African Hunter Traveller Books

The African hunter traveller books are generally the tales of independent travellers who hunted for themselves or to keep their travelling party in meat. Many were military men who travelled to remote regions as part of their army service and sport hunting was their main leisure activity.

They often became skilled naturalists, keeping meticulous diaries of their hunting expeditions. All the animals would have all their dimensions noted, not just the trophy part, along with habitat details, time of day it was taken and so on, all of which contributed to the wildlife knowledge collected on these previously little known areas of Africa.

Ferdinand Aitkens

Ferdinand Aitkens (1865 - 1935) was a British-born District Commissioner with the British South Africa Company. He first emigrated to Canada, before deciding to go to Africa to join the British South Africa Company formed by Cecil Rhodes in 1889. He served as a Captain in the Salisbury Field Force in the Matabele Rebellion. In 1896-97 he joined Robert Coryndon’s expedition to Barotseland, travelling 900 miles from Cape Town to Bulawayo by ox wagon.

He took the first official photographs of Victoria Falls. In 1898 he was appointed Assistant to the BSAC’s representative in Barotseland (now a province of Zambia), and in 1900 was appointed District Commissioner for the Barotse District (Northwestern Rhodesia) based at Lealui.

The Sportsman's Guide To North-Western Rhodesia: The Big Game Country by Ferdinand Aitkens (1905) was published to introduce sport hunters and fishing enthusiasts to the delights in store in north-western Rhodesia, after the new railway route to Victoria Falls opened the region to the world. The author includes much fascinating detail such as the timetables of shipping routes and railways, menus available on board, travel and tips on hunting areas, which game animals to expect and much more. Included are advertisements from the early 1900's for William Evans and Rigby firearms, camping equipment and Hardy Bros fishing tackle. Free eBook

Sir James Edward Alexander

General Sir James Edward Alexander (1803 - 1885) was a Scottish traveller, author and soldier in the British Army. In 1836 he conducted a 2 year exploration expedition into Namaqualand and Damaraland. He collected rock specimens, animal and bird specimens, weapons and implements from the Herero and Nama, as well as drawing maps of the region and making a first list of Herero words. Alexander Bay on the Orange River mouth, is named after him. In 1877 he was largely responsible for the preservation and transfer of the Egyptian obelisk, Cleopatra's Needle, to England.

An Expedition Of Discovery Into The Interior Of Africa by Sir James Edward Alexander (1838) is an early 2 volume work of travel and exploration in South Africa. Alexander hunted lions near the Orange River, also springbok and rhinoceros. Besides relating numerous encounters between natives and wild beasts, the author "decried the wanton sport of killing four elephants in one day, or the same number of hippopotami, with the same gun". Free eBook

Andrew A Anderson

Andrew A Anderson was an explorer, hunter, naturalist and colonial magistrate in the Cape before he embarked upon a 25 year journey through southern Africa, as far north as the Congo. He wanted to 'add another page to the physical geography of Africa'. He was twice believed to be dead - once for 3 years.

Twenty Five Year In A Waggon In The Gold Regions Of Africa by Andrew Anderson (1887).2 Volumes. These books are the account of the author's expeditions in the Drakensberg Mountains in 1863, the Orange Free State and the area later known as Griqualand West, then later Bechuanaland. He then nearly died of thirst crossing the Kalahari Desert to Matabeleland, and later travelled in Namaqualand, Damaraland, and Ovampoland, also "spending considerable time on the Orange River, shooting, boating geologising, and taking notes of everything of interest". There are also sporting encounters with lion, leopard, giraffe and buffalo, as well as the usual hunts for plains antelope for the pot. There is a Free eBook Vol I of the second edition of this book, titled 'Twenty Five Year In A Waggon:Sport And Travel In South Africa' 1888.

W J Ansorge

William John Ansorge (1850 - 1913) was a British traveller and collector of zoological specimens. He was born in Bengal and travelled extensively in Africa doing much big game hunting. There are dozens of African birds and fish named after him.

Under The African Sun: A Description Of The Native Races In Uganda, Sporting Adventures And Other Experiences by W J Ansorge (1899). The author travelled extensively in Uganda, having made the trip from the Indian Ocean six times including to the Unyoro region east of Lake Albert, and the Shiri and Zambesi Rivers. He provides detailed descriptions of the people, nature, hunting and caravan life. He also includes lists of butterflies, moths, beetles and birds that he collected. Free eBook

A Arkell-Hardwick

Alfred Arkell-Hardwick (b.1878) was a seaman and a member of the British South African Police before going to East Africa to become an ivory trader.

An Ivory Trader In North Kenia: The Record Of An Expedition Through Kikuyu To Galla-Land In East Equatorial Africa by A Arkell-Hardwick (1903). The author hunted along the Guaso Nyiro river in Kenya, bagging buffalo and rhinoceros. His party attempted to reach the Lorian Swamp but, having failed, they returned to the Guaso Nyiro where hippopotamus and giraffe were collected. There are numerous additional sporting incidents after rhino, gazelle and other game, including a successful elephant hunt by a member of the party. After encounters with hostile Kikuyus, the expedition headed into western Kenya where more rhino were taken, as well as kongoni. Free eBook

Rowland J Atcherley

Trip To Boërland: Or, A Year's Travel, Sport, And Gold-Digging In The Transvaal And Colony Of Natal by Rowland J Atcherley (1879) is a personal account of an Englishman's tour in the expanding colonial parts of South Africa in the late 1800's. The author does not appear to have been successful as a digger or a speculator, but his experiences at Spitz Kop and Pilgrim's Rest describe the life of the alluvial diggers at that period, which he believed were treated unjustly by the British authorities in the Transvaal. (Only reprints) Free eBook

Alfred Aylward

Alfred Aylward (1843 - 1889) was an Irish adventurer with a reputation as a 'rebel' or 'agitator'. Before going to South Africa he was said to have fought in Italy with Garibaldi and worked as a surgeon in the American Civil War - his medical knowledge was apparently acquired in Guy’s Hospital in London – when he was a patient. In South Africa he worked as a digger in the diamond fields where he led an unsuccessful revolt of diamond diggers against the colonial administration. He then led the Lynchburg Volunteer Corp, a Boer-sponsored mercenary army that fought against the Marota king Sekhukhune. During the first Boer War, he fought for the Boers in Transvaal. Later he edited the Natal Witness newspaper. Rumours of what became of him vary from being killed in a train crash in America, killed in the Sudan with the Mahdi forces or died in Sweden.

The Transvaal Of Today: War, Witchcraft, Sport And Spoils In South Africa by Alfred Aylward (1881) is the tale of the author's extraordinarily adventurous life fleeing from assassination, experiencing imprisonment and insurrection and hoping to establish the occasional republic. There is a chapter about big game hunters and hunting. Free eBook

Henry P Bailey / Bula N'Zau

Henry P Bailey aka Bula N'Zau spent four years in the Congo and kept a detailed record of his travels and sporting adventures. 'Bula N'Zau' which he used as a pen name, was his African name meaning 'the elephant smasher'. He bagged a huge number of elephants using a .577 Express rifle with solids.

Travel And Adventure In The Congo Free State And Its Big Game Shooting by Bula N'Zau (1894) covers his west African hunting exploits from 1884 to 1888. Bailey earned the non de plume of 'Bula N'zau' because of his hunting prowess. He initially hunted gorilla, then proceeded up the Rembo River where hippopotamus and leopard were hunted. In the Massabe Swamp, buffalo and antelope were bagged. He then traveled along the Kwilu River where elephants were taken. At Stanley Pool and later near Brazzaville, hippos and elephants were collected. This book ranks right up there with all the famous elephant hunting titles. Free eBook

R De La Bere Barker

Ronald De La Bere Barker or Delabere Barker (1889 - 1965) was a zoologist originally from Canterbury, New Zealand. After extensive world travel, he arrived in Africa and served with Frederick Selous in the World War I campaign against the Germans in Tanganyika. After the war he stayed in the Rufiji region of Tanganyika.

He lived in his grass hut in the depths of Africa where wildlife was daily unfolded before his eyes. He became known as the 'Hermit Hunter of Rufiji' and was occasionally called upon by the local natives to hunt and kill marauding lions or hippos. He was dependent for his livelihood upon his skill in hunting and upon his powers of observation. Barker's sharp-snouted worm lizard, Ancylocranium barkeri was named after him. He wrote several books and gave weekly broadcasts on wildlife, in Swahili over the Tanganyika Broadcasting system.

Rufiji by R De La Bere Barker 'Hermit Hunter Of Africa' (1956) is the author's story of living and hunting along the Rufiji River in Tanzania. He relates hunting elephants, lion, leopards, and hippos in the region, with additional encounters with crocodiles, hyenas, pythons and the like.

The Crowded Life Of A Hermit by 'Rufiji' (R De La Bere Barker) (1941-50) are a series of 5 booklets of short stories about wildlife and native life in Tanganyika, written under his pseudonym 'Rufiji'. The books, which were printed in Dar Es Salaam, were also titled 'Jungle Hermit' on some title pages.

James Barnes

James Barnes (1866 - 1936) was an American journalist and author.

Through Central Africa From Coast To Coast by James Barnes (1915) is an account of the author's 1914 expedition across Africa from the Indian Ocean to the mouth of the Congo River, under the auspices of the American Museum of Natural History. He travelled with one of the world's earliest wildlife photographers, Cherry Kearton, who also wrote a book about this expedition titled 'Through Central Africa From East To West'. They hunted in the Ituri forest and elsewhere for elephant, rhinoceros, lion and much more. Free eBook

Charles Barter

Charles Barter (1820 - 1904) was a British traveller, farmer, horse breeder and later, politician in the Natal Parliament. After his first exploratory trip to Natal, he returned in 1852 with his sister, Catherine Barter, and bought a farm in Karkloof. Barter did much to improve the quality of horse-breeding in Natal and imported several thoroughbreds.

Dorp And The Veld: Or Six Months In Natal by Charles Barter (1852) is an account of his first exploratory trip in 1850 to Natal & the Orange River Sovereignty. He returned to England and wrote this book on his experiences in Natal, which included hunting expeditions for African wild dog which he refers to as a wolf. He got on well with the Boers but was unconvinced that the British settlers could make a go of farming in South Africa. Free eBook

James E Baum

James Edwin Baum (1887 - 1955) was an American journalist, author, naturalist and big game hunter. After dropping out of Princeton University he bacame a reporter and later, the hunting and fishing columnist for the Chicago Daily News. It was during this period that he planned an expedition to Abyssinia with the aim of collecting museum specimens of mammals and birds. After the Ethiopian expedition, Baum wrote several other books and spent most of his life writing fiction, travelling and big-game hunting in Africa, Alaska, and Persia.

The expedition to Abyssinia was the known as the 'Chicago Daily News - Field Museum Expedition To Abyssinia In 1926–27. Other members included Charles Suydam Cutting, a wealthy American naturalist and Louis Agassiz Fuertes, America's most notable ornithological painter. In command of the expedition was Dr Wilfred H Osgood, the Field curator of mammals, who had much previous expedition experience to South America, Alaska and Central America. Alfred M Bailey, mammal expert from the Denver Natural History Museum, came along at Osgood’s suggestion. Baum was to be the big game hunter of the expedition.

