Warning!!! This thread may be hazardous!!!

As pointed out in the recent topic

https://forums.accuratereloading.com/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/1411043/m/629102592

Has anyone ever hired PHC for a safari?

Does anyone have first hand info on being a client of, or working with PHC for a safari company?

Did he really work as a cropping offical?

Or was this all part of his staying up till 3 or 4 drinking and having to drink more for breakfast in order to leave camp?

How much is true? Tell me Damnit!

I've enjoyed his writing and still will. However, I can't condone excess drinking with firearms.

Enquiring mind needs to know

Thanks

Minkman

When I first met Peter in Botswana he was actually working for a safari Company- Managing the lodge. He certainly got out to do some of his own hunting and was taking the odd client out asfter plains game.

He was a fiarly heavy drinker then (1978 and 1982) but was only drinking in the evening and hadn't got onto the writers damnation of a jug with breakfast.

Ever noticed that too many of the great writers - PHC, Taylor, Ruark, Hemmingway, Churchill etc, needed a good drop of dop to get the words flowing.

Minkman

I was told he shot a total a four elephants in his life, not 800.

Watch his "Hunting the African Elephant" video. When he is talking and says he has shot 800 elephants, notice how they edited the film so the scene immediately finished at the end of this statement. He or the crew probably burst out laughing.

Ganyana & NitroX,

Thanks for these comments. I had already wondered about about Peter since the recurring theme of drinking showed up in his writing.

He had an excellent way with dramatic writing and gave us many a suspenseful moment in the chair.

But alas no one drinks like that unless they are very unhappy about their situation, why they've been handed the opportunity to do what they love in life...Hunt & Fish.


Minkman

The safari industry in Zimbabwe is based on peters writings. The early operators, like Brian Marsh (Henderson & Marsh) Ian Percy, Peter Johnstone etc were just struggeling along until Peter diverted attention away from East Africa.

He surely had a way with words! But the drinking was linked to both the industry and the writing and certainly wasn't a case of drowning sorrows. Most PH's drink far too much. You entertain almost every night and too often if the client drinks heavily...And Peter's job was entertaing clients. He did it so well. Then he used to wander off after the last client had gone to bed and write.

Then he needed a drink to write
Then he drank to much to write
Then Fiona started to get him back on the rails and he died

Also, he worked (for how long I don't know) as a "bright lights" farm sitting in Rhodesia during the bush war. Nitro X - your mate Penny should know because it was in that part of the country Peter was farm sitting and where he became friendly with Brian Marsh (Brian was getting Spanish Clients Blown up by a landmine in Sij at the time and running arround trying to explain away the bad publiciry -it's poor form to get your clients squashed by a buff but dam poor form to have them shredded by a mine - especially when you climb out of the wreck with rinnging ears and say "blast, Now I need a new Landrover")

Ganyana,

Very riveting stuff!

How do you guys handle a client whose still drunk in the morning, walking behind you with a loaded .505?

Unfortunately we've all seen the results of too much freedom for a forty year old to handle. Thank God, once they're out of sight of the wife, home, and work, they forget the whole reason for the trip.

The rifle or fishing rod doesn't get picked up again until they have to pack.

Thanks again

Minkman

Drinking and firearms don't mix.

I have a feeling that Peter wasn't the first guy to hunt after a drink.

Where is that DH icon when I need it?????

Enjoy Capsticks writing anyway, as a collection of actual stories, true or fiction, or semi-fiction. I certainly enjoy his writings.

I was interested to read books detailing the autobiography of Karen Blixen and also her letters to and from Africa. Much of her "true life" stories were stories, true, fiction or semi-fiction as well. A master story teller too. Is nothing sacred!

I don't see that it makes much difference what anyone believes or does not believe and no one on this board knows what is true or what is not, and so it becomes gossip, something I find distasteful...

I knew Peter pretty well, and Fiona quite well, I will accept what he writes as truth, until someone can prove different...

