sandy river bed, trumpeting furiously. Startled, we all spurred our mounts on, but Bob’s horse responded by suddenly laying down, and Bob hurriedly walked off over its head. The whole caravan was thrown into utter confusion with the camel handlers desperately trying to restrain their excited charges. Seeing Bob’s ludicrous predicament, I snatched my rifle from its scabbard and slid from the saddle ready to use it if absolutely necessary. Fortunately the bank proved too high for the bull and he turned away still screaming and trumpeting, head and tail held high, and returned from whence he’d come.

In the meantime, a few hearty jerks on the bridle brought Bob’s mount back to its feet, and presently, our crew got the camels calmed down again and we continued on our way. We had a good laugh thinking back to Bob’s predicament, especially when he suggested that maybe it would have been better if he’d just picked up his horse and carried him. I can only attribute the strange behaviour of Bob’s horse to assuming an “attitude-of-submission.” Similar behaviour was recorded by Selous, the great hunter and naturalist, who mentions being chased once by an elephant while on horseback. Suddenly the horse stopped dead in its tracks, and to save himself Selous jumped off and hid in the bush. He watched the elephant come right up to the horse touch it all over with it’s trunk, and then without hurting it in any way, move off. It’s hard to say what motivates a horse sometimes.

For days we combed the bush around Ngoronit, and again sat for hours on hillsides glassing the surrounding country. It now seemed we were seeing fewer and fewer elephants, and the thought that maybe, just maybe, that hundred-pounder might elude us, began to sink in. Those long white tusks, which had been within our grasp early on, began to get longer and thicker by the day in my mind, and probably Bob’s as well. But to both of our credit, neither of us said outloud that maybe we should have taken him. Time was running out, and we still had a three-day trek back to base camp to consider. I knew my crew were also beginning to consider that if we didn’t get that big elephant the Bwana wanted so badly—maybe he might not be so generous with the tip at the end of the safari!

Then one day a Samburu moran (warrior) resplendent in his “red-ochre-mixed-with-sheep-fat” paint, and glistening with perspiration strolled nonchalantly into camp carrying his two long razor-sharp spears. Even before greetings were exchanged the crew were pressing him about whether he’d he seen any big elephants?

“Yes,” he said, and then we asked, “Where?”

“At a place called llaut—half-a-day’s journey from here.” he replied. “There were many elephants at llaut, but when the rains fell in other places, none fell there. All the elephants left except two—one very old bull with big tusks who has lived there for many years, and the other a young askari (guard) bull with him.”

With increasing interest, we asked when had he last seen these two bulls?

“Yesterday,” he replied, “but when I saw the old one he was alone. I think the young elephant has left. There is no food for elephants at Illaut.”

“Lets go,” I said to Bob. “It’s our last chance, unless a miracle happens and a hundred-ponder walks into camp.”

In very short order we broke camp, our camels were brought in, loaded, and we were off to Illaut—four hours away under the relentless “Big-Eye” of the sun. Arriving there just before sundown we soon had our camp set up, and settled in for the night. A Somali shopkeeper, who ran a very small duka (shop) nearby, confirmed that, indeed, an old elephant with big tusks did drink at the wells each night. He told us that until recently there’d been two bulls, but the younger one must have moved on, because now he one no longer accompanies the old one. We went to bed impatient for the morning.

At first light our lads were at the wells looking for tracks, and reported back that a bull elephant had visited the wells during the night. We ate a hasty breakfast while the horses were being saddled and were about to start tracking when Areng, the head groom suddenly appeared, almost dragging a young Samburu girl along behind him.

“This young girl says she’s just seen the elephant while she was bringing goats to the water.” he told us excitedly.

“Where?” I asked. The young girl pointed with her wire-ringed arm towards a not too distant low ridge.

“She says the elephant is behind that ridge.” Areng added.

Mounting up, we soon arrived at the low ridge the girl had indicated. As we crested the ridge, there he was standing on the top of the next ridge perhaps four hundred yards distance. He stood on open, barren ground, and everything from his toe nails to the top of his head was visible. Even without binoculars his dark stained tusks were spectacular, reaching nearly to the ground and thick in girth. He dominated the scene and like a dream-come -true, was what we’d been searching for during the last three weeks

We quickly dismounted and left the horses with a groom, while we walked up to within about 30 yards of the big bull. He stood very still with only the tip of his trunk moving slightly as he breathed in and out. He was obviously old, very old, his body shrunken and his hide mossy and barnacled with age, and perhaps he was sleeping as we watched him. Only those superb tusks indicated what a magnificent bull he’d once been. He was now alone and slowly starving. The herds, many of them perhaps his own offspring, were the first to move to greener pastures and finally even his askari, possibly a son, was forced to leave him owing to lack of food.

I whispered to Bob, “A hundred pounds plus for sure, go ahead take him.” Bob brought the double to his shoulder and fired twice, and the old bull faltered then crashed down and lay very still.

We approached cautiously, but he was dead and the men were jubilant, laying their forearms along the tusks in the traditional method of measurement while heaping congratulations on Bob. As I admired those grand tusks my eye fell upon the open but now unseeing eye, a tear welled in the corner then slowly trickled down the wrinkled old forehead….

Our objective, a hundred-pounder, had been achieved and our time in the area was nearly exhausted, so we busied ourselves with the picture taking and as soon as that was over old Katunga, an artist with skinning knife and axe, proceeded to remove, ever so carefully, the fine pair of tusks.

We rewarded the Samburu girl with some shillings, for having indicated to us where she’d seen the elephant, which possibly saved us hours of tracking in that hot, dry rocky country. We celebrated quietly that night beside our small campfire, and agreed that it had been a good safari, during the hunt we had had excitement, frustration, and some good laughs like when Bob’s horse lay down as the young bull charged. It had also been a totally new experience for us both, to be in truly wild country and no closer than three-day’s march from the nearest set of wheels. We’d achieved our objective, albeit by the skin of our teeth, but that added to the satisfaction we now felt.

We left Illaut early next morning to begin the three-day trek back to base camp, and all hands were jubilant, thinking that surely the Bwana would take into consideration those fine tusks when it came time to hand out the tips! For me the plod back to base camp was accompanied by some sadness. All that remained of the old patriarch, who in his day had been a noble bull forging through the bush with his mighty tusks thrust before him, were those grand tusks, now lashed to the saddle of one of our protesting camels.

I thought too of my close knit crew of fine fellows who’d been with me for so many years. With a few exceptions, the same crew had been with us on Bob’s first safari nearly 10 years before. Each man would now seek new employment, filling a gap in some other professional hunter’s safari crew.

This was to be Bob’s last safari in East Africa, a land he loved dearly and had written about so eloquently, eventually rewarding him with fame and fortune.
As for myself, it was to be the closing of an eventful seventeen-year chapter in the book of my hunting career, and the beginning of a new chapter taking place in “uncharted territory” in the British protectorate, then named Bechuanaland, and now called Botswana.

For Bob Ruark and myself, the safari had been, in all respects, truly a “Kwaheri Safari!”

What a great read!

I understand from the excellent Robert Ruark biography, Ruark Remembered, by Alan Ritchie and edited by Jim Casada, that the tusks of this elephant, which was his last, weighed 103 and 106 pounds.

Forgive me for suggesting that those were, indeed, some of the best of the good old days.

Kenya’s Northern Frontier Elephant Hunt.3
Harry Selby


We were into our third month on Bob and Harriet Maytag’s 1951 safari. The first month was spent in Tanganyika, and most of the second had been spent in the Northern Frontier of Kenya moving from one area to another, unfettered and following our noses. The NFD as it was known was really a semi desert, hot and dry with very little water and shade, despised by many as ‘hell on earth’, but I loved it there, it was home to grand old elephant bulls carrying big ivory, numerous rhino, and a great variety of other game animals and birds.
I admired the independent and sometimes turbulent nomadic people who lived there, especially their stoic acceptance of their harsh life centered around the well being of their animals. I felt totally at home in the vast flat scrub-bush plain with the weathered rocky hills rising out of it intersected by sand river beds known as luggas, the focus of all life in this arid country where the life giving water could often be found below the surface. And the great lava flows, black, broken-up, piled high and at midday almost as hot as the day they were spewed out from the volcano. And in contrast, the beautiful scarlet desert rose.

We had managed to collect a very commendable bag of trophies and were searching for a hundred pound elephant on which Bob had set his heart. We had hunted hard and followed many a reward motivated child of the desert for many miles who knew of an elephant so old and with such large tusks that he rarely moved away from a distant water hole only to find on arriving there, nothing but old sign, or, at best a bull with tusks no bigger than toothpicks. This had been the sort of anticlimax to many efforts for the past few weeks, which would commence with such anticipation on finding tracks made by the feet of one or more large elephants, the ivory growing bigger in the imagination the further these tracks led us….. finally dashed totally, when the mediocre or broken teeth those feet carried, we were at last able to see..
Then the long walk back always appearing much further, irked by the coo-cooing of a dove from its cool perch high up in the canopy of a lofty palm tree, seemingly mocking the tired and thirsty hunters as they passed beneath, trudging back wearily in the intense heat over the yielding sand after the long and fruitless stalk, but lured on by the vision of a bottle of frosted Carlsberg beer. Only it would not be Carlsberg nor frosted. We didn’t carry fridges in those days…
I finally decided to try an area from which I had on a number of previous occasions managed to secure fine elephant trophies, the area was south east of Garbatulla along the wide Bisanade lugger.