Savage Abyssinia by James E Baum (1927) is an account of the expedition mounted by The Field Museum of Chicago to explore and record the natural history of this ancient land. The author was the expedition's historian and hunted ibex, kudu, zebra and oryx.

Unknown Ethiopia: New Light On Darkest Abyssinia by James E Baum (1935). The hunting caravan trekked through almost 3000 miles of country never before penetrated by white men. This book originally published under the title 'Savage Abyssinia'.

Walter Bazley

Walter Roberts Bazley (1924 - 2012) was a British-born Canadian who served in the Royal Navy during World War II before enrolling in the British Colonial Service and working in Uganda from 1950 to 1963.

Bunyoro: Tropical Paradox by Walter Bazley (1993) is an account of the author's experiences in the Bunyoro district of Uganda in the 1950's, serving as a British administrator of the territory. The author was a keen hunter who shot with two Rigby-Mausers and his father's Boss & Co. 12 bore. He apparently had the local nickname of 'the sharp-eyed hunter' while being known by his colleagues as 'blood-bath Bazley'.

A G Bee

Allan Gordon Bee (1890 - 1962) was a British medic who served as a Surgeon Commander in the Royal Navy before going to practice in South Africa, where he also became a prolific author.

Kalahari Camp Fires by A G Bee (1944) "Retold from the Manuscript of A S Poultney, Pioneer". This the story and adventures of A S Poultney who arrived in South Africa in 1899 and proceeded to explore & hunt in the Lake N'Gami & Kalahari areas. Lion, kudu, duiker and a host of other plains game both for sport & while exploring. Very scarce.

H Channing Beebe

H Channing Beebe was an American petroleum geologist who travelled to Angola with his wife Elizabeth, to map potential oilfields to support the Allied effort in World War I. His diaries and photographs from his time in Africa remained unpublished until 2001.

Cannibals And Big Game: True Tales Of Cannibals, Big-Game Hunting And Exploration In Portuguese West Africa, 1917-1921 by H Channing Beebe (2001). The land is a hunter's dream, with plentiful game, angry elephants, charging lions, terrifying hippo, enraged buffalo and crocodile-infested waters. Beebe's elephant-hunting descriptions are especially riveting and the number of hippos he shot to feed his caravan is staggering by modern standards.

Edward Bennet

Edward Bennet (b.1880) was a British big-game hunter. He hunted for 8 years in India while working for the Civil Service. He then went to British East Africa in 1912 on long hunting safaris in what is now Kenya.

Shots And Snapshots In British East Africa by Edward Bennet (1914) is an account of his 1912 big game hunts in BEA. Free eBook

Alfred J Bethell

Alfred James Bethell (1862 – 1920) was a British officer in the 1st Battalion of the Northamptonshire. His older brother, Christopher was killed by Boers near Mafeking in 1884 and the tensions in the region led to the formation the Bechuanaland Border Police (BBP) to secure the frontier which Alfred Bethell joined as Adjutant in 1885 aged 23 years old, a year after his elder brother’s death. Much of his work entailed travelling to settle tribal boundaries with treaties between Bechuana chiefs. Following a journey to the Victoria Falls Bethell resigned from the BBP and the army because of poor health and returned to England.

Notes On South African Hunting: And Notes On A Ride To The Victoria Falls Of The Zambesi by Alfred J Bethell (1887). Travel and sport in Transvaal, Bechuanaland and Damaraland. This is one of the earliest practical guides to game hunting in Africa. His views on the techniques and the opportunities for big game in southern Africa in the 1880's. He describes the battery a hunter should bring, though his own hunting adventures are rather sparse, consisting of shooting ostrich and giraffe. He also details several of Frederick Selous' exploits. Free eBook

Lieutenant Colonel L A Bethell

Tales From The Outposts edited by L A Bethell (1932) is a 12 volume collection of articles which appeared in the Blackwood magazine. The titles are: Frontiers Of the Empire; Tales Of The Border; Small Wars Of The Empire; Pioneering; Jobs Of Work; Tales of the Sea; Soldiers Tales; Jungle Tales; Tales Of Africa; Shikar; From Strange Places; In Lighter. Available here as a complete set or as individual volumes.

Herbert 'Pop' Binks

Herbert Kay Binks (1880 - 1971) was born in England and arrived in east Africa at the age of 20 in 1902. He tried farming but gave up after making a better profit from selling his photographs. He accompanied American hunting clients as their photographer, on safaris which included that of film-maker Paul Rainey and Fritz Schindelar's fateful lion hunt. He later became an ivory hunter.

African Rainbow by Herbert Binks (1959) is the autobiography of a Nairobi photographer, astronomer and one of Kenya's earliest English residents. This book was ghost written for Binks when he became old and there are some discrepancies, perhaps due to fading memories.

John Jarvis Bisset

General Sir John Jarvis Bisset (1819 - 1888) was a British army officer in South Africa. He served throughout the Seventh Frontier War in 1846 and was wounded in the Eighth. For many years he commanded the Cape Mounted Rifles and retired with the rank of Lieutenant General. From 1865-7 he held the post of Lieutenant Governor of Natal.

Sport And War: Or Recollections Of Fighting And Hunting In South Africa From The Years 1834 To 1867 by John Jarvis Bisset (1875) Free eBook

Cecil Ireland Blackburne-Maze

Cecil Ireland Blackburne-Maze (1889 - 1963) legally changed his name to Cecil Ireland Blackburne in 1914. During the war he was an officer in the Queen's Own (Royal West Kent Regiment).

Journals Of My African Travels by Cecil Ireland Blackburne-Maze (1913). Blackburne-Maze and a companion, Lydford, travelled up the Nile through Egypt and the Sudan to reach the hunting grounds of Uganda and Kenya, where they pursued oryx, eland, impala and rhinoceros near the Makindu River before crossing the Uaso-Nyero to hunt zebra, lion, buffalo and gazelle. His engaging diary, illustrated with silver gelatin prints, was "for private circulation among friends" and is inevitably rare, with a handful of copies traced. Blackburne-Maze published another account the following year, entitled 'From Oriental To Occidental Africa'.

Sir John Bland-Sutton

Sir John Bland Sutton (1855 - 1936) was a distinguished British surgeon, author and big game hunter who travelled to Africa in 1910.

Man And Beast In Eastern Ethiopia: From Observations Made In British East Africa, Uganda And The Sudan by John Bland-Sutton (1911) Free eBook

Men And Creatures In Uganda by John Bland-Sutton (1933) describes the territory and game of the region and recounts the exploits of various big game hunters. He describes his safari to the Lake Nakuru area with note of game bagged such as wild boar, reedbuck and more. This is the popular version of the author's previous book 'Man And Beast In Eastern Ethiopia'. Free eBook

The Story Of A Surgeon by John Bland-Sutton (1930) is the autobiography of John Bland-Sutton with a preamble by his friend Rudyard Kipling. Free eBook

Alnod John Boger

Alnod John Boger (1871 - 1940) was a British lawyer, cricketer and big game hunter.

The Road I Travelled by Alnod Boger (1936) is an autobiography which includes big game hunting in Uganda, India, the Far East and Norway.

Dermot R W Bourke

Dermot Robert Wyndham Bourke, 7th Earl of Mayo (1851 - 1927) was an Irish peer, novelist, politician and travel writer.

Sport In Abyssinia: Or The Mareb And Tackazzee by Dermot R W Bourke (1876) is an account of the author's hunting party as it travelled through the Mareb River region of Abyssinia and encountered lion, gazelle, hartebeest and elephant. While there are many incidences of sport, much of the narrative is of travel in the area. Free eBook

De Rebus Africanis: The Claims Of Portugal To The Congo And Adjacent Littoral, With Remarks On The French Annexations by The Earl of Mayo (1883) or Dermot Robert Wyndham Bourke. 'Of Things African' is an account of Portuguese claims on south west Africa and the English responses. It includes a guide to the southwest coast of Africa and the river Congo.

John L Brom

John Ladislav Brom (1908 - 1969) was born in what is now the Czech Republic but since 1945, lived in Paris. He was a filmmaker and photographer-explorer making documentaries, expedition films and travelogues in Africa, particularly of Saharan and Equatorial African cultures.

20,000 Miles In The African Jungle by John L Brom (1958). The author's lone 20,000 mile expedition across Africa to to record by camera African animals, African people and African scenery. He hunts for food and protection when neccesary.

African Odyssey by John L Brom (1966) was originally published in French in 1957 as 'Kon-Tiki Africain'. The book is an account of the author's journey in east Africa making documentary films.

Pitiless Jungle by John L Brom (1955) is the account of the author's year spent travelling over three thousand miles, shooting a film in Equatorial Africa.

Sidney Spencer Broomfield

Sidney Spencer Broomfield (1847 - 1930) had a numerous and varied careers which included ivory hunting and trading in East Africa in the 1860s and 1870s.

Kachalola Or The Mighty Hunter by Sidney Spencer Broomfield (1930) is an account of his life in Africa, Ceylon, Sumatra and New Guinea. There are numerous encounters with natives, as well as collecting a variety of big game including leopard, rhinoceros, buffalo and especially elephant. The natives provided him with the name 'Kachalola' meaning 'the mighty hunter'. In Asia he experienced adventures with cannibals and also hunted tiger and elephant in Sumatra.

Robert Brown

Wild Africa Adventures And Explorations by Robert Brown (1904) is the tale of African explorations, the wildlife, the people, history, development, Cecil Rhodes, diamond mining, big game hunting, the Boer War and much more.

William Harvey Brown

William Harvey Brown (1862 - 1913) was an American naturalist and big game hunter who was sent to Africa on a US Government expedition.

On The South African Frontier: The Adventures And Observations Of An American In Mashonaland And Matabeleland by William Harvey Brown (1899) is a book that celebrates the early Rhodesian Pioneers - hunting and adventures throughout. The author became a collector, big game hunter, gold seeker, landowner, citizen and soldier during seven years participation in the early settlement of Rhodesia. His sporting adventures included hunting for antelope, hippopotamus, rhinoceros, buffalo and lion. Free eBook

Sir Michael W S Bruce

Sir Michael William Selby Bruce (1894 - 1957) was a British baronet, author and adventurer who joined the British South African Police as a trooper at age 19, shot an escaping criminal in South Africa, hunted and captured a double-murderer, waged campaigns against the Germans and was sole survivor of a gold-seeking expedition up the Amazon.

Sails And Saddles by Sir Michael W S Bruce (1929). "The Adventures of a Man Who Had Fled Convention, as a Policeman in Rhodesia, a Soldier in the War, a Sailor Before the Mast, a Cowboy, a Journalist, a Rancher, a Schoolmaster, a Big Game Hunter, an Explorer, an Engineer, a Surveyor, Etc".