I do know that Safaris as we know them today would not exist were it not for Peter, and that my children would not have eaten as well were it not for his writtings...He took a dead industry and built it up to gigantic proportions..For that we should all be thankful.

How do we know what is the truth that we read from any writer of hunting dangerous game? it seems we only have degrees of confidence in various writers veracity. As far as PHC writings, I don't really care too awfully much how much experience he really had. He was a master at taking you on the tracks of dangerous game. I suspect that if he didn't actually do what he wrote he based most of his stories on what others that did told him. Sit back read his stories and enjoy. I have heard rumours of the same sort about John Taylor. But both of them gave good advice based on their collective knowledge. I haven't seen much to to indicate they gave bad advice.

465H&H

I have heard people talk about departed friends with dignity and all respect for someone no longer around to speak for themselves, and they did it without turning it into gossip. Some others have not succeeded. Or rather, feel it isn't a virtue worth pursuing. For my part, my respect for Peter Capstick has not been diminished from hearing what he lived through. Suffice to say there are many more insideously dangerous things in the world than a charging buffalo. The man behind all the public persona stuff has inspired loyalty among his friends. There was a good man there.

Dan

First of all, I have to agree with Ray. If it weren't for PHC, I would have never considered a safari. As a stroke of pure luck, we hunted the concession in the South Luangua that PHC hunted. Even though it was most likely him that brought modern day hunters to Zambia, they badmouthed him at every turn. Even if he did use other PH's stories, so what. They didn't bother to write a book. I have all of his writings, and enjoy re reading them often. I'm sure that's because alzhiemers has set in, and I forget I've read it, but look at the money it saves me.

For a lot of reason, I don't think that PHC was who he claimed to be, and this isn't exactly an industry secret. But he was a gifted writer, and like Ruark, PHC's booze and cigarette addictions killed him off way before his time.

But we as clients and the entire safari industry owe PHC a lot. He influenced countless hunters to go to Africa for the first time...........

AD

Many years ago, I spoke to PHC when he lived in Florida...I called him on the phone...That was approximately 20 to 25 years ago...Being the time many of his clients may have been 45 to 50+ years old...They would all be over 60 amd more... IMO..
But he told one hell of a story...

Mike

I am lucky that I do not have all his books. That gives me all the more to enjoy as I get them.

But there is something more important here that a man responsible for hunters continuing to enjoy Africa. That is the continued wild game that has not been poached because safaris pay better in the long run.

You tell me. Does that make Peter Hathaway Capstick the most important figure in the conservation of African game?

quote:

Originally posted by Atkinson:
I don't see that it makes much difference what anyone believes or does not believe and no one on this board knows what is true or what is not, and so it becomes gossip, something I find distasteful...

I knew Peter pretty well, and Fiona quite well, I will accept what he writes as truth, until someone can prove different...

I do know that Safaris as we know them today would not exist were it not for Peter, and that my children would not have eaten as well were it not for his writtings...He took a dead industry and built it up to gigantic proportions..For that we should all be thankful.

Ray

What you say makes a lot of sense to me at least ...

It the same as dear friend Wilber Smith ////

Peter HC and Wilber have proberbly done more to promote Africa than all these SOB's meeting at the G8

The truth always comes through in the end

Peter B

Amen

When I was "dirt floor poor" Capsticks books were all I could afford so he took me to Africa several times a year (thru his writings) and later his videos. I'm not bragging just stating fact, now that the Lord has blessed me and my wife in the years of 04, 05 and 06 I will when done have spent approx. $100,000.00 in Africa. Thats new rifles, airfare and hunt costs. Its mostly due to Capsticks books.

For good or bad he has had a major influence on my hunting. I could read between the lines when he wrote about needing a beer for breakfast claiming his medication required it. But it did not detract from his style and wit. The same goes for Skeeter Skelton, he drank too much and died from liver trouble but his writing is priceless. Kinda strange..................JJ

much as i enjoy his ramblings, as I understand it most of them came from listening in when he was a bartender at the safari lodge