Arriving late afternoon in the area where we proposed to hunt, we camped a few miles from the Melka Magado wells.
At such places the underground water rises closer to the surface, allowing both the local nomadic tribesmen and animals to dig shallow holes in the sand to get at it.
We resisted the strong urge whilst camp was being set up to visit the wells to establish whether any bulls had been drinking there. Our scent could pollute the whole area, possibly causing any bulls which might visit the wells that night to drink then decamp, those wise old fellows are very sensitive to the smell of strangers.
However a local with a few camels came past our camp and told us the wells were being visited nightly by elephants, and as I had never seen a cow, or even the track of one in this area, our hopes for the morrow were high.
Early next morning we drove to the spot and found that a group of bulls, maybe seven or eight of them had visited during the night, had satisfied their thirst, sprayed themselves liberally with water and sand, in doing so completely messed up the shallow wells dug the previous day by the locals, had generally enjoyed them selves, and then wandered off. Several of the tracks indicated age, being large and worn quite smooth at the heel, however, one track was gigantic, and very much worn…. this bull I really wanted to see.
We began following the tracks, easy enough as the huge pad marks on the soft sand stood out clearly leading away from the water… piles of fresh droppings were everywhere, which the baboons had begun scratching about looking for any undigested delicacies, and as always, the dung beetles flying in as if by radar then crash landing on the dung were starting to get busy pushing about balls of the aromatic stuff. It appeared the bulls had arrived at the wells after midnight, suggesting that they had come from afar and left just before dawn. The sign indicated they were dawdling, we might possibly come upon them before they left the lugger to return to the far away feeding grounds, if we were lucky this could save a very long slog
The tracks led along the lugga in the direction of the Tana river many miles away, more or less in single file making it difficult to decide precisely how many of bulls there were, then leaving the lugger they entered a fair sized patch of scrub palm growing along the edge of it not very far from where they had drunk.
This scrub palm is dreadful stuff for anything other than elephant or rhino, it varies in height from a few feet to twenty, and the clumps grow very closely together … each frond is armed on both edges along its entire length with hook thorns, making it very difficult for a man to get through, however, large thick skinned animals are able to pass through it easily, the fronds bending forward as the animal passes and then closing again behind them.
Growing up through this rubbish are numerous mature forked palm trees thirty five or forty feet high, each branch topped by a crown of foliage and bunches of yellow fibrous nuts on which elephant, baboons and sometimes humans feed, if times are hard. Flat topped acacia trees also grow in these thickets, either singly or groups of two or three, the undergrowth beneath them completely cleared out over years by elephants and the ground strewn with their droppings. To these shady amphitheatres the old bulls retire and drowse during the heat of the day, and all the rhino in the vicinity, mostly with attitude seem to regard these patches of palm as a convenient ‘flop house’.

To get back to the hunt, It was impossible to see anything from ground level, so I motioned one of the gun bearers up a tree, and he immediately by signs, indicated that he could see the bulls, eight in all, not far away strung out feeding in the palm and unaware of our presence. I climbed up after him, and could see although only their backs were visible, that some of the bulls were old and big, but one appeared gigantic, obviously the maker of the huge tracks we had seen. He literally towered above the others by what appeared about two feet. Well, if his tusks were in any way proportionate to his body size we might have a hundred and fifty pounder here. They would probably later, as the sun rose higher, make for one of the shady retreats previously described. We needed to get a look at them before they did so.
One cannot resist indulging in this sort of speculation, its part of the difficult to explain thrill of being an elephant hunter, although occasionally it can be counter productive, as it turned out to be on this hunt..
It was as well we had taken a look from a tree as the wind, what little there was of it, was blowing almost from us to them. We hastily shinned down from the tree, and made a detour back across the lugga to get on the right side of the wind, fortunately it seemed to be steady, and took up position on the edge of the palm thicket in which the bulls were feeding.

We were most anxious to get a look at the big boys tusks, who was fortunately not too far within the palm thicket but it was too dense and high to see anything other than his back, and the trees on the side the lugger where we now were, were not climbable. Consequently we kept moving in closer to him, in that stuff probably too close.. but no matter how we peered into the scrub, couldn’t see anything of his tusks as his entire head was hidden in a patch of dense palm on which he was feeding.
The situation was precarious…we needed to stay close to him in order to see his ivory, and be in a position to shoot if his tusks were what we were looking for, but if we stayed too long where we were, he, or one of the others, there were bulls feeding on three sides of us.., and very close, would sooner or later get our scent,.
Eventually a bull on our right started to move up between us and the big boy, we had to back off a little, and as he moved through a small opening in the palm gave us a clear view of his teeth, and at about ten paces. Wow!! both tusks were beautiful, but one, due to the angle from which it grew from the head just about touched the ground.
What a beauty!!, what should we do? Forget about the big boy and take this one? That would have been the sensible thing to do, but I was mesmerized by the thought of those huge phantom tusks the big boy might be carrying, so I decided to gamble and whispered to Bob ’No don’t shoot we’ll wait until we get a look at the big one!!!’.
We let the newcomer pass on, he settled down to feed a little to our left. After what seemed years, but was in fact, minutes, the big boy slowly started backing out from the clump in which his tusks were hidden. Both Bob’s and my rifles came up to the shoulder, and then he raised his head … no tusks at all!! absolutely toothless !!! The Fraud!!! and we had just let a grand trophy pass. What an infernal foul up!!!,
Our attention quickly returned to the bull we had passed up, who was still feeding quietly on our left, to get up to him again would not be easy as the wind was blowing almost from us to him.
There was only one chance, and we would have to take it right away, that would be to forget about caution, move in close to him through the matted palm growth as quickly as we could, we had seen his tusks, no need to wait for a clear view of them before opening hostilities…. get in a couple of shots before he or any of the strung out group got our wind, and then beat it out of there. Gone were the days of Karamoja Bell, when you just stood your ground and shot anything coming your way. The Game Department now frowned on that sort of thing.

Forcing our way right up to him as fast as the thicket would allow, he was still somewhat masked by palm leaves but we could see enough of him to shoot. Bob gave him a right and left with the .470, and I got in two shots with my .416, both at his rear end, the second at the spot where his stern had just disappeared amongst the leaves a fraction of a second before.. Then all hell broke loose, he roared, other bulls roared, and elephants were everywhere, baboons shrieked, barked, and literally fell or leaped out of the tall palms in which they had been perched feeding on nuts
Bob and I didn’t hang around either, we got out of the way, nearly colliding with big boy on our way back to a more open space behind us where we had left Harriet and the trackers. Phew!! that was quite an excitement.. it certainly got the adrenalin flowing!!
We both felt good about our shots, mine although from the rear, the .416 solid bullets should have penetrated to the vitals.
We now listened intently for the hoped for sound of a heavy body crashing down, in that palm rubbish, with all sorts of dead branches broken off by feeding elephant, we should hear him fall from quite a long way off…but that sound did not come. He presumably had gone further than we had expected, perhaps due to shooting through the palms our bullets had not been as well placed as we had thought. Maybe a ‘bit high’ which often happens when shooting through grass or leaves.

So, waiting awhile, whilst having a smoke, and listening for any sounds which might give us a lead and some idea of the situation. We decided he probably had not fallen in the palm thicket as nothing was heard other than baboons who seemed to us to be having a good laugh at our expense.

Losing no more time, we returned to where the action had taken place to have a look at where he had been standing, searching for any signs of blood., We did find some and were generally scouting about looking for any further clues prior to getting Harriet back to the car, where she would remain with one of the skinners, we had brought along to carry the water bag, whilst, Bob, myself and the two gunbearers would return to take up the spoor.
A little distance from the lugger where the car was parked, the country was bare, and people, with their stock were already arriving at the wells., we could hear the hollow almost musical kok-kok-kok made by the wooden camel bells. Harriet would be OK there, the skinner, one of the old guard thoroughly reliable, an inheritance from Philip Percival, would be with her and she had the security of the car, water, food, rifle, etc.. She might even get some good un-posed pictures . As I was about to act on this plan, and as I was peering through a little alley in the palm thicket which showed no sign that several elephants had just passed through, there was a sharp snort followed by several more snorts right ahead, Lookout rhino!!.
Its sharp end appeared amongst the agitated palm leaves directly in front of me. I threw myself aside into the palm to avoid it, at the same time wrenching my body around to enable me to shoulder my .416. I dimly became conscious of a stabbing pain in my right ankle as I did so …. the rhino jolted my knee as it rushed past .
I was about to settle it, when my subconscious took over, and the words of my mentors, so deeply etched there, in this instance, ’you only shoot an animal in self defense as the very last resort’ flashed through my brain, and I, in that fraction of a second, realized that the rhino was not attacking, it was merely getting out of the way.. it had not taken a swipe at me with its horn as it passed, or even paused in its gait… neither was it headed in the direction of Bob and Harriett, who were behind me… and who had been unceremoniously shoved into the palm by the trackers I did not fire, and it blundered on still snorting back into the palm. It seemed as ‘put out’ as we were. This all happened in the twinkling of an eye. but it had been a close thing, that rhino nearly got it, had it paused for a moment, I would have shot it.

After the immediate danger was behind us, and I had time to take stock of the situation, It appeared we might have a problem, I could not put any weight on my right foot, the pain was excruciating, and I realized that as I threw myself sideways I had damaged the ankle.. It appeared the damage was serious as the ankle and foot started turning blue and swelled so rapidly I was obliged to remove my boot. We did have a real problem!!!

The fist thing now was to make sure the rhino had left the country, and was not hanging about close by, and secondly, to find a tree or bush without thorns from which we could cut a reasonably straight sapling for me to use as a crutch in order to be able to move without hanging onto someone. Lastly to have a smoke, and decide what to do in our changed circumstances, and laugh, although nothing was funny, but one always does laugh after something like this to relieve tension… and wonder what that rhino was doing where eight bull elephant had until recently been feeding
We decided he had probably been disturbed by the stampeding elephants as they rushed through the palm, and had come our way by coincidence.

It did not look good!! We possibly had a wounded elephant on our hands, how badly wounded we did not know, and a white hunter with a damaged ankle on which he could not walk. If the wounded bull had not fallen in the palm thicket, and was still with the group, those elephants could be soaking along for parts unknown as fast as they could go, and we might never see them again. There was not much we could do about that.
It was essential now was to find out what had happened to the wounded bull. I had the gun bearers climb trees a little distance off which overlooked the thicket to see whether the elephants were still in there, or had gone straight through.
They saw nothing, so we assumed the whole bunch had gone on. However it was possible that the wounded bull had fallen, or could still be on his feet hidden from view by tall palm scrub. I was pretty sure he was not dead though, I felt we would have heard him crash had he gone down, but we needed to know for sure.