Captain Angus Buchanan

Captain Angus Buchanan (1886 - 1954) was a Scottish explorer, hunter, writer, photographer and naturalist who was exploring remote areas of Canada when WW1 broke out. He at once went to England and enlisted in the 25th (Frontiersmen) Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers. He went to Mombasa as a private in that distinguished unit in the following April, earned a commission before the end of 1915, and served with the unit until September 1917, when he was invalided out due to fever. Frederick Selous also served and died with the 25th (Frontiersmen) Battalion of the Royal Fusiliers in East Africa.

In 1919 Buchanan undertook an expedition to Aïr in the Central Sahara on behalf of Lord Rothschild which produced important zoological and scientific data. He brought back over 140 mammals, 18 of which were new to science. In 1922 he set out again with the aim of crossing the Sahara from south to north.

Three Years Of War In East Africa by Angus Buchanan (1920) is an unofficial war diary of the operations in which he took part in East Africa.

Exploration Of Aïr: Out Of The World North Of Nigeria by Angus Buchanan (1921) is the story of his first trip to the Sahara in 1919 - a 1400 mile expedition financed by the Baron Rothschild to find new species of animals in an unexplored area of Nigeria. Free eBook (1921)

The Lean, Brown Men by Angus Buchanan (2008) is likely to be a re-print or revised version of Capt Angus Buchanan's book 'Three Years Of War In East Africa' published in 1920 in which he tells the story of the campaigns and hardships of the Great War in East Africa. Capt Angus Buchanan died in 1954. The disparate group of men who fought together included Canadian Mounties, American cowboys, Arctic explorers, adventurers, rogues, big game hunters and sportsmen. They also included some well known men like Cherry Kearton, the naturalist and African hunter, Frederick Selous. All these men had come together under the Union Flag to do battle against colonial Imperial Germany in East Africa. They were under the command of Daniel Patrick Driscoll (1862 - 1934), originally of the Driscoll's Scouts who served with distinction during the Boer War. They formed the 25th Royal Fusiliers and their battlegrounds were to be the great plains of Africa.

Sahara by Angus Buchanan (1926) is the account of the author's 10 month journey across the Sahara - over 3500 miles from Kano in Nigeria to Touggourt in Algiers. The expedition was also filmed and the movie 'Crossing The Great Sahara' was on general release in 1924 before this book was published.

Ben Burbridge

Ben Burbridge (1876 - 1936) was an American real estate agent and big game hunter who made 5 trips to Africa. He hunted, took photograhs and made motion films - his film of gorillas in the wild was acclaimed as the best ever made at the time. Burbridge was also the first westerner to capture a live female mountain gorilla and bring it back to the USA. She was called 'Miss Congo' or just 'Congo'.

Gorilla: Tracking And Capturing the Ape-Man Of Africa by Ben Burbridge (1928). Apart from tracking and capturing gorillas, the author trekked through British East Africa, where he bagged rhinoceros, lion, buffalo, elephant and hippo, as well as plains game. After this sporting interlude, he went to Mount Karisimbi and the Ituri Forest in the Congo to find gorillas.

Major Frederick Russell Burnham

Frederick Russell Burnham (1861 - 1947) was an American scout and world-travelling adventurer known for his service to the British Army in colonial Africa and for teaching woodcraft to Robert Baden-Powell, thus becoming one of the inspirations for the founding of the international Scouting Movement.

Scouting On Two Continents by Major Frederick Russell Burnham (1926) reads like an adventure novel - warring against the Apache Indians in Arizona, gold prospecting in the Southwest, the Northwest and the Klondike, joining Cecil Rhodes in Africa in the war against the Matabele and Chief of Scouts under Lord Roberts in the Boer War.

Taking Chances by Frederick Russell Burnham (1944). The first half of this scarce volume relates Burnham's adventures in East Africa and Matabeleland with details of lion hunting.

J E Burns

Adventures In Wildest Africa by J E Burns (1949) has got to be the weirdest hunting book ever...subtitled 'The Stirring Narrative of a Big Game Hunting Expedition in Equatorial Africa, illustrated with Third Dimension Pictures taken at the time'. This must be the only big game hunting book with 3D images that you need to use 'Wonder Spectacles' to view the pictures. You will find your 'Wonder Spectacles' in a pocket inside the rear cover, with full instructions on their use. Burns' expedition departed Mombasa for Nairobi, then travelled by train across the Rift Valley to Londiani, near Lake Victoria. They took 80 porters with them on their march into the Eldama Ravine, to mount Sirgoit and Elgeyo forest. Burns relates several close calls with leopards and lions and recounts bagging zebra, elephant, waterbuck, giraffe and rhino.

Captain Guy Burrows

Captain William Guy Burrows (1861 - 1912) had an 8 year British military career which took him to India and Eygpt before he retired from the army. Then as an unemployed former army officer, he became the district commander in a remote corner of the Congo for 3 years. After he published 'The Land Of The Pigmies' Burrows was successfully sued for libel in connection with alleged atrocities perpetrated on natives by Captain Henri Keyser and other officers of the Congo Free State. Burrows offered no evidence in defence and was ordered to pay damages to Keyser.

Captain Burrows was involved with yet another strange legal case which was set before Sir Gorell-Barnes to solve. Burrows secretly got married 6 months before he left for the Congo. His wife read in a French newspaper that her husband had died and some years later she remarried. Then a detective reports that her first husband, Burrows, was in fact alive and in England. The second husband arranges a meeting where Burrows confirms the woman is his wife but she says she has never met Burrows in her life. Burrows left England again and the second husband tries to dissolve his marriage legally by serving divorce papers on Captain Burrows. Read more about the mysterious case here

The Land Of Pigmies by Captain Guy Burrows (1898). During his three-year stay in the Congo Free State, Burrows commanded the Welle-Mobanghi division and the Makua (Upper Welle) and Rubi-Welle Zones. He goes on to describe the Mangbetton (Monbuttu), Ababawas, Azande, Maigoes, Mabode, Momvus and Pigmie tribes, among others. The introduction is by Henry Morton Stanley. The book is mainly about his travels and job with one chapter on elephant hunting. Free eBook

The Curse Of Central Africa by Captain Guy Burrows (1903). This book is an exposé written by Burrows after his post as district commissioner of the Aruwimi district of the Congo Free State. It describes the 'scandalous rule' of the Belgian government in the Congo, complete with illustrations of natives submitting to Belgian torture and accounts of their excessive forced labour. One of the chapters is a section by former Congo State Service agent Edgar Canisius entitled 'A Campaign Among Cannibals' in which the author takes a sympathetic stand on the natives with further descriptions of their floggings and mistreatment at the hands of the Belgians. Free eBook

Frank Hedges Butler

Frank Hedges Butler (1855 – 1928) was a British wine merchant and a founding member of the Aero Club of Great Britain. He was also a keen golfer, yachtsman and big game hunter. With Charles Rolls (the co-founder of the Rolls-Royce car manufacturer) he organised motor vehicle races before being introduced to ballooning by Charles Rolls. He made more than a hundred balloon ascents, including several record-breaking flights.

5000 Miles In A Balloon by Frank Hedges Butler (1907) is a 48 page soft-cover book which includes some of the author's ballooning exploits.

Fifty Years Of Travel By Land, Water And Air by Frank Hedges Butler (1920) this is the book which contains the author's 1912 big game hunting exploits in East Africa, as well as chapters on his other global travels. Travelling with Sir Arthur Lawley, his safari started in Uganda where he hunted a hippo. Sir Arthur Lawley (1860 – 1932) was a British colonial administrator who served variously in Matabeleland, Western Australia, Transvaal and Madras. Butler then returned to Nairobi to outfit for a short safari to hunt lion with Major H B Dooner, who he describes as "the Selous of the region, and had a tally of numerous lions to his credit". Hugh Brandon Dooner (1876 - 1935) was an Australian settler who farmed ostriches and coffee in Kenya, possibly also doing some professional hunting at times. Free eBook

Captain H Butler

Captain Henry Butler (1805 - 1881) was an Irish soldier who was commissioned in the 27th Regiment until 1841, when he transferred to the 59th Regiment assuming the rank of Captain. He served in South Africa until 1839 and retired from the army in 1850. The expeditions Butler took in 1837 and 1838 to the hunting grounds of the Bontebok Flats (between the Klipplaats and Windvogel Rivers in Eastern Cape Province, form the basis of this book.

South African Sketches: Illustrative Of The Wild Life Of A Hunter On The Frontier Of The Cape Colony by Captain H Butler (1841) is a volume of hunting scenes at the 'extreme verge of the Cape Colony'. The sketches were made "to relieve the dreariness of two years' residence upon a barbarian frontier," and to record the profusion of game on the Bontebok Flats near the Kat River Settlement. They also give an interesting record of this part of South Africa during the first half of the nineteenth century.

E N Buxton

Edward North Buxton (1840 - 1924) was a British conservationist, politician and big game hunter.

Two African Trips: With Notes And Suggestions On Big Game Preservation In Africa by E N Buxton (1902). The first trip was to British East Africa for lion, rhino, buffalo and plains game. His second trip was again through the same country and more into Sudan where he bagged dangerous and plains game and enjoyed excellent sport. Free eBook

Short Stalks Or Hunting Camps North, South, East And West by E N Buxton (1893) is an account of trips hunting Barbary sheep, gazelle and moufflon in Algeria near the Jebel Melili on the rim of the great Sahara. There is more hunting of elk, Pyrenean ibex, bear and reindeer. Free eBook

Camp-Fire Tales by E N Buxton (date unknown) is a book of stirring episodes collected from the works of mighty hunters.

Short Stalks: Second Series by E N Buxton (1898) is the continuation, or second volume of the author's hunting adventures after 'Short Stalks: Or Hunting Camps North, South, East And West' (1893). This volume details his big game hunting trips in the Haud region of Somaliland, where he bagged oryx, greater and lesser kudu, hartebeest, gazelle and other antelope species. He also hunted in Sinai, the Eastern desert of Egypt, Crete, the Carpathian highlands and Daghestan. The two volumes of 'Short Stalks' may be purchased as a pair.

H M B, C E B & T B

Hidden behind the initials are the authors...Hannah Maud Buxton (1872 - 1931), who would become the great grandmother of the singer James Blunt, Claire Emily Buxton (1873 - 1959) and Theresa Buxton (1874-1961). They were all the daughters of the well-known big game hunter, Edward North Buxton.

On Either Side Of The Red Sea by H M B, C E B & T B (Hannah Maud Buxton, Claire Emily Buxton & Theresa Buxton) (1895) was written as a series of letters by the daughters of E N Buxton who accompanied him on "two delightful (shooting) journeys undertaken in 1893 & 1894". They crossed the Kitter mountains to hunt ibex, then to the Sinai Peninsula again to hunt ibex. The authors accompanied their father on several hunts and describe the terrain and the outcome of the hunts, though they did not hunt themselves. E N Buxton wrote the introduction and footnotes of the book. Free eBook

Will J Cameron

William John Cameron (1879 - 1953) was a Canadian-born American businessman who sold pharmaceutical products before founding 'Cameron's Surgical Specialty Company' in Chicago. He was a very keen big game hunter and explorer.