I decided our best option, as I was grounded, was for the trackers to skirt the palm thicket, I did not want them to go through it . possibly more rhino in there.. find where the group had left it, and if the tracks indicated that the wounded bull was still with them, come back, letting us know what they had found. Then return to where they had left the spoor, take it up, and try to find out whether the wounded bull was still going strong. If he was, he was lost to us in the present situation, but maybe they would find he had been unable to keep up with the others and held back, or even succumbed.


I outlined this plan to Kidigo and Matheke my gunbearers, They agreed to it right away.. I told them each to take a rifle, the company .470 Bob was using, and my .450 No. 2 which we always carried as a spare weapon, I kept my .416 with us, and off they went.
They returned presently with the news that the whole bunch, wounded bull included, evidenced by the presence of blood on the spoor, had cleared the palm and were heading away from the lugga, into more open, but very rocky country. At least we now knew the score.
Off the two plucky guys went again, now to see how far the group might have gone, and that could take a long time. I told them that if they had not caught up with the group within two hours, or had reason to believe they were close them, to return to us.
Bob, Harriet and I started back to the car, not far away, but as we were unable to find anything straighter than a corkscrew to use as a crutch, I borrowed a tribesman’s spear, and grasping it below the blade used it as a staff, it was certainly better than a crooked stick..
We arrived back at the car to find that the wells were now a hive of activity, many nomadic Boran tribesmen were busy preparing to water their animals, so we waited there and watched both men and women lifting the precious stuff out of the wells in wooden vessels, pouring it into rough hollowed out palm logs, for the disciplined animals to approach, a few at a time, to drink, the remainder of the herd waiting for hours, but never rushing in. The groups of bleating goats streaming from one acacia tree to another pouncing on the tightly curled seed pods which fall to the ground, and are loved by all animals including elephants, who pick them up one at a time with their trunks… and the haughty camel, standing aloof, peering down his nose through half closed eyes in mild disapproval at the intruding strangers.
A couple of hours later, years it seemed, we heard two shots in the distance, then silence, we of course wondered what could have happened, was it another rhino? or had they been waylaid by the wounded bull?
I had visions on an infuriated elephant with Kidogo spitted on one tusk and Matheke on the other, rampaging through the bush brandishing a double rifle grasped in its trunk!!!… How I wished I had been along following those tracks!! I felt totally helpless!…. I cursed myself bitterly for having been seduced by the thought of those mythical tusks, and allowing a beauty, and a sitter at that, to pass.
However, looking back on it after fifty years, I was not so stupid, in 1951 there were, we now know, lots of big teeth still out there, we were in country known for big ivory, and that big boy standing so close to us, could certainly have been carrying something rather exceptional. It was worth the gamble!!
.
Eventually, after what seemed to us, ages, back the guys came with the best possible good news. The elephants after abandoning the palm thicket had not gone far, they came on the group milling about, the wounded one still with them, but very sick, he was presumably unable to go further, and that would have been the reason the others had waited.
Kidogo and Matheke had been unable for some time by the presence of the other bulls, alert and angry, to get near enough to the stricken beast to do the necessary and finish him off. Eventually the group moved off a short distance, but were still uncertain, preparatory to general flight I presumably, leaving the wounded bull clear….the guys closed in and fired the two shots we had heard.
He would most likely have gone down fairly soon anyway, as on examination, we found our bullets had been a little high, due to shooting through the palm, but a couple were in the lung region. Had it not been for the rhino’s intrusion, the hunt would have been unremarkable, just another case of a body shot elephant going a good deal further than usual.
It was fortunate the bull was so badly wounded otherwise they would all have been thirty miles away by night fall.

Both Kidogo and Matheke did a comendable job, it was plucky of them to get the wounded bull finished off whilst his aroused and aggressive companions were still with him. Trackers, gun bearers, we called them in East Africa, were not experienced in the use of firearms, although familiar enough with the handling of them… most of us hunters did not arm our gun bearers, as there had been some nasty accidents when an overexcited gun bearer opened up during a mixup with unfortunate results.

We were able next morning with the help of many of the camp crew to get the hunting car to where he lay with much pushing, moving of rocks, and laying of bush over the sand. His tusks were great, and weighed in excess of 100 pounds each. One, the longer of the pair slightly heavier that its mate.
This story fortunately, had a happy ending, but it illustrates what an infernal nuisance rhino were in those days when hunting anything from elephant to dik-dik, They were everywhere and the ‘rhino factor’ had always to be taken into consideration, an adequate rifle had to be carried at all times, even when after birds.
With Bob’s hundred pounder in the bag, we were now nearing the end of our hunt in the Northern Frontier, but we were loath to leave, maybe a few days at Isiolo, to say hello to George Adamson who was game warden there, look for a big gerenuk, the best heads came from that area, or a big northern impala, do some more bird shooting, enjoy a swim from time to time in Buffalo Springs, a hole blasted out of the rock above a natural crystal clear spring, by the South African Air Force during the war, with Mount Kenya clearly visible in the distance.

In fact we were just looking for excuses to stay a little longer in the NFD, but all good things must come to an end, and reluctantly, with baggage truck heavily loaded and the men clinging precariously to the ropes holding the tarpaulin over the load, we set out to climb some three thousand feet up the escarpment to the shoulder of Mount Kenya.
On reaching the top we stopped the hunting car to have a last look at the low lying land stretching away to the north and east where we had roamed so freely and happily for the last month. From this high vantage point, we could only just make out the outline of mountains in the distance, the Mathews range, now blurred by heart haze. Only the rocky hills in the foreground, pockets of ground up debris left by glacial action during some bygone ice age, were still clearly visible rising up out of the enveloping dust and shimmering heat. We looked back down the road and watched the slow progress of the truck climbing laboriously up the escarpment below us.

So we said Goodbye to the NFD, sorry to leave but now looking forward to the next leg of the safari which would take us to the Southern Masai, as that area was then known, today the world renowned Masai-Mara National Park, then a fairly inaccessible hunters paradise.

Foreword to Alan Richie’s Book. X2

Rough Draft. Revised but not finalized. (First)


As I start to write this forward to Alan Richie’s book based on the time he spent
as Roberrt Ruarks secretary cum right hand man, my mind is drawn back over
the span of fifty five years to the day when Bob, Virginia, and I…..Virginia straddling the gear lever between us, with our two gunbearers in the back of a short wheelbase Land Rover followed by the five ton baggage truck heavily laden with all the camp gear, food, fuel, and last but not least, a goodly supply of gin and beer, eased our way out of the Nairobi traffic, climbed labourously up the Kikuyu escarpment, and then plunged down a couple of thousand feet to the floor of the Great Rift Valley. Perched on top of the loaded truck, clinging precariously to the ropes which secured the tarpaulin covering to it, were about a dozen camp staff making themselves as comfortable as possible for the long hard ride.

Leaving the main highway which runs roughly north - south along the rift valley floor, and following a rough track leading between two extinct volcanoes, we cut across that great gash in the earth’s surface. We were on our way and after many hours and miles of slow traveling we started seeing numbers of common game , zebra, wildebeeste, kongoni, grant’s and thomson’s gazelle. We also passed large herds of Masai cattle guarded by slim moran standing on one leg in typical ‘nilotic’ stance leaning on their long stabbing spears wearing nothing but their ochre coloured chukkas draped over one shoulder

We talked continuously as we traveled…. mostly Bob asking questions about the country and all we were seeing, and myself trying to answer them as best I could. I realized he was soaking up information like a sponge, and only later did I get to know that he never took notes other than names of people or places, and that he never forgot anything he was told..
I knew he was a journalist. It had been impressed on me by Ker & Downey Safaris, the outfitters that a successful Ruark safari would bring good publicity to the country and all concerned, although I don’t think any of us in Kenya realized just how widely read he was through his syndicated column and magazine pieces. Surely no one could have predicted the book ‘Horn of the Hunter’ which would result from the safari, perhaps not even Bob himself.

I found him really outgoing, witty and humourous, ready to laugh and to take the rough with the smooth. He looked upon himself very much the ‘Bwana’ and was acutely aware of how he would be perceived as such, especially by the Africans, after all his reading about African hunting safaris
We discussed all aspects the forthcoming safari and Bob’s attitude towards it, he was most enthusiastic about the hunt, hoped to collect some excellent trophies, but insisted he was not in Africa hunting in order to see his name in the record book, and made it quite clear that if he wounded a dangerous animal, I was welcome to assist in finishing it off, whether coming or going. Most of all, he hoped it would be an experience he could cherish for the rest of his life.
Virginia was very pleasant with a tremendously wicked sense of humour. I have no doubt she would much rather have been in New York, but once on safari in Africa, dressed in hastily tailored slacks and bush jacket, topped off with a safari hat on her blond head, she was doing a good job of ‘making the best of It’
Starting out with these attitudes, it looked as though we would have a good safari..
Towards dusk I shot a Thomson’s gazelle, dinner for ourselves and the crew, and after a couple more hours of traveling, swerved off the track and bivoukaed the safari for the night. I could not have chosen a more lively spot had I tried, everyone, lions, hyenas, baboons, jackals, and a leopard serenaded the Ruarks with roars, grunts, barks, shrieks and chuckles non stop on that first night on safari….then just as dawn was breaking a pair of Hadada Ibis in a mocking ‘grand finali’ swept low over our makeshift camp uttering their raucus haa-haa-haa-haaaa cries on their way to distant feeding grounds.

Later over a hasty breakfast, I was interested to observe how the previous night’s concert had gone down with my charges. Bob was a little awed I think finding himself after dreaming of it since boyhood, ‘Bwana wa Safari’ in his hero Hemingway’s Africa…. perhaps after the previous night, wondering how well he would be filling the ‘bwana’s’ boots, but ecstatic and rearing to go nonetheless.
Virginia was merely resigned to her fate, her husband she now knew was crazy getting them into this situation, and she would have another month of riding with her knees straddling the Rover’s gear lever if she wasn’t eaten before then.

We crossed into Tanganyika and paid a visit to the Loliondo Government offices where we applied for Bob’s hunting licenses, and whilst they were being made out, we visited my friend, Mr.Dillon who owned the local duka to refuel, and as usual he insisted on us partaking of several cups of very sweet and milky cinnamon tea, and took great pride in showing off his mature buffalo bull which grazed along with his cattle.
It was incidents such as the tea drinking with the Indian shopkeeper that made me realize Bob was enjoying every aspect of what was going on…. many clients would have been impatient and would be thinking valuable time was being wasted, but not Bob, it was all part of the safari experience to him.

Formalities taken care of, we drove on to the famous Serengetti plain, a game reserve since 1934, in those days still very wild with no tourists, few tracks and a game reserve in name only.
Leaving the east - west track we drove cross-country southwards to Banagi the reserve exit point…. passing through huge herds of wild animals…also saw some lions which allowed us to approach very close in the vehicle, quite an experience for Bob and Virginia freshly out from New York, both agreed they would never forget that day on the Serengetti, ever!!
Finally, after many hours traveling, we arrived at our hunting camp site on the Grummetti river in the Ikoma area well after dark and proceeded to pitch camp, our crew, skilled campers as they were, made it ‘home from home’ within a couple of hours.
Bob claimed that we had been lost getting there but in-fact we knew very well where we were, it was necessary to feel our way in the dark through twenty miles of bush where all tracks of the previous season had been obliterated by the recent long rains
I thought we did a pretty good job, and saved a day by not camping out by the roadside for another night. However Bob never let me forget getting the safari lost in the ‘wilds of Africa’
From the camp on the Grumetti we hunted with considerable success collecting many fine trophies. Game of many species was everywhere, and the nights a bedlam of animal noises.

I found Bob to be an ethical hunter, he only killed for a good trophy or food, a fair marksman and a true sportsman, he seemed to be rather unsure of himself when we were about to tackle the big ones, and after shooting one of them, would be quite pale and so shaky that I would have to light his cigarette for him.
I think a lot of the problem was due to his ‘Bwana’ fixation. He felt I think that everything he did was being closely watched, and he had to be seen as performing like a ‘Bwana’. He often asked me after killing a significant trophy if the gunbearers thought he had excelled. I have to say though that when we were after buffalo, possibly in very thick bush, or sometimes wading through a swamp after them, he may not have liked it, but if I was prepared to do so, he would be along..
.

Bob was still at that time a Scripps Howard newspaper syndicated columnist, and he mentioned from time to time that he needed to get some columns written in order that they could be mailed at Musoma, a port on Lake Victoria, some ninety miles distant from our camp, where I would need to send the truck to replenish fuel and provisions. He was enjoying the safari so much that he was loth to take the time off to get the writing done and kept putting it off
Finally I said we were about to run out of fuel and the truck would have to leave on the morrow. Bob decided that he would hunt in the morning of that day and then write in the afternoon whilst Virginia and I went photographing.
After we returned to camp from the morning hunt we had lunch preceded by several martinis, and when Virginia and I left that afternoon Bob was at his typewriter in the dining tent., and I must admit I wondered what he would produce in the way of columns
Arriving back at dusk we were surprised to find Bob sitting at the campfire drink in hand, I was even more surprised to find that he had during our absence of perhaps four hours completed ten columns…. and they were extremely good columns, only minor corrections were required before they were sent off to Musoma next day to be mailed to New York
When I expressed surprise and admiration at what he had done, he said that the columns had already been written in his head during the time we had been hunting, and that they merely needed to be put on paper. He was greatly relieved to get this chore over with in order to continue enjoying the safari. We had quite a few more martinis that night.

The safari moved on to other areas, hunting with varying success., but basically getting most of the game we were after. An unfortunate incident occurred whilst we were making one of the camp moves, to this day I do not know how it happened. A leather bag with the cameras containing three belonging to the Ruarks and my Leica disappeared, whether it was stolen out of the Land Rover at one of the small settlements we passed through or jolted out of the vehicle whilst traveling we never discovered.
Now this on most safaris would be a disaster, and I was surprised and relieved at Bob’s reaction, even though I had also lost my Leica with telephoto lens. He said he hated cameras anyway, and now we could concentrate on the hunting without bothering about picture taking. The staff couldn’t believe it, they envisaged all sorts of recriminations as a result, and were quite amazed at Bob’s philosophical reaction.
This was typical of Bob, his approach was ‘if there is nothing that can be done about a problem, accept the situation and make the best of it’. This attitude was often demonstrated when we would get hopelessly bogged down in either sand or mud, Bob would find somewhere to sit, and laughingly say ‘OK Haraka let’s see you get out of this one’…. others would possibly be looking at their watch and counting how much the delay was costing them.

On one occasion we were trying to reach some inaccessible country, and were unable to do so due to the depth of water in the only passible ford .. I had the camp pitched a little way back from the river bank, and with the aid of some of the friendly locals and a long thick rope, we hauled the Land Rover almost submerged across to the opposite side..
We allowed it to drain over night, filled it up with fuel and oil in the morning and used it each day to hunt on the other side of the river, we either waded or used a dug-out canoe to ferry ourselves across That episode to Bob meant more than collecting a trophy.

We finally made it back to Nairobi and I have to say it was one of the happiest safaris it was my good fortune to conduct. The three of us became fast friends, gone was the client-hunter divide. There had been no trophy-itis, a virulent affliction which assails some when a desired trophy is hunted hard but proves to be illusive. No angry word had been spoken by any of us… we had worked hard and laughed a lot… had rejoiced at our triumphs and accepted our failures. It was a sad day for all of us when we rolled back into Nairobi. The safari was over, but my long association with Robert Ruark was just beginning.

Bob’s next African safari developed into a somewhat different exercise. Firstly, the Mau Mau insurrection had only recently erupted and the old ‘happy go lucky’ Kenya attitude was bring replaced by uncertainty and foreboding, certainly that was the case in the areas where the Kikuyu tribe predominated.
Some hunters including myself and some game wardens had been drafted to the Kenya Police Reserve to assist the regular force tracking the terrorist gangs in the forests. I, in-fact had only days before Bob’s arrival, come from our forest camp to conduct the safari.
Talk of Mau Mau was the main topic of conversation as nothing like it had happened before , and many people carried side arms.
A further complication arose due to Bob arriving together with a photographer having made a deal with a film company to shoot a film depicting all aspects of the safari from the hunting right through to the bread making for distribution commercially.
I pointed out to him that it was quite impossible to do both the hunting and photography using one hunter and one hunting vehicle and expect good results in both areas.
Either he lowered his sights in regard to the trophies he hoped to collect, Elephant, Rhino and other desert game, and concentrate more on the photography, or we take along another hunter with his vehicle to take care of the photographer whilst we were doing the actual shooting.
This would leave Bob and I free to manoeuvre into position for the shot,… relying on the other hunter to safeguard the cameraman and by closely following behind us to make sure the he was in the right place at the right time when we were about to shoot. They would also need to do a lot of filming by themselves of game in general, and the nomadic tribal people going about their daily lives to pad the film.
Bob saw the logic in my argument and agreed that we should do as I suggested.. Considering the very small monetary outlay involved , a surprisingly good film resulted. We covered the Northern Frontier Province and Masailand in Kenya, then traveled to the Great Lakes region of Uganda.

Bob designated himself to the position of ‘Bwana Director’ and apart from some ‘not seeing eye to eye ’with the camera crew occasionally, all went off pretty well Alchohol consumption was moderate throughout the safari, and Bob soon lost his rather bloated and pasty look when out in the bush. The film was titled ‘African Adventure’ and was shown around the world, and in-fact is still sometimes aired on late night programmes.
I will not attempt to recount all our adventures whilst making the film and collecting the trophies Bob was after, but will mention one amusing and frustrating, but finally most fortunate episode which arose when on the morning of New Years day, our first day in the field, we were driving along a rarely used track when our trackers drew our attention to three elephants some distance off in the bush.
Although only their backs were visible, they were obviously bulls by their size, and one appeared to carry good tusks, but they were a strangely reddish colour, Bob was convinced that he was seeing ‘pink elephants’ attributing it to our celebrations the previous evening. Actually, the reason was simple enough, the soil in that area was quite red and as it had been raining, the elephants had taken on a reddish colour after spraying themselves with liquid mud.
One of the main objects for the film was to get a spectacular shot with the cine of the actual shooting of a really fine trophy elephant. Accordingly we left the vehicles and began to carefully approach the larger animal in order to get a better view of his tusks…. we got pretty close to him but still had not seen his tusks clearly, when he suddenly became aware of our presence, swung round without warning, and came straight for us head held high with his massive tusks now clearly visible above the bush, his great ears spread wide like the sails.of an Arab dhow
We had to shoot him whether we intended to or not, we had no option he was too close. Bob fired twice with the .470 as he came on, and then as he slewed around, I sent in a.416 solid bullet to his shoulder as insurance. He staggered, ran a short distance and collapsed. Fortunately for us he was carrying very fine tusks, and we were elated not only with the trophy, both tusks evenly matched and when weighed later scaled well over one hundred pounds each, but also for the great sequence it had provided for the movie.
Imagine our dismay when we learned that the actual shooting had not been filmed, our camera crew seeing the monster bearing down had obviously decided to try ‘filming from a different angle’..

We had anticipated spending weeks hunting for a really good elephant, it is generally reckoned in hunting circles that one hundred miles is walked on average for every good elephant trophy taken, and here we were with a hundred pounder on the first day.
This altered the safari plan time-wise completely, we would have time to spare and Bob asked me if it would be possible for us to leave the safari for a few days and visit the district where we had been conducting anti- terrorist operations for him to gather material for his column and magazine pieces. I agreed to this, feeling through Bob’s extensive readership the outside world would get to know something of what was happening in Kenya.
Later on, after we had filmed many of the sequences required for the film and collected most of the trophies Bob was after in that area, we did leave the safari and traveled to the camp in the forest I had recently been operating from. Bob was able to see for himself what was going on, and even met some of the terrorists who had been captured.
I was able to arrange having got to know a lot of the local farmers, interviews with prominent people from that community, some taking place in the same homes where victims had been attacked.
These interviews together with others he had in Nairobi, plus what he picked up ‘here and there’ from hunters, policemen, game wardens and local people, formed the basis for ‘Something of Value’.
Most of the Kikuyu folklore was gleaned from Louis Leakey’s writings on the Kikuyu tribe. There was also a liberal infusion of Elpsbeth Huxley’s ‘Red Strangers’ thrown in
Much later when the book appeared I was disappointed to read the way he had portrayed some of the very accommodating people with whom I had arranged interviews, especially the two courageous ladies who had turned the tables on a gang bent on murder who attacked them in their home.