In 1928 he embarked on an expedition into the heart of Africa to study the people of the Kalahari Desert. Though Cameron did a lot of hunting on the expedition, it was primarily to develop and test improved surgical and dental equipment on the Bushmen of the Kalahari. He hand-picked a team of experts to accompany the expedition - including anthropologist C Ernest Cadle, who had previously undertaken the 'Denver African Expedition' in 1925. The expedition then went under the title of 'The Cameron-Cadle Kalahari Expedition'. Also on the payroll were portrait painter, Neville Lewis of London, geologist Richard Lee Mannen, cinematographer Fred Parrish and mechanic Henry A Hoder. Cameron funded the whole of the expedition, which totalled somewhere between $25000 and $30000.

From Cape Town To Belgian Congo by Will J Cameron (1929) is a private publication of Cameron's address relating his African experiences to the Executives Club of Chicago in 1929. The hardback booklets were printed for distribution to friends and business allies. While there are observations of the native peoples and the wildlife, there are also incidents of hunting lion, buffalo and a variety of antelope species. The photographs were taken from movies he shot on the trip.

Allan Wolsey Cardinall

Sir Allan Wolsey Cardinall (1887 - 1956) was a District Commissioner in the Gold Coast(now Ghana) and went on to be the British Commissioner of the Cayman Islands and Governor of the Falkland Islands.

In Ashanti And Beyond by Allan Wolsey Cardinall (1927) 'The Record of a Resident Magistrate's many Years in Tropical Africa, his Arduous & Dangerous Treks both in the Course of his Duty & in Pursuit of Big Game, with descriptions of the people, their manner of living & the wonderful ways of beasts & insects.'

All other books by Allan Wolsey Cardinall about the Gold Coast and Togoland

Lewis Carey

Lewis Adolphus De Vic Carey (1871 - 1936) was a British soldier who served in the South African War, followed by the Matabele Rebellions, which gave him opportunities to do a lot of hunting. He eventually emigrated to Canada where he became a popular writer of hunting and fishing articles. He gained the reputation as a great hunter, angler, soldier and all-round sportsman, almost on a par with Selous and Samuel Baker.

My Gun And I: A Book Of Shooting Memories by Lewis Carey (1933) are the author's fond recollections of his hunting life which included rabbits in England, game birds in Ireland, wolves and grizzley bears in Canada and lions in Africa.

Sacha Carnegie

Sacha Carnegie is the pseudonym of Raymond Alexander Carnegie (1920 - 1999) who was a prolific British author of mostly novels. He was married to Diana Denyse Hay, 23rd Countess of Erroll who was the daughter of Josslyn Victor Hay, Earl of Erroll - the victim of a murder that caused an intriguing scandal among the 'Happy Valley' set in Kenya.

Red Dust Of Africa by Sacha Carnegie (1959) is an account of the author's experiences in Africa with much on the characters he met, scenery, native customs, safaris and hunting. He was almost jailed for shooting an elephant.

William E Casey

William Stamps Cherry: Into the Dark Unknown: Central Africa In 1899 by William E Casey (2020) is the first in a trilogy about the life of William Stamps Cherry, an American explorer of Africa during the years 1896 to 1900. He travelled alone on foot for three years through the bush in the country that is now known as the Central African Republic.

William Stamps Cherry: They Called Me 'Demba Creecy' by William E Casey (2020) is the second book of the trilogy which focuses on William Stamps Cherry as the big game hunter - particularly his elephant hunting experiences.

William Stamps Cherry: 'THE African Explorer': Before And After Africa by William E Casey (2020) is the final book of the trilogy which addresses what happened to him after he returned home from his second journey in Africa and how come nobody has ever heard of him?

William Stamps Cherry

William Stamps Cherry (1869 - 1927) was an American engineer and explorer who made a solo voyage up the Congo’s tributaries and through the forests of the Congo basin. For nearly two years he did little but hunt elephants, returning to America with a large collection collection of African artifacts and tusks (his shipping documents suggest 250 tusks, weighing 2900kg).

Hunting The Elephant: William Stamps Cherry's Wild Sporting Adventures In The Congo Basin by William Stamps Cherry (2023) is a compilation of two magazine articles published from extracts from Cherry's journal about his elephant hunting experiences in central Africa. The first of these articles, titled 'Elephant Hunting in Africa' appeared in the October 1901 issue of McClure's, pages 579-584. The second article (which can be read below), titled 'Hunting the Elephant' was published in Hearst's International, Volume 5, 1903, pages 1426-1431 .

Lord Randolph Churchill

Lord Randolph Henry Spencer-Churchill (1849 - 1895) was a British statesman and father of Winston Churchill. He travelled for some months through the Cape Colony, the Transvaal and Rhodesia, making notes on the politics and economics of the countries, shooting lions and recording his impressions in letters to a London newspaper, which were afterwards re-published as 'Men, Mines And Animals In South Africa'.

Men, Mines And Animals In South Africa by Lord Randolph Churchill (1892) is an account of his tour of the gold and diamond fields of South Africa while enjoying considerable sport on his journey. Free eBook

James L Clark

James Lippitt Clark (1883 - 1969) was a distinguished explorer and scientist of the American Museum of Natural History in New York. When he found out his friend Arthur Radclyffe Dugmore, was about to sail for Africa to photograph big game in advance of Theodore Roosevelt’s presidential safari, Clark proposed going with him as his gun-bearing bodyguard. Clark later admitted that he had never fired a rifle in his life and "couldn’t hit a tomato can at three feet." After the Dugmore safari, Clark joined Carl Akeley on the Roosevelt safari to assist with the trophy skinning. He was an expert taxidermist and sculptor and made some distinguished studies of wild animals.

Read more about James L Clark's career as "the powerhouse behind the AMNH’s construction of diorama halls" in Painting Actuality: Diorama Art of James Perry Wilson, Chapter 5, by Michael Anderson.

Good Hunting: Fifty Years Of Collecting And Preparing Habitat Groups For The American Museum by James L Clark (1966) is his autobiography of his experiences collecting and preparing specimens for the museum. He collected animals in Africa and Asia including elephant, Marco Polo sheep and lion.

Trails Of The Hunted by James L Clark (1928) Hunting lion, rhino, elephant and buffalo in East Africa. American big game and then to Central Asia for ibex and marco polo sheep for the American Museum of Natural History. Free eBook

The Giant Eland Of Southern Sudan by James L Clark (1931) is a brochure from the American Museum of Natural History about the Southern Sudan's giant eland. Hunting and natural history. This edition comes with a handwritten note form Clark to Russ Aitken. This brochure is not currently unavailable.

The Great Arc Of The Wild Sheep by James L Clark (1964) is considered to be the Bible for sheep hunters, with numerous photographs of different species, their distribution and methods of hunting. It includes descriptions of each type of sheep, including information on pelage colour, habitat, body characteristics and typical measurements. The frontispiece is an Ovis poli, sculpted in bronze by the author. "His fine sturdy body all seems to point to and culminate in support of his massive horns which he always carries with pride and dignity".

Edwin Clarke

The Diary Of Edwin Clarke: A Police Officer In Rhodesia, 1906 by Edwin Clarke (2016) is the journal of a young British colonial police officer in remote southern Africa. Edwin Clarke left behind his life as the son of a bank manager in England to become a mounted trooper in the British South Africa Police in Rhodesia in 1901. When he died in 1955, Clarke bequeathed a handwritten diary of his service, which has been published over 110 years later. It includes his account of horseback safari across miles of rural Matabeleland and hunting big game. There are tales from characters such as gold prospectors, farmers, settlers, African chiefs and Clarke's fellow police officers. There is tragedy too - sickness, brutality and violent death, set against the fascinating account of the daily life of a colonial police officer in a remote African district in 1906.

Lance Colam

Lance Colam was an intrepid British travel adventure writer who sought out particularly dangerous assignments that read like fiction and he lived to tell the tales. He also wrote 'normal' travel books on how to survive on £25 in various locations.

One Jump Ahead Of Death by Lance Colam (1940) includes all kinds of adventures such as elephant hunting in Uganda and gun-running in Korea.

Death Over My Shoulder by Lance Colam (1947) is the autobiography of an adventurer. Includes elephant hunting, religious rites, voodoo in Brazil, head-hunters of the Amazon and more!

Augustus C Collodon

Congo Jake: The Story Of An Adventurous Life by Augustus C Collodon (1932). From the introduction by Edwin C Hill describing the author... "Augustus C Collodon. was a bargee's offspring, son of a bargeman on English rivers. Destiny gripped him when his father sold him for a pound to a skipper of a windjammer trading to Africa. A kind fate brought to him, out of Yorubaland, in Nigeria, the big, bluff 'Rhino King', hunter and trader, who first revealed the mysteries of Africa, the mysteries and terrific perils to body and soul."

Mrs Arthur Colville

Mrs Arthur Colville was born Olivia Spencer-Churchill (1859 - 1943) and married Brigadier-General Arthur Edward William Colville (1857 - 1942) in 1883.

A 1000 Miles In A Machilla: Travel And Sport In Nyasaland, Angoniland, and Rhodesia, With Some Account Of The Resources Of These Countries; And Chapters On Sport By Colonel Colville, C. B. by Mrs Arthur Colville (1911) is an account of her and her husband's travels across Portuguese East Africa to The Zambezi river. Free eBook

P H Combe

Hunting Beasts And Men by P H Combe (1937) is story of the life and adventures of Phillip Harvey Combe. The book describes how he arrived in Cape Town after the Great War to join the Rhodesian Mounted Police. Besides the excitement of a trooper's life and his law enforcement duties he managed to hunt buffalo, rhinoceros, hippopotamus and antelope in the border country between Rhodesia and Portuguese East Africa.

David C Comyn

David Charles Edward Ffrench Comyn (1877 - c.1918) was a British army officer who served in the Sudan.

Service And Sport In The Sudan. A Record Of Administration In The Anglo-Egyptian Sudan. With Some Intervals of Sport And Travel by David C Comyn (1911) is an account of the life of a British officer in the Egyptian Army at the end of the 19th Century. The author describes his travels in the country. Free eBook

H Copley & R F Mayer

The East African Sportsman's Handbook by H Copley & R F Mayer (1934) covers big game hunting and bird shooting for the sportsman in Kenya and Uganda with information on rifles, game, habitat and game laws of the era.

Manuel Nunes Correa

Across Africa East To West: From Benguella To Beira by Manuel Nunes Correa (1913) is a photograph album with 70 original gelatin prints mounted to 28 pages of stiff card which is said to have been compiled by Portuguese Comendador Manuel Nunes Correa as a souvenir for a Mr & Mrs Garrett. The photographs record an African hunt from in 1912 and 1913, showing the various camps, companions, scenery, and their quarry, including lion, haartebeest, hippopotamus and eland. However, further research reveals the dates of birth and death (1909 - 1995) of Comendador Manuel Nunes Correa, the Portuguese businessman, who this album was said to have belonged, make this an impossibility as there is a clearly dated photograph in the album. Comendador Manuel Nunes Correa owned a large chain of mini-mart grocery stores and introduced Coca Cola into Portugal and had no connection to Africa or crossing the continent.

William Bensley Cotton

William Bensley Cotton (1872 - 1944) was a British barrister born in India who worked for the Indian Civil Service. He was a big game hunter in India and Africa.

Sport In Eastern Sudan: From Souakin To The Blue Nile by W B Cotton (1912). This work details the author's 1910-1911 expedition on which he bagged gazelle, leopard and hippopotamus near the Atbara River. Continuing on to the Setit, he shot lion, buffalo, kudu and other plains game, some from a machan near a watering hole. Cotton then trekked to the Rahad and Dinder Rivers where he collected lion, buffalo, hippopotamus and a variety of plains game. The nine-month safari cost Cotton £750. Free eBook

Lieutenant Colonel Herbert Edmund Crocker

Lieutenant Colonel Herbert Edmund Crocker (1877 - 1962) served as an officer in the Second Boer War where he was wounded. During the First World War, Crocker commanded the 13th Signal Company at Gallipoli, where he was also wounded. He was then appointed second-in-command of the 8th Battalion, Chinese Regiment, in Mesopotamia, later becoming battalion commander. When he retired from the army in 1929 after some years in India, he decided to travel, hunt, write and explore Africa with his wife.

Sport Hunting And Travel by Lieutenant Colonel Herbert Edmund Crocker (c.1960) is a substantial archive of typescript works by the author who was a renowned hunter and soldier.The papers feature his game hunting and travel in Rhodesia, Tanganyika, the Congo and Nigeria, as well as Australia and India. His recollections of his hunting expeditions in Africa include hunting for lions in Tanganyika, a black rhinoceros in East Africa, hippopotamus and elephant hunting in the Belgian Congo and duck on the Zambesi. He further mentions hunting wild boar and jackals in Cawnpore and the Kadir plains of India, but deems Queensland, Australia to be the 'hoghunter's paradise'.

Bert D'Amico

Albert D'Amico (1936 - 2017) was an adventurer whose travels took him to the sub-Arctic, the Amazon and the Northern Frontier District in Kenya. In the far reaches of the NFD he hunted game for famine relief, initiated fund raising projects and delivered food/medical aid.

A Touch Of Africa by Bert D'Amico (2005) chronicles Bert D'Amico's adventures, first in Africa, then in the Amazon rainforest. But the book is more than simply an interesting memoir, as D'Amico blends in discussions of mythology, anthropology and even theories of animal behaviour into his storytelling.

Major Henry Darley

Major Henry Algernon Cholmley Darley (1870 - 1945) was a British explorer, ivory hunter and formerly British Frontier Agent at Maji in Abyssinia.

Slaves And Ivory: A Record Of Adventure And Exploration In The Unknown Sudan And Among The Abyssinian Slave-Raiders by Major Henry Darley (1926) recounts his travels from Mount Elgon in Uganda and through the Karamojo district to reach Abyssinia. There is much on elephant hunting with his first elephant bagged from his sickbed. He collected more elephant near the Lokulan River and in the Abyssinian hinterland. After leaving Addis Ababa, there was continued hunting for the big ivory in the region between the Sobat River and the White Nile. Darley says "I potted elephants until I was tired". Besides his sporting adventures, Darley adds his observations of the Ethiopian slave trade in the early 1920s.

W E Davis

Congo Doctor by W E Davis (1941) includes accounts of elephant hunting and experiences of witch doctors and other Congolese customs. An edition of this book was previously published as 'Ten Years In The Congo' in 1940. Free eBook

Captain Lionel Dawson

Sport In War by Captain Lionel Dawson (1937). The sports of the field have always appealed to the British Army, in peace and at war. Adventures in sport during war are vividly brought to life in this assembly of anecdotal descriptions of hunts, horse races, pig-sticking and polo games.

Hunting Without Tears by Captain Lionel Dawson (1938) is a collection of hunting stories and articles.

Lionel Decle

Lionel Decle (1859 - 1907) was a French traveller, journalist, explorer, hunter and scientist. He completed a world 'grand tour' in 1881 to 1885 before being sent to south and east Africa by the French Government in 1890 to study anthropology.

Three Years In Savage Africa by Lionel Decle (1898) is an account of his epic journey which took him through South Africa, Bechuanaland, British Central Africa, Mozambique, Nyasaland, German East Africa (Tanganyika), Uganda and Kenya to Zanzibar. He was also the first man to travel from the extreme south of Africa to above the Equator. The introduction was written by Henry Morton Stanley. Free eBook

Trooper 3809: A Private Soldier Of The Third Republic by Lionel Decle (1899) is the story of the Dreyfus Affair, which divided France into two hostile camps, those who believed in the condemned man's innocence, and those who believed he was guilty. Decle tells the story of this conspiracy and gives a faithful account of the hardships he endured when he served in the ranks of the French Army. Free eBook

The New Russia by Lionel Decle (1906) Free eBook

Eugene De Horthy

Eugene (de) Horthy was a Hungarian big game hunter and a brother of Miklos Horthy de Nagybanya, Admiral and Regent of Hungary. In 1905 he made the first of several hunting safaris to East Africa.

The Sport Of A Lifetime by Eugene De Horthy (1939) is about hunting and shooting mainly in Africa but also earlier experiences in Europe and others in Indo-China. Includes the hunting of wild geese, wild-boar, stag, big game in Africa and tiger in Indo-China.

Count C A C De Lewenhaupt

Count Claes Adam Carl Lewenhaupt (1859 - 1937) was a Swedish writer, traveller, angler and hunter. Lewenhaupt travelled extensively in both Spain and France and also made longer trips to India, Burma, the United States and Morocco.

Sport Across The World by Count C A C de Lewenhaupt (1933) are tales of the author's field sport trips around the world. Includes hunting in California, tiger and elephant hunting in Asia, falconry and boar hunting in North Africa, mouflon in Corsica and grouse shooting in Norway. There is one chapter on fishing for sardines, tunny and tarpon.

W C Devereux

William Cope Devereux (1837 - 1903) entered the Royal Navy in 1854. He served in the Crimean War off Sebastopol in the Black Sea and in the Mediterranean and the China seas. He joined HMS Gorgon as a clerk in 1859. He was promoted to Assistant Paymaster when the Gorgon set off to the Cape in 1860. In 1861, the Gorgon reached the patrolling area off Mozambique, the Swahili coast and Zanzibar.

A Cruise In The "Gorgon" by W C Devereux (1869) "Or, Eighteen Months on H.M.S. Gorgon engaged in the Supression of the Slave Trave on the East Coast of Africa including A Trip up the Zambesi with Dr. Livingstone." The 'Gorgon' was a paddle-wheel sloop dispatched to the east coast of Africa to stop the illegal slave trade in the region. The vessel made its way up the Zambesi to meet the missionary explorer David Livingstone. During the journey up river, they hunted waterbuck, buffalo and hippopotamus. Free eBook

Phillipe Diolé

Philippe Victor Diolé (1908 – 1977) was a French adventurer, author, big game hunter and undersea explorer. As a friend and associate of Jacques Cousteau, most of his books are about his undersea adventures. He also co-wrote, with Jacques Cousteau, 7 out of the 8 volume book series 'The Undersea Discoveries Of Jacques-Yves Cousteau'. He wrote 3 books about Africa - one about his journey across the Sahara, another about African big game hunting titled 'Chasse d'Afrique' (1965) which unfortunately has not been translated into English, plus a novel.

Sahara Adventure by Phillipe Diolé (1956) is an account of the author's camel trek across the South Fezzen region of the Sahara Desert where he encounters exotic vegetation and a huge number of prehistoric cave paintings of African animals. Please note, some reprint publishers of this book are selling it with with blurb such as ... "harrowing encounters with lions and crocodiles to the thrill of the hunt ...". There is no hunting in this book and the author did not meet lions or crocodiles in the Sahara. Free eBook

Okapi Fever by Phillipe Diolé (1965) is a novel, set in 1963, about a group of hunters who search the jungles of the Congo for an exotic wild animal to bring back for an European zoo. From the southernmost city of Portuguese Angola, three men and two women set out for the Congo River in a pickup truck and a jeep. "This engrossing novel of outward and inward adventure tells how, with emotions at fever pitch, they made their illegal journey of more than two thousand miles, over the worst trails in Africa, through regions laid desolate by civil war and anarchy".

Captain C H W Donovan

Charles Henry Wynne Donovan (b.1860) served with the British Army Service Corps.

With Wilson In Matabeleland, Or Sport And War In Zambesia by Captain C H W Donovan (1894). The author landed at the Cape in 1839 to enjoy a big game hunt near the Limpopo River. Buffalo, eland and sable were collected with hippo bagged on the Umtelique River and additional sport after lion and kudu. The sporting adventure had just come to an end when the First Matabele War started, with the author participating in that action. The title refers to Major Wilson, with whom Donovan served, who lost his life in the war. Free eBook

Marcus Dorman

Marcus Roberts Phipps Dorman was a British big game hunter and traveller who was hired with others to conduct 'independent' investigations into European brutality in the Congo.

A Journal Of A Tour In The Congo Free State by Marcus Dorman (1905). The author went to the Congo with the hope of shooting big game and had a negative opinion of the Congo government. After a lengthy trip, where he did shoot some game but did not see munch, he returned with a favourable opinion of the government. More travel than hunting but with many interesting observations about some really remote country. He went to the Upper Ugangui regions where game was abundant but hunting was most difficult. Does not appear that he shot much game. Free eBook

Sir Hector Duff

Sir Hector Livingston Duff (1872 - 1954) became an Assistant Resident in the British Central Africa Protectorate in 1897 when Sir Alfred Sharpe became the Commissioner of the country. He was promoted to be Resident and First Grade Residentship, frequently acting as Deputy Governor of Nyasaland.

African Small Chop by Sir Hector Duff (1932). Duff talks about elephant hunters like Sutherland, Sharpe and Selous in Nyasaland. He also includes accounts of his own hunting for buffalo and crocodile.

Nyasaland Under The Foreign Office by Sir Hector Livingston Duff (1903) is a history of the founding of the protectorate and his own personal connections to it as well as sections on wildlife, big game hunting and the lives of the natives. Free eBook

James Dunbar-Brunton

Dr James Dunbar-Brunton (1863 - 1910) was a Scottish medical doctor who was sent to NE Rhodesia, appointed by the Government as a district surgeon. It was in Africa that he investigated sleeping sickness and became known as a big game hunter. In 1912 he set up in practice in Heliopolis, near Cairo and then went to France to undertake duties at a base hospital. There he was taken ill and died.

Big Game Hunting In Central Africa by James Dunbar-Brunton (1912). The author hunted near Lake Bangweulu in North-Eastern Rhodesia. It includes excellent descriptions of hunting elephant, buffalo, hippo and rhinoceros, as well as bagging lion near Lake Mweru. The book is dedicated to the African big game huntress, the Duchesse D'Aosta and contains a photograph of her with her elephant. This occurred because Dunbar-Brunton had no photographs of his own so used those of others to illustrate his book. Free eBook

J F Elton

James Frederic Elton (1840 - 1877) served with the British army in India and China and with the staff of the French army in Mexico. In 1868 Elton went to Africa to report on the gold and diamond fields, and was also employed on a diplomatic mission to settle differences with the Portuguese. In 1872 he was appointed government agent on the Zulu frontier and later became assistant political agent and vice-consul in Zanzibar. In 1875 he was promoted to the office of British consul in the Portuguese territory of Mozambique.