During the ensuing years my own situation also changed . I got married, but in order to make a living, continued to hunt professionally. In due course Miki my wife became pregnant and Bob happened to be in Nairobi at the time she went into hospital to give birth. He was due to fly home within a day or two, but as
he had all along insisted that if it was a baby boy he would he the Godfather, he wanted to be on hand at the time of birth, telling everyone when ordering a drink ‘We need It, we’re having a baby’ .but the baby was slow in coming… He delayed his departure several days but still no birth, finally he could wait no longer and his parting farewell was ‘Well, I’m leaving, but it’s going to be a big, fat, ugly girl anyway’. Mark Arthur Robert Selby came into the world a couple of hours after his departure. Some time later whilst he was passing through London he came across two rifles for sale originally owned by Karamoja Bell who had recently passed away. Bob bought them both and had a plate affixed to the stock of each, inscribed ‘To Mark Robert Selby from Uncle Bob Ruark’.
From then on Bob made numerous visits to Kenya either to go on safari, or in connection with the film rights to ‘Something of Value’, He was also assigned by Scripps Howard to cover the political Winds of Change’ which were sweeping Africa, and together we visited Uganda, Tanganyika, Ethiopia, Somalia, Rhodesia and South Africa collecting information for his column on the political climate in those countries, particularly those approaching independence from the various colonial powers.

An amusing incident took place in Ethiopia..We were granted an interview with the Emperor Haille Salassie, and on arrival at Palace at the appointed time we were met by the ‘Minister for the Palace’ who put us in the picture as regarding the formalities and etiquette involved. We would be allowed twenty minutes and the interview would be conducted through the Minister acting as interpreter We were duly ushered into the presence. The usual pleasantries were exchanged with nothing of much importance being said
The interview came to an end, we rose went back to the desk, shook hands again and proceeded in reverse, as one must never turn ones back on the Emperor, in the direction of the door. We eventually reached it in some confusion, and there in the passageway we were confronted by an enormous fully maned lion dragging a chain, obviously put there to test the ‘great hunters’ reaction . Bob’s reaction was ‘Damn it Haraka!! where’s the .470’ So ended our interview with ‘The Conquering Lion of Judah’

After the success of ‘Something of Value’ and the sale of the film rights, Bob flaunted his fame and wealth shamelessly, and spent lavishly on entertainment.
I remember meeting him at the Nairobi airport, and whilst still separated by the customs barrier him calling out to me ‘Haraka, man are we rich !!’, It has only been since biographies have appeared we learn that, in fact, he was always pressed financially.

Throughout this period Bob was drinking as usual but able to cope, it was when he started on the ‘Winds of Change’ assignment that he began drinking more heavily. Few people realized just how momentous this rush for independence by people totally unprepared it would become. I think the assignment was just too big for one man, and it became clear to him that his beloved East Africa, the East Africa he felt was his, with all it held for him, was about to slip away and change beyond recognition. This combination of factors precipitated a total collapse, fortunately my friend Dr.Roy Thomson and a few of Bob’s dedicated friends supported him through the crisis and eventually get him on to a plane bound for London, subdued, but on the wagon, which lasted all of nine months.

When he returned to Nairobi to research and collect material for a book he had in mind which would be titled ‘Uhuru’. He was drinking again, he had obviously decided he could not live without alchohol, and was contemptuous of anyone especially the doctors, referring to them as ‘quacks’, who warned him of the consequences of continued drinking. Although over the years I had noticed a gradual change in Bob’s general attitude, it was now much more marked. He assumed an arrogant ‘I know it all’ attitude to all things concerning African hunting and politics. We remained close friends nonetheless, and made a couple of short safaris, one with Walker Stone and one with Alan Richie, author of this book, and Bob’s very diplomatic and capable right hand man. Naturally, as Bob was researching Kenya’s changing and volatile political scene, one of the main topics of conversation was the looming ‘Uhuru’ and the ending of British rule in Kenya, and speculation as to whether it could become another Congo debacle.
Bob looking to the future, had already made a safari in Mozambique where the Portuguese gave him the red carpet treatment hoping for the resulting publicity which might benefit the newly established safari industry there.

As for myself and family, Ker Downey and Selby Safaris were planning to expand south to Bechuanaland, a British protectorate bordering South Africa, reputedly teeming with many varieties of game animals. I was offered the job of getting the operation set up and running. It was a bit of a gamble, as we were not too sure whether the game population there would support a full blown professional safari operation. Only time would tell , but it was a challenge I was happy to take up.

Bob and I decided that one last safari in Kenya would be a fitting farewell.to our years of hunting together in East Africa. Coincidentally, a large section of country lying east of the Mathews range in the Northern Frontier having been a game reserve since the turn of the century, and renowned for elephants carrying big ivory was about to be opened to hunting using horses and camels instead of vehicles.
Kenya’s Northern Frontier had always been my favourite hunting ground anyway, so It seemed the ideal location for our last safari together in a new area never hunted before and using horses instead of a vehicle, it would be a unique experience. An elephant with tusks each weighing one hundred pounds or more would be the object of the safari. I reserved the area for a month
.
We arrived with the safari at the designated camp site where the vehicles would remain for the duration of the safari, and found the horses and camels hired from the local tribal authority with their attendants awaiting our arrival. From then on all hunting would be from horse back, and the camping equipment would be carried by camels when we needed to move camp. The whole concept was most refreshing and one felt that one was really in ‘wild Africa’. The camps were of necessity would not be as sophisticated as the usual safari camp, but it is amazing how comfortable a camp transported by camels can be when only the essentials are carried and loaded by experienced packers.

We assembled a light but reasonably comfortable ‘fly camp’ which we then loaded on to the camels, said ‘Goodbye’ to base camp, and proceeded to wander northwards skirting the foothills of the Mathews range, hunting from one water hole to another, camping at places where promising sign was discovered, the whole safari enclosed by a strong thorn brush ‘boma’ to deter the lions which were numerous, from attacking our animals.
We had with us some of the ‘old hands’ who had been along on each of Bob’s previous safaris, and with whom he had a lasting bond, including the incomparable Juma head man extraordinary, flashing the gold tooth he had insisted be added in the dentures Bob had arranged for him, ancient Ali, the best safari cook in East Africa , Matheke an outstanding and fearless hunter and tracker, and old Katunga, artist with a skinning knife, camp entertainer, medicine man and philosopher We were as free as air.
Game animals and birds were plentiful and varied, and were extremely tame being used to, and unafraid of horses and camels, we had no difficulty feeding ourselves and the retinue which included our reduced safari staff, plus the horse and camel handlers.
There had been heavy rain in the area before we arrived, consequently the bush was very green and visibility fairly limited, but as there were a number of fairly high rocky hills throughout the area, we made use of them for spotting with powerful binoculars ….Literally hundreds of elephants were on view, all a pronounced reddish colour which made them stand out amongst the green bush on which they were feeding.

This was the first time Bob and I had been on safari together without others along, and Bob’s old witty, cheerful, and happy self reemerged. We sat up late each evening round our small camp fire and had a great time reminiscing about the safaris we had made together in the past. We talked about the old time ‘ivory hunters’ such as Karamoja Bell and Jim Sutherland and others, and the more recent greats like Phil Percival and Pat Ayer who had shown me the way, about the Kenya of yesteryear, and wondered what the future held in store for this magical land.

Hemingway’s name naturally cropped up from time to time, Although Bob admired him and it appeared, virtually modeled his own life on that of Hemingway, he could not resist the occasional ‘put down’,
I was reminded of the time I passed on to Bob the news of his death. The ‘love hate ‘ relationship which had always lurked in Bob’s subconscious, surfaced and he became extremely excited, as excited as I had ever seen him, exclaimimg ‘Haraka I’m now the ‘herd bull’, do you realize that? I’m the ‘herd bull’.!!

We had from the outset seen some fair tuskers but not what we were looking for, Bob, having already collected an elephant with tusks in excess of a hundred pounds, felt he would rather not take another unless it was in the hundred pound class. I admired his sportsmanship.
On one occasion we were riding along in light bush beside a lugga at the head of our lengthy caravan, when, with a scream a young elephant bull came charging across the sand straight at our line of animals causing instant panic Bob and I naturally tried to urge our reluctant mounts into action, but Bob’s just lay down and he walked on over its head. Fortunately the bank was quite high, and the enraged elephant unable to climb It, turned aside. Bob said later that he should have just picked up his horse and followed the general stampede
.
However time was marching on, we had worked hard, ridden and walked many miles, sat on hillsides spotting with binoculars for hours in the hot sun, had covered most of the area allocated to us, and had as yet not found what we were looking for. Diana did not appear to be riding along with us on this hunt, or if she was, felt that we needed to work very hard for our game. The distinct possibility began to dawn on us that the hundred pounder we had set our hearts on might elude us even in this totally untouched country where there had never been any hunting. But then elephant hunting is always unpredictable.

Then one morning a young Samburu moran, head and shoulders literally glistening with red ochre mixed with sheet’s fat, and carrying two long razor sharp stabbing spears, came into camp and casually mentioned that an old elephant with big tusks frequented a watering place named ‘Illaut’ some twenty miles still further north. He claimed the old bull had lived there for years and never moved away…. he was now the only elephant drinking there, all the others had migrated south to feed on the green bush we had recently passed through. He was apparently too old to follow.