His explorations began in 1877 from Mozambique on an expedition to the west and north-west, into the heart of the Makua country, returning to the coast at Mwendazi or Memba Bay - a journey of 450 miles on foot. In July of the same year Elton left Mozambique for the Zambezi and the Shiré rivers, his intention being to visit the British mission stations on Lake Nyassa and to visit various chiefs connected with the slave-trade. The country was devastated by wars among the different tribes, porterage and food wore often unobtainable, and instead of taking a direct route to the east Elton was compelled to travel by a very circuitous one to the north. He died from malaria in December 1877, aged 37, and was buried about two miles from his last camp, under a large baobab tree which overlooks the plains of Usekhe.

Travels And Researches Amoung The Lakes And Mountains Of Eastern & Central Africa by J F Elton (1879) is a posthumous account of the author's journey along the coast between Dar-es-Salaam and Kilwa in 1875 and his 1877 expeditions from Mozambique to the Makua country, and to the Zambesi River and Lake Nyassa in search of a possible route from the north end of the lake to Kilwa. He died of malaria during the course of this last journey. The book was edited and compiled from Elton's journals by H B Cotterill. The introductory chapter on Africa and the slave trade was written by Mr Holmwood, assistant political agent at Zanzibar, while the memoir preface of Elton was written by Horace Waller. Some elephant and other big game hunting expeditions were made. Free eBook

G Antonio Farini

Guillermo Antonio Farini aka William Leonard Hunt (1838 - 1929) was born in the US and raised in Canada. He was a showman known as The Great Farini for his Niagara Falls tightrope walking performances. He took his tightrope act to Africa in 1866 and went on to do his Kalahari expedition.

Through The Kalahari Desert: A Narrative Of A Journey With Gun, Camera, And Notebook To Lake N'Gami And Back by G Antonio Farini (William Leonard Hunt) (1866) is a scarce exploration report by 'The Great Farini' describing his journey (the first by a white man) across the Kalahari Desert in which he recounts finding the legendary Lost City of the Kalahari. Farini was already a legendary showman, acrobat, hire-wire artist and inventor when he turned his attention to this exploration, which he hoped would lead him to a fortune in diamonds. Although Farini did not get rich from his exploration, his reports of the region to include its flora, fauna and geology were exceptional. Farini's claim to have found the Lost City is still controversial as no other explorations have been able to verify its existence.

Henry Faulkner

Henry Faulkner was a British cavalry officer who joined the Royal Geographical Society search for David Livingstone in 1867.

Elephant Haunts: Being A Sportsman's Narrative Of The Search For Doctor Livingstone, With Scenes Of Elephant, Buffalo, And Hippopotamus Hunting by Henry Faulkner (1868) Free eBook

Reginald Fenton

Reginald Fenton (1840 - 1924) was a British settler in South Africa who became a diamond mine owner. His mines were taken over by de Beers and eventually he emigrated to the USA.

Peculiar People In A Pleasant Land: A South African Narrative by Reginald Fenton (1905) is the story of a young man and his first four years experience in South Africa. Tales of Boers, trading, gun-running, hunting and veldt life. Free eBook

Captain V H Fergusson

Captain Vere Henry Fergusson (1891 - 1927) was a British soldier who served in the First World War in Africa. In 1919 he joined the Civil Service in Sudan becoming the District Commissioner in the Bahr-el-Ghazal, where he was murdered by a Nuer tribesman in 1927.

The Story Of Fergie Bey (Awaraquay) by Captain V H Fergusson & Others (1930) is based on the author's journals and published by his friends after his death at the hands of Nuer tribesman. It details his life as a commissioner in the Sudan and his big game hunting exploits.

C E Finlason

Charles Edward Finlason (1860 - 1917) was a British-born journalist who also played first-class cricket for South Africa. He played a single match of Test cricket for the South African national side, against England in March 1889.

A Nobody In Mashonaland: Or The Trials And Adventures Of A Tenderfoot by C E Finlason (1893) describes an expedition to Salisbury, Rhodesia by ox-drawn cart, with near-disastrous but very entertaining results. The hardships, dangers and privations encountered in the early days of the settlement are depicted in a most graphic style with exciting lion stories and the lucky escape from a crocodile. Free eBook

William Walter Augustine Fitzgerald

Travels In the Coastlands Of British East Africa by William Fitzgerald (1898). The author spent two years exploring and mapping the coastlines of British East Africa, Zanzibar and Pemba to report on their agricultural capabilities for the Imperial British East Africa Company. As well as the detailed study of his findings, the book also contains accounts of his hunting exploits. Free eBook

G D Fleming

Blue Is the Sky by G D Fleming (1945) As an RAF and airline pilot, the author's tales of flying over 1,250,000 miles in thirty two countries including his efforts at big game hunting and wandering in Africa.

Hugh G Foster & Francis J Foster

Hugh Gascoigne Foster (1894 - 1956) and Francis Foster (1892 - 1965) were two of the 7 brothers and 3 sisters who were children of a British doctor. Five of the brothers, George, Robert, Francis, Charlie and Hugh went to East Africa around the time of World War I. Their early farming ventures were in Uganda growing coffee. When coffee planting proved unsuccessful, Hugh Foster started ivory hunting, and then tried to grow cotton. Throughout the war he served in German East Africa and then went back to Uganda. They moved from Uganda to Kaptagat, near Eldoret, Kenya in 1931. The brothers were good hunters and after their war service Hugh had various game control jobs, hunted in Tanganyika and the Belgian Congo as well as Uganda. Robert was killed by a lion while hunting in the Congo in 1919.

Uganda Adventures by Hugh G Foster & Francis Foster (2008) is an account of the Foster brothers lives in Africa during the early 20th Century. In 1913 Hugh's grandmother gave him a .375 rifle, 300 rounds of ammunition and his fare to sail from Britain, to join three of his brothers in East Africa. Hugh was only nineteen years of age when he took up farming and hunting, predominantly in Uganda but later in Kenya. There are tales including hunting buffalo in their pyjamas, trying to trade bicycles for African sheep and goats, driving steam rollers through thick elephant grass, joining up during World War I, rescuing a motorbike from the bottom of a crocodile infested river and waking up with a leopard by the bed.

Edward Fothergill

Edward Fothergill was a British civil servant who worked on the Government steamers in the waterways of southern Sudan from 1900 to 1905. He was a very keen sportsman and spent most of his time big game hunting. He took every animal species to be found in the area except lion, including a record elephant trophy.

Five Years In The Sudan by Edward Fothergill (1910) is an account of his travels through Taufikier, Bahr-el-Abyad and the Bahr-el-Ghazal which was unexplored at that point, following the Blue Nile. He describes the peoples, wildlife and big game hunting. Free eBook

James Foulkes

Hunting Stories by James Foulkes (2014) is a memoir of an American medical doctor missionary in Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia) in 1958. As well as treating patients, he was also required to hunt wild game to provide meat for the hospital. In this book, the author recounts his hunting adventures with elephants, man-eating leopards, buffalo, hippo and lions.

Captain John C Francis

Captain John Cyril Francis (1856 - 1894) served with the 5th Bombay Infantry. He ran the Deolali Musketry Class and also was an "excellent shot with the rifle, and the best revolver shot in India". He had only just returned to Deolali, India in excellent health from his arduous shooting expedition in Somaliland when he fell a victim to cholera and died at 38 years of age.

Three Months Leave In Somali Land by Captain John C Francis (1894) is a rare account of the author's diaries of a shooting trip in Somaliland in 1894. He and his companions went into previously little or unknown hunting areas and once they found water and the game lands they hunted lion, gazelle, kudu, oryx and more. Francis died after the trip so this book was published privately only for a few friends. Free eBook

Douglas C Fraser

Douglas Clifford Fraser has become popularly known for the quotation "Delay here means nothing, for is not Africa herself a delay?" from his book 'Through The Congo Basin'.

Impressions: Nigeria 1925 by Douglas C Fraser (1926). Big game hunting memoir when the British Empire still ruled Nigeria. The author writes about hunting hippos, crocodiles and other big game.

Through The Congo Basin by Douglas Fraser (1927) is a personal record of adventure and observation as the author travelled throughout the Congo Basin. He describes the terrain, the natives and his hunting adventures with elephant and buffalo.

Louis Agassiz Fuertes & Wilfred Hudson Osgood

Louis Agassiz Fuertes (1874 - 1927) was an American ornithologist, illustrator and artist who set the current standards for ornithological art. In 1926 to 1927 he participated in the Field Museum's Abyssinian Expedition led by Wilfred Hudson Osgood. He produced some of his most exquisite bird and mammal watercolours as a result of this trip.

Wilfred Hudson Osgood (1875 – 1947) was an American zoologist who became the assistant curator of mammalogy and ornithology from 1909 to 1921, and curator of zoology from 1921 to 1940 at the Field Museum of Natural History in Chicago. He was in command of the Chicago Field Museum/Daily News Ethiopian Expedition which also included James Baum as the expedition big game hunter and Charles Suydam Cutting, a wealthy American naturalist.

Artist And Naturalist In Ethiopia by Louis Agassiz Fuertes & Wilfred Hudson Osgood (1936) is a day-by-day account of the Chicago Field Museum/Daily News Ethiopian Expedition, for which Fuertes was the museum staff artist. It describes field work, birds, animals and local human residents encountered with Fuertes' techiniques for painting and preparing study skins in the field. There are 16 full page illustrations in colour painted from life by Louis Agassiz Fuertes.

D W Gess

John Baldwin Smithson Greathead (1854-1910) was a medical practitioner and district surgeon based in Grahamstown, South Africa.

African Hunting And Travel Journals Of J B S Greathead 1884-1910 edited by D W Gess (2003) record not only his hunting journeys, but also his observation of the people and natural history he encountered in the course of his trips. Comments on medical matters of the time also appear. A skilled photographer, he kept an extensive and meticulously recorded visual account of his travels. Among the trips described are a journey of six months in 1893 in what is now the Kruger National Park and a journey through the then Nyasaland and Northern Rhodesia in 1910. The editor is a great-grandson of JBS Greathead.

E J Glave

Edward James Glave (1863 - 1895) was an English adventurer, author and journalist. In 1883, he was appointed to the management of a station on the Congo as one of Henry Morton Stanley's pioneer officers. When his contract with the Congo Free State expired he returned to England. Glave then offered his services to US diplomat and businessman Henry Shelton Sanford and went back to the Congo for another 2 years.

He then went on a lecture tour in America and joined 2 expeditions to Alaska, crossing the Chilkoot Pass without native guides in 1890. Glave then returned to Africa to report on the slave trade and the cruel conditions under Belgian rule. However, this was not published until after his death in 1895 in Matadi, Congo.