Unfortunately, information gleaned from the local natives has a way of being very misleading, they tend to tell you what they think you would like to hear, or they think that if they can persuade you to follow them to some out of the way place, an elephant might be encountered, and possibly collected. In which case the informant will claim full credit and the reward. But this young fellow seemed different, he was totally unsophisticated and had never heard of a reward for information about elephants.
We decided to give it a try, we were getting pretty desperate anyway, so we packed up camp, loaded the camels and set off for Illaut..

Arriving at the Illaut wells after a long march under a broiling sun late in the evening we set up our small camp, some people living close by confirmed the story the Samburu moran had told us. An old elephant with large tusks did drink regularly at the wells. We would have to wait till morning to see whether he would return during the coming night. We went to bed with high hopes for the morrow.

Early next morning we discovered that he had visited the wells during the night, we decided to have a quick breakfast then take up the spoor. Whilst we were doing this, Sala, the head camel handler brought brought to us a young Samburu girl who claimed she had seen the bull not very far away whilst escorting her flock to water. This was great news, we quickly saddled up and rode off in the direction she indicated.

We had not ridden more than a couple of miles, when on cresting a low ridge, a buttress of the massive mountain range overlooking the area, we saw him. He literally filled the eye!! Every inch of him was visible from his toenails to the top of his head, standing absolutely motionless, as if carved out of stone, his long symmetrical tusks nearly touching the ground. What a sight!! I know of nothing so thrilling as ones first glimpse of a really fine tusker. There was no doubt here was the trophy we were looking for.

We dismounted and walked to within thirty of forty yards of him, no reaction, he was probably partially blind and possibly deaf. Small wonder he had remained behind when all the others had moved to greener pastures. No need to relate the actual shooting, it was infact an anticlimax in comparison to the hunt, suffice to say Bob did a good clean job of it.
After rewarding the young girl for having brought us the news, and having removed the fine tusks, no doubt about it they would easily exceed one hundred pounds each. We started the return march to base camp which we reached after two long days where we found everything in order. We had collected our ‘hundred pounder’ the safari was over.

Next morning, it was time to say Goodbye, and show our appreciation with a very generous gratuity, to the horse and camel handlers who had been most cheerful and helpful, in fact, indispensable throughout the safari. We had become quite fond of our little troop of horses and camels, it takes quite a lot of togetherness to become fond of a hissing, spitting and quarreling camel, but we were sorry to leave them
With camp packed once more on the vehicles, we started on the return trip to Nairobi. By arrangement Bob was picked up by a charter plane at a bush strip in order to reach Nairobi in time to meet some friends who would join us on the second leg of the safari in Masailand. I elected to remain with the safari.

On the last evening before we reached base camp we were as usual sitting by our little camp fire chatting about our experiences with this unfamiliar method of hunting, and the unspoiled area we had explored, also congratulating ourselves on the extremely satisfactory outcome of the hunt, then just before turning in Bob in all seriousness said ‘Haraka you might not realize it, but I have for years fed off your carcass like a hyena’

When I shook hands with Bob and said goodbye, as he was about to climb aboard the charter plane, I did not realize then that it would be the last time I would ever see him. He left Nairobi that same night for London due to an unexpected legal problem which had suddenly cropped up..

Holland’s .375 Mag. hundredth anniversary.

Harry Selby

Introduction and Early History.

The .375 H&H Magnum was introduced by English gunmakers Holland & Holland in 1912 as the .375 Belted Rimless Nitro Express.
It was one of the first cartridges to feature a belt, necessitated by the sharp taper of the case which resulted in very smooth feeding from the magazine, but also created an inadequate shoulder unsuitable for headspacing. The new cartridge headspaces on the belt.

The .375 H&H Mag’s. development was a direct result of the popularity being gained in Africa and India by the German Mauser 9.3 X 62 developed by Otto Bock in Germany in 1905.
This much cheaper yet highly effective cartridge / rifle combination was becoming more popular than, and out selling the expensive English doubles which were widely used at that time for hunting dangerous game.
The English gunmakers began experimenting with various cartridge designs in order to come up with an alternative to the 9.3X62 .and the.375 H&H Magnum was Holland’s contribution.

A rimmed version of this new cartridge was also produced for use in double and single shot rifles and proved very successful.
It was known as the .375 Flanged Magnum and for a lady hunter who might prefer a double to a bolt action rifle, it was ideal. The ballistics of the two cartridges were very similar.

The overall length of the loaded cartridge was 3.6 inches which was too long for a standard action so Hollands opted for the longer Mauser action on which to base its new cartridge. The Mauser squarebridge action became synonymous with the H&H .375 Mag. although it was used for other long cartridges as well.

Initially, three bullet weights were offered…. 235 grain (2964 ft/s)… 270 grain (2694 ft/s) and 300 grain (2645 ft/s) loads.
The two hundred and seventy grainers on plains game and the three hundred grainers on dangerous game proved most popular…. the 235 grainer was intended for shots at longer ranges.

Hollands also claimed that many of the new .375 Mag.rifles could produce close to the same point of impact with the three different bullet weights at all reasonable hunting ranges ..
An unusual achievement for any cartridge, but this claim has been independently borne out and is of considerable importance to the hunter using different bullet weights whilst after more than one species of game as it eliminates the necessity to re-adjust sights.

It was not long before glowing reports concerning the new rifle / cartridge combination’s outstanding effectiveness started circulating from hunters who had purchased the new .375 Mag. for use on hunting trips to Africa, India, and also Alaska.
The outstanding ‘knock down’ qualities of the three hundred grain bullets, in conjunction with the increased velocity became immediately apparent, and that increased velocity driving lighter bullets also established the .375 Mag. as a flat shooting, reasonably long range cartridge.
Holland & Holland would appear to not only have equaled the German 9.3 X 62s performance, but had actually improved upon it by quite a margin.
The rifle sold well in Europe and America throughout the period between the two world wars mainly to those hunters planning a safari to Africa, India or possibly Alaska and it’s enviable reputation became legendary.

However in colonial Africa due to the cost of the rifle and it’s ammunition (a 375 Mag. cost about double what a Mauser 9.3 X 62 would cost ) the Mausers and Manlichers dominated the market and continued to do so for many years although a .375 H&H Mag. was on most serious hunters ‘wish lists’…. cost was the problem.
The reason for the considerable price differential was that the German and Austrian manufacturers had developed very sophisticated ‘mass production’ techniques enabling them to produce very well made and finely finished rifles priced much lower than the British equivalents which were mostly ‘hand made’.
I can well remember as a schoolboy spending hours admiring the rows of superb Mausers and Manlichers ranging from 6.5 m/m to 10.75 m/m in Charles Heyers’s Nairobi gunstore… the prices ranging from fifteen to twenty East African pounds.
The first U.S. company to produce rifles chambered to the .375 H &H Mag.in their bolt action rifles was Winchester, early in 1925.

My first introduction to the H&H .375 Mag. was in 1947 when I was employed on a three month hunting safari conducted by Philip Percival. The clients brought with them a number of rifles which had been used on a safari with Percival prior to World War two…. One of these rifles was a .375 H&H Mag.… I was well aware of it’s reputation and having studied it’s ballistics, I was anxious to see it perform on game.
When the rifles arrived in Nairobi I took the opportunity to examine the .375 Mag. and was immediately struck by its clean classic lines…a slender pistol grip, adequate but not bulky fore-end, and of course the beautifully shaped butt with cheek-piece and rubber recoil pad.
The Mauser square-bridge action was the first I had ever seen and I was impressed by it’s rugged appearance and how smoothly it cycled.
I also noted with interest the dropped magazine box to accommodate the larger cartridges and the reshaping of the wood forward of the trigger guard to accommodate it, which enhanced the appearance of the rifle I thought.
The only thing that seemed incongruous to me was the rather ‘angular’
foresight ramp, the sort of ramp one might expect to find on a military weapon, it did not appear to harmonize with the classic lines of the rifle.
I am sure it was very effective with it’s little built in foresight protector
but to me it looked a little ‘out of place’.

The rifle saw little use by the clients on the safari, only the wife was hunting seriously, and she being an older lady was unable to handle anything heavier than a 30-06. Fortunately for me I was invited to use the .375 Mag, as often as I wished, and as there was plenty of ammunition of both 270 and 300 grain weights I gladly availed myself of the kind offer and discovered that using it proved to be a new and rewarding experience.
I soon realized that all the claims I had read about it’s performance were true, in-fact in my opinion, possibly understated…. And I did find that at one hundred yards the two seventy and three hundred grain bullets impacted close enough to each other for all practical hunting purposes.

Used on buffalo, the three hundred grain solid, if the shot was well placed, would usually result in one shot ‘on the spot’ kills, and the two seventy grain soft nosed bullet was capable of reaching out to several hundred yards merely by holding a little higher on the intended target.
This was a versatile combination indeed, a truly all-round rifle such as I had never seen before… powerful, accurate, and dependable with the ability to reach out there if necessary with enough retained power to do the job.
This was the commencement of my life long ‘love affair’ with the .375 Mag. and I determined to own one myself as soon as I could… however that did not come about until 1950 when at the end of a three month safari I was presented with a Winchester Model 70 .375 by the clients.
It was the first of several .375 Winchester Mags. I have owned, and I cannot recollect ever being on a safari without a .375 in the gun racks of the hunting car. Regrettably I have never owned a genuine H&H .375 Mag.

The .375 Mag’s. roll on the African Safari scene.

During the late 1940s and early 1950s hunting safaris from overseas, mostly the U.S.A, began to trickle back to East Africa and as new rifles were not available in Nairobi, prospective hunters brought their own with them.
Rifles chambered for the 30-06 and .375 H&H Mag cartridges were by far the most common, although there were a small percentage of other calibers as well. A few English rifles showed up belonging to clients who had been on safari prior to the war, such as the 375 H&H previously discussed
It had become customary on pre war safaris for clients to hire a heavy double rifle from the Safari company for Elephant, Rhino and Buffalo and the .375’s roll had been largely for use on the larger plains game and lion.
Due to the advent of convenient and time saving air travel, combined with the writings of people such as Hemmingway, Ruark, and O’Connor, increasing numbers of people decided to undertake an African safari, and many of them had minimal hunting experience and were not too familiar in the use of firearms either.

It takes time and much practice to shoot a heavy double well, and having read stories about the horrendous recoil attributed to the heavy English doubles, some of the new generation of clients were possibly more apprehensive of the weapon they were about to use, than they were of the animal on which they would be using it on.
This situation did not contribute to accurate shooting and resulted in many missed shots, wounded animals and ‘messy’ follow ups.
I personally saw an elephant run off after having been cleanly missed by both barrels at less than forty yards.
As time went by, clients, encouraged in many cases by the professional hunter, began using the .375 Mag. on the ‘big three’ instead of the heavy doubles, the change proved most rewarding, as more accurate placement of bullets resulted in cleaner kills and less time wasted, not to mention the danger involved in following wounded animals.
The .375 Mag. was confirming it’s status as a very effective ‘Dangerous Game’ cartridge and many gunmakers worldwide began chambering their rifles for this outstanding cartridge.

New government regulations in a number of African countries require that the minimum legal caliber for hunting thick skinned dangerous animals be .375. This requirement forced many users of sub caliber weapons to invest in a larger one, and the logical choice was a .375 Mag.
It is impossible to estimate how many .375 Mags. are owned by people living in Africa today, there must be many thousands, and although manufactured by different companies from different countries, they all owe their existence to Holland & Holland’s design dating back to 1912.
The success of the .375 Mag. resulted in a range of so called ‘improved’ versions of the cartridge, usually by fire-forming the original case in an enlarged chamber in order to accommodate more powder and thereby increase velocity.
In my opinion these ‘improved’ versions do not demonstrate any real advantage over the original Holland & Holland design which is an extremely well balanced cartridge other than some extra striking energy and a somewhat flatter trajectory. They certainly produce more noise, more muzzle blast and more recoil, to add to the downside the ammunition becomes a hand loading proposition.
Members of various groups such as professional hunter associations, game control officers, and professional guides associations have on a number of occasions voted by a considerable margin in favour of the .375 H&H Mags. acceptance as the best ‘all round hunting caliber.

This distinction has been earned by the outstanding and dependable performance of this rifle / cartridge combination over a period of one hundred years from all corners of the earth. From the frozen wastes of the north and south poles to the sweltering deserts of Africa and Asia, to the great primeval jungles in other parts of the world.
Today with so many rifles chambered for this cartridge it is usually possible to obtain ammunition in many countries, sometimes in quite remote places…. This is a considerable advantage to the travelling hunter.
For me.. the .375 H&H Mag. is the most outstanding and versatile cartridge ever developed, and no matter how hard they try it’s track record will never be equaled.

The Enigmatic African Leopard X2.
Final Draft.

My first leopard experience was as a teenager on the family farm in Kenya. A pair of leopards made a hole in our calf pen one night and killed four of the calves…. They dragged one carcass outside through the hole they had made and fed on part of it leaving the remainder by the pen. The other three were left untouched, where they were killed.

A trap was prepared with the remains of the calf as bait, but they never came back… they were presumable a roving pair, far from their usual habitat.
My conclusion was that the leopard was indeed a compulsive killer….. he kills for the sake of killing, not necessarily to eat.
Since then, after fifty five years experience of observing and hunting leopards as a professional hunter I have come to the conclusion that he is totally unpredictable as the incidents I will relate later in this narrative will illustrate.

He can be very secretive and will sometimes live quite near to human habitation, raiding rubbish bins, or feeding on the odd stray dog or cat or even poultry, without anyone realizing a leopard was the culprit….. at other times, especially at night, he can be excessively bold and has been known to jump through an open window to make off with a dog sleeping on the floor beside his masters’ bed.
I have repeatedly seen his tracks around the camp fire area where we had been sitting on the previous evening, and evidence that he had also entered the dining tent where a bright light had been burning. He will readily attack if cornered but will however, take to his heels if the odds turn against him.

Pound for pound the leopard is possibly the most powerful African animal, and also one of the most beautiful…yet, in sharp contrast, he will readily feed on the most putrid flesh, something even a hyena would reject..
I once came upon a young zebra kill which would probably have weighed about one hundred and eighty pounds stashed neatly in the fork of a tall tree….. the leopard got it there by gripping the head in his jaws and allowing the kill to hang down his back whilst hauling himself and the kill up the tree using his claws, both front and rear dug deeply into the soft bark of the tree, as anchors.
When we collected the leopard later it weighed one hundred and sixty five pounds on the beam scale I always carried in my hunting car. That leopard had hauled somewhere around three hundred and fifty pounds up the tree.

He is a very efficient killer and I have seen a large male kill a fully grown Topi which would have weighed possibly in excess of four hundred pounds, in broad daylight …and he did it with ease. However, he appears to prefer smaller animals such as warthog… a great favourite…. and impala sized animals, probably due to the necessity for him to stash the kill in a tree to prevent it being robbed by hyenas…. , and his relationship with these opportunistic scavengers Is very interesting and ambiguous.

Once whilst travelling from Musoma on Lake Victoria to Ikoma to start a safari we noticed off to one side, two large hyenas baying at the base of a large acacia tree, they were standing on their hind legs with forepaws against the tree just as a dog might do.
We stopped the vehicle and when I put the binos on to the tree, to my considerable surprise they revealed, in the upper branches, a large male leopard.
We hastily removed the guns from the racks and started to approach the tree on foot… Whereupon the leopard ran down the tree and made off with the two hyenas in hot pursuit… in fact they were right on his tail.
The leopard quickly went up another tree, and by this time we were in position and my client killed it with one shot. . An unexpected bonus before reaching camp. At the sound of the shot the hyenas bolted.

On another occasion my client and I were following a buffalo herd in thick cover, and on reaching a large sausage tree I motioned one of my gunbearers up the tree to see if there was open country ahead,
As I looked up I saw the body of a hyena, hanging by it’s jawbones which were neatly wedged in a fork of the tree by a leopard, and the hind legs had been recently fed on…This was a case of a hyena having been killed by a leopard for food.

On a third occasion, late one evening, we were sitting quietly in a blind waiting for a leopard to come to the bait placed in a tree close to thick cover.
Presently, I noticed a hyena approaching cautiously… it would stop every few paces and look long and hard at the thick bush behind the bait tree.
Eventually it arrived at the base of the tree and began picking up the bits and pieces of bone the leopard had dropped. This went on for a few minutes when suddenly without any warning a big male leopard sprang from the bush and there began a rough and tumble between the leopard and hyena, with much noise from both of them.
After a few seconds of this strange ‘mix up’ the leopard suddenly disengaged himself and sprang back into the bush leaving the hyena seemingly, unhurt….. after shaking himself a few times he wandered away passing close to our blind. We could see no blood on him, although he did twitch the hide on his back repeatedly, presumably where the claws had dug in.

The leopard’s relationship with baboons is also very complex, It is believed in some quarters that baboons form a significant part of a leopard’s diet…maybe that is the case where game animals are scarce and baboons still survive in the rocky hills.
I have never over the years come across a baboon killed by a leopard stashed in a tree. There very definitely is a natural enmity between them, and baboons will make a tremendous fuss if they detect a leopard on the prowl.
One day in the NFD whilst hunting elephant we were walking along the edge of a lugga and eventually climbed a rocky outcrop overlooking both the lugga and the extensive scrub palm thicket on the opposite side of it.
We began glassing and after a few minutes we heard a noise from the scrub at the base of the rocky outcrop…soon a large leopard streaked out from the below us and tore across the lugga and disappeared into the scrub palm on the opposite side. Immediately there ensued a fearful racket… the leopard had landed up in the midst of a foraging troop of baboons..
This lasted for a couple of minutes: then from our vantage point we spotted the leopard break from the scrub palm going for all he was worth with four or five big male baboons literally on his tail. he doubled back across the lugga and re-entered the same patch of scrub at the base of the outcrop he had just vacated.
The baboons, sharp eyed as they are, spotted us on the rocks when half way cross the lugga and called off the chase, but continued to strut back and forth on the sand whilst hurling insults at both the leopard cowering in bush below us, and ourselves on the rocks above him until we finally left.
I have no doubt that had we not been there, the leopard would have been dragged out of the bush and torn to shreds.

The most frequently employed, and possibly most successful method of hunting a leopard is by placing a kill in a suitable tree in an area where a leopard might be expected to lurk.
If, and when a leopard discovers the kill and begins to feed on it…. this might take some days, a blind is constructed in a suitable position in relation to the bait tree.
A leopard usually visits his kill to feed either in the late evening or very early morning, and the hunters can choose to wait in the blind at either of those times in case he does come to feed.
The choice of ‘bait tree’ and the positioning of the blind in relation to it, are of critical importance, and can influence the outcome of the entire exercise.

I enjoyed the leopard ‘baiting game….’ it was almost a battle of wits, each time I would try some tactic to outsmart him , he would react to what I had done, . illustrated by the incident described in the next paragraph….and there were times when he outsmarted me
Occasionally, a leopard will not come to the bait during daylight hours but feeds regularly at night. On one such occasion a very large leopard, judged by his tracks, had taken possession of one of our baits.
I hit upon the idea of rebuilding the blind and enclosing the roof completely so that we in the blind, would be invisible to the vultures cruising high above..
About mid-morning the next day when the vultures would be active I arranged for another kill, which we had secured beforehand, to be dropped in the open space between the ‘bait tree’ and the blind.
My client and I took up our positions in the blind and waited developments which were not long in forthcoming.
First we heard the swish of wings above us as the vultures began to circle, and at about that time I heard a francolin give an alarm call a short distance off…. The leopard was moving!!.
A few vultures, attracted by the decoy kill began landing in nearby trees, and eventually one landed in the ‘bait tree. That did it… within a couple of minutes a magnificent male leopard came up the trunk of the bait tree and stood on a branch facing the blind snarling at the vultures flying by.
I whispered to my lady client, to hit him on the point of the shoulder… which she did. He fell out of the tree and never moved from where he landed.
When we weighed him back in camp he tipped the scales at one hundred and eighty five pounds, and measured eight feet two inches… the largest leopard of my career, his belly did not appear distended… had he been gorged as they sometimes are… he might have made it to the two hundred pound mark.