In Savage Africa: Or, Six Years Of Adventure In Congo-Land by E J Glave (1892) describes his long journey in the Congo with observations and adventures. Of sporting interest are his hunts after hippo and buffalo near Stanley Pool and elephant near the Congo River. Free eBook

Heinrich Gortz

Beyond The River Bend: Life In The West African Bush by Heinrich Gortz (1979) includes a period in which this planter, big game hunter and adventurer spent in the Cameroon.

Captain Claude Henry Baxter Grant

Captain Claude Henry Baxter Grant (1878 - 1958) was a British big game hunter, ornithologist and collector. Grant's rock rat, Grant's bushbaby and Grant's golden mole are named after him. He co-authored many African bird books with Cyril W Mackworth-Praed

The Shikari: A Hunter's Guide by Claude Henry Baxter Grant (1914) is full of tips and information about hunting in Africa from 'Fitness and General Health' to 'Taxidermy'. Free eBook

Lawrence G Green

Lawrence (Laurie) George Green (1900 - 1972) was a South African journalist and prolific non-fiction and fiction author.

Strange Africa By Lawrence G Green (1938). The author was an experienced hunter and includes tales of hunting elephant and lion by local sportsmen and pioneers. Free eBook
More books by Lawrence G Green

William K Gregory & Henry C Raven

William King Gregory (1876 – 1970) was an American zoologist, particularly known as a primatologist, paleontologist and functional and comparative anatomist. He was a scientific staff member of the American Museum of Natural History and also taught at Columbia University.

Henry Cushier Raven (1889 – 1944) was an American naturalist-explorer, scientific collector, mammologist and anatomist at the American Museum of Natural History.

In 1929, Raven and Gregory, with 2 others, embarked on 'The Columbia University and The American Museum of Natural History Expedition to Africa'. They had received permission from the King of Belgium, Albert I, to collect two gorillas. Crossing the continent from east to west, they collected comparative anatomical material and secured gorilla specimens in the Belgian Congo and French Cameroon.

In Quest Of Gorillas by William K Gregory & Henry C Raven (1937) is the scarce account of the authors', both eminent museum curators, journey through Tanganyika, the Congo and into western Africa in quest of elusive mountain gorillas. There is much on the Kivu area and great lakes country of Africa.

G B Grinnell & Theo Roosevelt (Editors)

Trail And Camp-Fire edited by G B Grinnell & Theo Roosevelt (1897) is the 3rd 'Book of the Boone & Crockett Club' and is one of the few editions to have any African hunting stories. Included is 'An African Shooting Trip' by William Lord Smith who hunted with Arthur Donaldson-Smith and on the stop in Aden met with Harald Swayne, then only a Captain, who gave him "many valuable hints in regard to what we should carry as food for ourselves and men, and the best method of packing it up for camel transportation." They hunted oryx, leopard, lion, elephant, kudu, rhino and other game in Ethiopia. Free eBook

Rene Guillot

The Great Land Of The Elephants by Rene Guillot (1971). A hunter's memories of French West Africa. Translated by Gwen Marsh. Contents include chapters headed... M'Bam and M'Bil, Wart-hog and Antelope, the Great Rain Forests, Buffaloes, the Frontiers of Thirst, Firearms and Traps, Hippos, A Fine Captive, More Elephants, Whistle and Mask and Down the Niger in a Pirogue.

Major-General Sir Francis De Guingand

Major-General Sir Francis Wilfred de Guingand (1900 – 1979), was a British Army officer who served in World War II as chief of staff to Field Marshal Viscount Montgomery. After he retired from the army in 1947, he emigrated to Southern Rhodesia to pursue various business activities there and in South Africa. He also wrote 4 books about his military experiences during the war.

African Assignment by Major-General Sir Francis De Guingand (1953) is about the author's pre-war life in Nyasaland where he was seconded to the King's African Rifles from 1926 to 1931. It includes his big game hunting hunting and travel experiences.

Georges-Marie Haardt & Louis Audouin-Dubreuil

Georges-Marie Haardt (1884 - 1932) was a Belgian-born French industrialist and explorer. He was the first general manager and vice president of Citroen automobile company. He was appointed leader of the three Citroen expeditions - first across the Sahara (Touggourt to Timbuktu 1922-1923), then across Africa (1924-1925), then Asia (1931-1932). He died of flu and pneumonia in Hong Kong during the third expedition.

Louis Audouin-Dubreuil (1887 - 1960) was a French military officer and explorer. He was recruited by Andre Citroen (President & Founder of Citroen) as the deputy for Georges -Marie Haardt for the three Citroen expeditions.

The Black Journey: Across Central Africa With The Citroen Expedition by Georges-Marie Haardt & Louis Audouin-Dubreuil (1927) is about the 1924-1925 journey with 8 Citroen by half-track trucks from Algeria, to the Sahara, west and central Africa, east coast of Africa and to Madagascar in the years. With some hunting of antelope, lion, hippopotamus, rhinoceros, elephantand buffalo on the way.

Lt-Col Andrew C P Haggard

Andrew Charles Parker Haggard (1854 - 1923) was a British officer in the Egyptian army serving in Egypt and the Sudan, earning himself a DSO. He was the elder brother of novelists Rider Haggard and Edward Arthur Haggard. After retiring from the army, he eventually settled in Canada, writing historical novels, hunting and fishing.

Sporting Yarns: Spun Off The Reel by Lt-Col Andrew C P Haggard (1903) is an entertaining collection of stories including hunting lion in Abyssinia, moose and bighorn sheep in Canada, ducks in Japan, salmon in Newfoundland, fishing in the Middle East (Aden), fishing the Grand Cascapedia in Canada and more. Free eBook

David Haig-Thomas

David Haig-Thomas (1908 – 1944) was a British ornithologist, explorer, hunter and rower who competed in the 1932 Olympics. He was an army commando during the Second World War and was killed in action during D-Day.

I Leap Before I Look: Sport At Home And Abroad by David Haig-Thomas (1936) is an account of the author's hunting and shooting adventures including hunts for Spanish ibex, wild geese, hunting in Canada, Iceland, Abyssinia & Sardinia and bird photography.

Wilfrid Dyson Hambly

Wilfrid Dyson Hambly (1886 - 1962)) was a British, Oxford educated anthropologist and author, who became the Curator of African Ethnology at the Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago. Hambly led the 1929 expedition to Africa sponsored by Frederick H Rawson.

With A Motor Truck In West Africa by Wilfrid Dyson Hambly (1931) a rare book about a "trophy hunter's adventures in Angola and Nigeria".

Charles Edward Hamilton

Sketches Of Life And Sport In South-Eastern Africa by Charles Edward Hamilton (1870). Hamilton travelled throughout Natal in 1864, mainly in the Pietermaritzburg, Drakensberg and south coast areas, hunting buffalo and leopard near the lower Umlazi River and crossing into Basutoland to hunt lion, wildebeest and giraffe. Free eBook

Oriental Zigzags: Or Wanderings In Syria, Moab, Abyssinia, and Egypt by Charles Hamilton (1875) is an account of the author's travels in the Middle East and North Africa which includes an episode when he was brutally attacked and nearly killed in Egypt on the return leg of his journey. Free eBook

Clement Handley

Briton, Boer And Black: Or Ten Years' Hunting, Trading And Propecting In South Africa by Clement Handley (1906) is a "narrative of travel, trade, and adventure in South Africa may serve the purpose for which the Author has written it, viz., to let the English people understand some of the dangers and difficulties faced by the pioneer in South Africa". Free eBook

M A Harbord

Maurice Assheton Harbord (1874 - 1954) served in the Boer War between 1899 and 1902, gaining the rank of Captain in the 1st Imperial Light Horse. He then became an inspector in the Johannesburg Town Police between 1902 and 1908, after which he decamped to East Africa to hunt big game.

Froth & Bubble by M A Harbord (1915) recounts the author's early life in England, with numerous adventures working in a mill in Sibley, Iowa, a Montana cattle ranch and with travels in Rhodesia and South Africa, particularly during the Boer War and with the Transvaal Town Police. By 1908, he was in British East Africa hunting big game in the Kedong Valley. He bagged buffalo, lion and rhinoceros, though he usually found himself armed with a shotgun rather than a rifle at most inopportune times.

Edward Vernon Harcourt

Edward William Vernon Harcourt (1825 - 1891) was an English naturalist hunter and politician.

Sporting In Algeria by Edward Vernon Harcourt (1859) is about hunting in Algeria with some account of Moorish culture.

Colin Harding

Colonel Edwin Colin Harding (1863 - 1939) spent most of his life hunting until his father died leaving him in dire financial straits but with a good education and horse-riding ability. In 1894 he arrived in Bulawayo and took jobs such as a labourer, solicitor's clerk, mining claims dealer before joining the military in the Rhodesian Horse, where he obtained the rank of corporal. In 1896 he was engaged in the rebellion in Mashonaland, playing a very active and distinguished part as a galloper in the Mounted Infantry.

As a Major, Colin Harding was first commander of the Barotse Native Police force from 1900 to 1901. He selected a site for a new fort (to be known as Fort Harding) at Monze to replace the old fort which was at an unhealthy site. He later became an administrator in Barotseland. Colonel Harding was then appointed to Northern Nigeria before serving in World War I in France. He was invalided out after the Somme and then went back to the Gold Coast.

In Remotest Barotseland: Being An Account Of A Journey Of Over 8,000 Miles Through The Wildest And Remotest Parts Of Lewanika's Empire by Colin Harding (1904) is an account of Harding's expedition to explore and report on the extent of Lewanika's territory. Harding had accompanied King Lewanika to London for the 1902 coronation of King Edward VII. While in London, Lewanika sought the protection of the British Government, under the administration of the British South Africa Company. Free eBook

Far Bugles by Colin Harding (1933) is an autobiography describing Harding's early years in Bulawayo earning a precarious living as a bricklayer, miner or solicitor's clerk before some mining speculations turned out well. It includes his experiences in the Mounted Infantry, becoming an administrator in Barotseland and Nigeria and his service in the War in France. Harding also describes his encounter with a lion who mauled him and left him for dead.

Frontier Patrols: A History Of The British South Africa Police And Other Rhodesian Forces by Colin Harding (1937) is the history of the mounted forces recruited during the 'scramble for Africa' to help guard Britain’s imperial possessions in South Africa and Rhodesia. The British South Africa Police had a vast territory to patrol and Colonel Harding took part in the campaigns against risings by Rhodesia’s two major tribes, the Mashona and the Matabele.

Richard Harding Davis

Richard Harding Davis (1864 - 1916) was an American journalist and prolific author of fiction and drama. He was the first American war correspondent to cover the Spanish-American War, the Second Boer War and the First World War.