One evening in Kenya’s Masai country we were waiting in a leopard blind …. He did not come up the tree until the very last shooting light.. My client fired and the leopard fell out of the tree but regained his feet and made it to the nearby wooded gully.
I ran up and cautiously approached the spot where he had disappeared into the bush… I was greeted from the dark bush by a vicious growl. I backed off.
We went back to camp to collect flashlights and a powerful gas lamp. I have found that when following or retrieving a wounded leopard at night that a powerful lamp has some advantages over a flashlight as if one is knocked over, the light will continue to illuminate the area allowing ones companions to see what is happening… whereas the beam from a flashlight would be directed in one direction only.
We parked the Land Rover about twenty yards from the bait tree and I together with my two gunbearers, Matheke and Muema, entered the gully where the leopard had disappeared. and began the search. One man carried the gas lamp and a machete, the other a powerful flashlight and a heavy club. I carried my shotgun.
It was very thick in there, and rather eerie, with weeds almost waist high and the very real possibility of a wounded leopard waiting to spring.
We found no blood, but whilst we were in the bush two leopards ‘sawed ‘ on several occasions close by, but from different directions. Either the leopard was not dead or more likely there was another leopard in the vicinity.
After about an hour we gave up and returned to the Land Rover. We hung the gas lamp quite high up against the bait tree and settled down to spend the night in the vehicle, hoping that if we heard hyenas during the night we could recover the leopard from them
I went to sleep sitting in the drivers seat but was woken up at about three o’clock in the morning by one of the guys who said ‘look at the kill’,… there was a large male leopard lying on a branch feeding on it.
He had climbed up the tree trunk passing literally inches, from the hissing gas lamp . I switched on the Rover’s headlights. ..He looked up in our direction then carried on feeding until he left the kill some time later…. presumably after he had had his fill. The ‘sawing’ from more than one leopard continued until dawn..
When there was enough light to see we again entered the bush and found the ‘wounded’ leopard dead… we had passed within a couple of feet of him on the previous evening…. due to the tall weeds we had missed it.
During the night one of the other leopards had opened up it’s belly, and eaten the intestines which contained meat from the kill…. So neatly was this done that the skin was in no way damaged.
This posed the question,,,, How did the other leopard know meat from the kill was in the dead animal’s belly?. No other organs had been eaten. It was not a case of cannibalism.

Toward the end of 1958 I was on safari with a couple in Kenya’s Masailand Only the husband was hunting and we were after Buffalo and Leopard in particular, plus the various species of plains game available there. Lion were closed to hunting.
One morning we discovered a Leopard kill in an isolated tree some distance from the nearest cover. On examination the kill appeared to be very fresh and only a small amount of flesh had been consumed. I wondered if the leopard, possibly hungry, would return if we waited for him in a hastily constructed grass blind. It was worth a try….
After instructing the car to return in two hours of no shot was heard, the client and I made ourselves as inconspicuous as possible in the makeshift hide and settled down to wait.
I must admit that I did not hold out much hope as everything was wrong, the bait tree was too far from the nearest cover and it was in the middle of the morning.
How wrong I was… within half an hour we heard scratching noises from the direction of the bait tree and very soon a very large male leopard stood in the tree looking directly in the direction of the blind. The client very slowly raised the rifle and fired. The leopard did not fall from the tree… he sort of jumped from it with a growl,, and on hitting the ground made off in the direction of the nearest cover, some two hundred yards distant. I knew it had been hit.
The car arrived soon afterwards expecting to find a dead leopard, but instead heard that we now had a wounded leopard on our hands. We held out hopes though, that we might yet find him dead.
We followed his tracks, but found only a small amount of blood, and when we got fairly close to the cover, I scanned it with the binos, and there to my amazement at the very edge of the cover, lay the leopard flat on his side.. presumably dead.
I said ‘there his is …he’s dead’. and started to move forward, but just then the client whilst fiddling with his pump shotgun for some reason , discharged it.
That leopard came to life like a volcano and with guttural grunts came straight for us. At about thirty paces I fired one barrel with contained OOB and kept the other barrel in case he got really close, He swerved at my shot and went into another very small patch of thick cover close by.
We waited a few minutes in case we might hear something, then began throwing anything we could find into the bush to see if there would be any response.
We heard nothing, so I decided that we would circle the small patch of bush to establish if he was still in there.
When we got to the other side we found the leopard just outside the cover… he had gone straight through it. He was truly dead this time… …... .
On careful examination after the skin had been removed we found that the client’s shot was too low and far back…. And what really opened my eyes was that the only other wound was where one OOB pellet had hit the leopard in the middle of the chest and penetrated to the heart..
I was horrified that only one pellet had hit the animal, which reinforced by belief that buckshot is only as effective as it is reputed to be, at very close range, before the pattern has opened up, and the larger the pellets, the more open the pattern.
Question. Why did that leopard behave as if dead, when in-fact he had plenty of life left in him??

I conducted a safari in Botswana in 1985 for some clients from Brazil. The group comprised a father and teenage son combination and a young male relative in his twenties. Only the father and son were hunting.
The safari was going very well and after about ten days we had collected a fair amount of trophies. The father was very anxious to bag a Sitatunga, so I decided the time had come, as there was no moon, for him to go off in the dug-out canoe with the two experienced polers to try his luck.
We sent the father off early one morning in the mokoro (dug-out canoe)…. the two young clients set off with me and the two trackers in the Land Cruiser to hunt. The lad particularly wanted a Kudu.
After about an hour we drove through a belt of bush and emerged on an extensive flood plain and to my considerable surprise saw way out in the centre, a large leopard standing knee deep in the water.
He saw us as soon as we saw him and began to lunge back through the water toward the shore line.
He must have figured that we were cutting him off from reaching it, as he suddenly began charging directly at the vehicle uttering the usual leopard throaty grunts.
I did not want him to make contact with the side of the vehicle as the young client and the two trackers were standing up against the rear of the cab in the open back.
I swung the Toyota around and drove toward the on-coming leopard, reasoning that if he did attack the vehicle the bush guard would provide some protection… at the same time yelling to the trackers to remove a rifle from the rack and have it ready.
He did not slow down after clearing the water… he came straight on… when he reached the front of the Toyota he reared up on his hind legs and began chewing viciously on the top rail of the bush guard.
He then abandoned the bush guard and jumped up on the hood and stood staring with those big yellow eyes directly at the two of us in the cab, occasionally baring his teeth in a snarl.
My guys in the back were experienced hunters and they had wasted no time in getting a rifle ready and they now ‘more or less’ thrust it into the boys hands commanding him to ’SHOOT’
He fired and the leopard fell off the hood but was far from dead,… however, It did not try to run away or renew the attack on the Toyota, It just sat beside the passenger door.
March one of the trackers finally took the rifle from the boy and leaning over the side of the Toyota, shot it again, to prevent it from climbing back on to the vehicle.
The entire episode probably lasted no more than a few minutes but it seemed like hours…
I will never forget those two big yellow eyes, only inches away, glaring at us with only the windshield in between..

I hope you still have more!

I really enjoy Mr. Selby's writing.

I wish he was still around to tell him so.

I have a few left.

I am out of the country till later this month and will post more.

Harry's daughter Gail is still alive and well in Botswana. She would probably be pleased to hear we are enjoying her Dad's writings still today. I don't have contact info, but I know at least one AR member communicates with her... maybe he is reading this and will PM you??

CHEERZ,

Saeed,

Wishing you a Great Hunt again this year!!

.

A superb collection of photographs and writings Saeed! Thank you for starting this thread and posting all the pictures and texts.

I was born in Nairobi in the early 60`s, my parents emigrated from England in mid 1950s, (during the Mau Mau rebellion). My father was posted from the UK to Kenya and then Uganda.

They knew Joy and George Adamson. My uncle came over too and joined the Parks as a Game Warden.

I have memories as an infant sleeping in the back of a Landy with my cousins whilst my father and uncle drank brandy and sodas in a canvas mess tent in the Mara. Those small round soda bottles with flat sides!

My father purchased a .300 H&H when he arrived in Nairobi and sold it when he left Kenya for equivalent of £ 5/-

Interestingly whilst my uncle shot and culled hundreds of animals and took many trophies, my father, whilst he shot a lot for the pot, only shot one animal as a trophy. That was a very large Grevys zebra stallion that he searched for a long long time. He had it done as a rug on black felt in Nairobi and only had one house where the walls were big enough to hang the skin.

I now have the rug in my study, it fills the whole floor. A very large zebra rug of a now near to extinct species.

Would have been special if he had kept that H&H too but was not to be.

Kenya in the `50s and `60s, another world!

.

quote:

Originally posted by 470EDDY:
Saeed,

Wishing you a Great Hunt again this year!!

Thank you.

That is going to be later this year.

I am enjoying a very cold and wet break in Northern Sweden!

Well I hope there is some good fishing up there!! The only reason to get wet and cold, like Alaska!!
Wishing you Safe Travels...

CheerZ,

Saeed, thanks for sharing Harry Shelby’s writings with us, they’re wonderful. This thread has been one of the best in a long time.

quote:

Originally posted by Michael Robinson:
Maybe my favorite.



Pretty intimidating. Even though it is inconceivable, I surely wish they were still walking around East Africa in great numbers.

But I confess that, as a hunter, I'd have a hard time figuring out where I should shoot the damned thing!

Mike, I had a friend, Dr. William (Bill) Pritchard (deceased), who was the Dean of the School of Veterinary Medicine at the University of California at Davis. During safaris Golden Age Bill went on many exchange trips to East Africa on behalf of the University of California, where he would work with the Kenya Wildlife Service and other governments game departments doing veterinary related services. Bill told me that after these veterinary tasks were completed, he’d often stay for 4-6 weeks and hunt. I have no idea who he hunted with as his PH, but recall that he said the license included two elephant bulls, and if I recall correctly, 2 Black Rhino. Bill told me that rhinos were so common they were a nuisance, especially when hunting elephants.