The Congo And Coasts Of Africa by Richard Harding Davis (1907) recounts his journey through the Congo to the east coast of Africa, with his wife Cecil Clark Davis. One chapter describes hunting hippopotamus and crocodile on the Kasai River. Free eBook

Rex Hardinge

Charles Reginald Quintin Von Donop Hardinge (1905 - 1990) was born in India and educated in England. He farmed in South Africa before returning to England in 1929 to become a full-time freelance writer. He served in the Observer Corps at the start of WWII, later in the Royal Armoured Corps, then transferred to the Indian Army, then posted to China for undercover activities. He returned to England after the war and resumed full-time writing. Rex Hardinge was one of the Sexton Blake detective story authors. He was renowned for his stories set in India and Africa which he knew from first-hand experience.

South African Cinderella: A Trek Through Ex-German West Africa by Rex Hardinge (1937) is the tale of the author's bicycle trek through what now is Namibia. Includes stories about the Orange River, Hottentots, Nazi activity in SWA, evidence relative to the treatment of natives by the Germans after 1906 and up to 1914, and extracts from the report of the SWA commission. Free eBook

Gambia And Beyond by Rex Hardinge (1934). The author made a bet that his trek from Dakar, the main port of French West Africa, through Senegal into the little-known colony of British Gambia, into Portuguese Guinea would cost no more than £50 including fares, kit and all expenses. He won the bet after recouping his costs by writing this book about his journey.

James J Harrison

James Jonathan Harrison (1857 - 1923) was a British part-time soldier and keen, if indiscriminate, big game hunter in Africa. Amongst others, he lead a hunting expedition through Abyssinnia, travelling further on to Lake Rudolph. On this trip he was accompanied by P H G Powell-Cotton, Archibald Edward Butter, William Fitzhugh Whitehouse and Donald Clarke. Powell-Cotton was unhappy by Harrison's indiscriminate shooting of young elephants and left the expedition to hunt ibex in the Simien Mountains while the others proceeded to Lake Rudolph.

Life Among The Pygmies In The Ituri Forest, Congo Free State by James J Harrison (1905) is a short book about James J Harrison's visit to the Congo Free State. He has two main goals - to hunt an okapi and to bring some pygmies back to England. He failed to get an okapi and did bring 6 pygmy people which he set up as an entertainment group. Free eBook

A Sporting Trip Through India by James J Harrison (1892) is a scarce account of the author's hunting trips for tiger in India, stag and pig sticking and elephant in Ceylon.

Lt Col A H W Haywood

Austin Hubert Wightwick Haywood (b.1878) served in India and Africa with the Royal Artillery.

Sport And Service In Africa by Lt Col A H W Haywood (1926)..."A record of big game shooting, campaigning & adventure in the hinterland of Nigeria, the Cameroons, Togoland, etc, with an account of the ways of native soldiers & inhabitants & a description of their villages & customs as well as the fauna & flora". Includes lion hunts near the Niger River, elephant hunting near Timbuctu, interspersed with military campaigns.

Through Timbuctu And Across the Great Sahara: An Account Of An Adventurous Journey Of Exploration From Sierra Leone To The Source Of The Niger, Following Its Course To The Bend At Gao And Thence Across The Great Sahara To Algiers. by Captain A H W Haywood (1912). By the time of Haywood's journey, this route was no longer "exploration" and the are was administered by the French, though it still took 75 days to travel from Gao to Biskra. An entertaining account of this trip. Free eBook

Lutz Heck

Ludwig George Heinrich Heck (1892 - 1983) was a German zoologist and became the director of the Berlin Zoo in 1932. As well as collecting animals, one of his projects was the reconstruction of extinct animals such as the aurochs through the cross-breeding of various modern breeds which he thought had parts of the original genetic heritage.

Animals: My Adventure by Lutz Heck (1954) tells the stories about Heck's adventures in Africa, Europe and Canada, capturing animals for the Berlin Zoo. He first went to Ethiopia where the Galla and the Somali people brought in live specimens of birds and animals, including leopards and cheetah. He went on expeditions to get a gerenek, Hamadryas and Gelada baboons and various birds. Before returning home Heck was presented with a lioness by Emperor Haile Selassie. In Tanganyika he captured rhino, wildebeest, giraffe and more. In 1938 Heck and his wife successfully captured 3 gorillas in Cameroon which eventually died - the one survivor was killed when the zoo was bombed during the war.

Animal Safari: Big Game Hunting In South-West Africa by Lutz Heck (1956) is an account of the author's safari with is wife to photograph and collect animals in South West Africa, now Namibia. His trip took him down the coast to Walvis Bay and Cape Cross and then to the game regions of the Kalahari, Etoshaland and the Kaokoveld.

William Helean

William Brindley Helean (b.1917) was a New Zealand born soldier from 1939 to 1945. He was appointed to a cadetship in the Colonial Service in Tanganyika in 1948, became a District Officer in 1950 and Senior District Officer in 1958. Since 1961 he was an Administrative Officer and at independence in 1962, he was transferred to the Vice-President's office.

Bed In The Bush by William Helean (1991) is an account of the varied problems which District Commissioners had to handle in the remote areas of Africa. The frustrations of trying to introduce and maintain profitable work projects such as growing cotton, the establishment of a pond and stocking it with fish which disappeared overnight, solving leopard man murders and killing man-eating lions.

H N Hemans

Herbert Nassau Hemans (1871 - 1935) served in the BSAP during the Anglo-Boer War before becoming a Native Commissioner in Rhodesia.

A Log Of A Native Commissioner: A Record Of Work And Sport In Southern Rhodesia by H N Hemans (1935) is an account of the experiences of a Native Commissioner in the remote area of Sebungwe in Rhodesia prior to World War I. The service included opportunities for hunting, the watching wildlife and exploration with hardships and self-denial which was the way of life for Native Commissioners. Apparently Hemans enjoyed hunting so much that he refused promotion opting to stay where the hunting was good.

H N Heman's son, Trevor Hemans, wrote a book 'Those Were The Days' about his time as a Native and District Commissioner in Rhodesia. Includes much hunting. Available only as a Free eBook

Robert Henriques

Robert David Quixano Henriques (1905 - 1967) was a British writer, broadcaster and farmer. He joined the Royal Artillery in 1926 and served in Egypt and the Sudan, retiring in 1933.

Death By Moonlight: An Account Of A Darfur Journey by Robert Henriques (1938) is the account of big game hunting and exploration journey in the Dafur desert of Sudan.

Philip Hoffman

Philip Hoffman (1872 – 1951) was appointed by Theodore Roosevelt as the US Minister Resident or Consul General in to the Court of King Menelek in Abyssinia from 1909 to 1910.

Abyssinian Memories: Christmas 1948 by Philip Hoffman (1948) is a privately printed account of Hoffman's experiences in Abyssinia, including hunting kudu and oryx, with an additional note of missing a shot at a marauding lion.

Emil Holub

Emil Holub (1847 - 1902) was a Czech doctor, explorer, cartographer and ethnographer in Africa. He settled near Kimberley to practise medicine and soon set out in a convoy of local hunters on a two-month scientific safari where he began to assemble a large natural history collection. On his third expedition in 1875, he went all the way to the Zambezi river and made the first detailed map of the region surrounding Victoria Falls. In 1883, Holub set out to do what no one had done before - explore the entire length of Africa from Cape Town to Egypt. However the expedition was forced to turn back in 1886.

Seven Years In South Africa: Travels, Researches And Hunting Adventures Between The Diamond Fields And The Zambesi (1872-79) by Emil Holub (1881). 2 Volumes. Includes much on the upper Zambesi regions where hunting has always been enjoyed but this is not primarily a hunting book. Free eBook Vol I Free eBook Vol II

Edward J House

A Hunter's Camp-Fires by Edward J House (1909) is the author's memoirs of big-game hunting on both Canadian Coasts, cariboo hunting in Newfoundland, mountain goat hunting in the Rockies, moose hunting, giraffe hunting in East Africa, elephant hunting around Meru and bagging rhinos near Mt Kenya

On Safari: East African Big Game Hunting On The Veldt, Mount Kenia, And Guaso Maru by Edward J House (1909) (Kindle only) The author says "From the standpoint of the hunter, I have endeavored to furnish a plain and unvarnished description of some of the more successful hunts in which I have participated. After experience in hunting with a rifle, and with a camera to a lesser degree. I am frank to confess that I have found an element of excitement in the former totally lacking in the latter."

J E Hughes

Joseph E Hughes (b.1876) was born in England and became the assistant native commissioner in north-east Rhodesia. He resigned in favour of becoming a full-time hunter and trader and spent the years from 1901 to 1919 organising hunting expeditions at Lake Bangweulu. He is noted for his information about the existence of a large prehistoric animal known as 'Chipekwe'.

Eighteen Years On Lake Bangweulu by J E Hughes (1920) is a scarce work of hunting and adventure with great detail of the area, which is today, Zambia. Hughes explored and hunted around Lake Bangweulu and the rivers Chambesi and Luapula. There are numerous hunting incidents, particularly after elephant, lion, buffalo, hippopotamus and rhinoceros, with cheetah bagged near the Luena River. In addition, eland, sable, puku, sitatunga, warthog and other game was collected.

G T Hutchinson

From From The Cape To The Zambesi by G T Hutchinson (1905) is an account of his tour of South Africa in 1904 with much on Rhodesia, also comments on Kimberley, Johannesburg, the siting of the bridge over the Zambesi, Cape Colony politics, the native question, the land settlement in Orange River Colony. Includes some hunting. Free eBook

Major Jack R.E.

Major Evan Maclean Jack was a Royal Engineer who commanded the Anglo-Congolese Boundary Commission and later, the Anglo-Belgian-German Boundary Commission of Uganda.

On the Congo Frontier: Exploration And Sport by Major E M Jack (1914). Near Lake Edward, the author surveyed huge herds of antelope and he hunted buffalo and lion there, before proceeding to the Semliki Valley after elephant. After surveying the 30th Meridian, he bagged additional elephants and buffalo, then headed into Rwanda after lion and more buffalo.

F L James

Frank Linsly James (1851 - 1890) was an English traveller and hunter in Sudan, India and Mexico. He was killed in San Benito on the west coast Africa by a wounded elephant. A bird of East Africa, the Three-Streaked Tchagra, Tchagra jamesi, was named after him.

The Wild Tribes Of The Soudan by F L James (1883) is an account of the personal experiences and adventures during three winters spent in that country chiefly among the Base tribe. It includes an account of the routes from Wady Halfah to Berber by the author and a chapter on Khartoum and The Soudan by Sir Samuel Baker. Free eBook

The Unknown Horn Of Africa: An Exploration From Berbera To The Leopard River by F L James (1888). The author hunts for kudu, lion, rhino and other assorted antelope near the river Webbe. This work is actually more important as a work of exploration rather than big game hunting. Free eBook

Major J Willes Jennings

Major James Willes Jennings (1899 - 1954) was a surgeon in the Royal Army Medical Corps and served in South Africa and East Africa before being selected for service with the Abyssinian Army in the campaign against the so-called Mad Mullah of Somaliland.

With The Abyssinians In Somaliland by Major J Willes Jennings (1905) is the author's memoir as a British medical officer who participated with the Somaliland Expeditionary Force in the campaign against the Mullah in 1904. He travelled with another medical officer, Captain H N Dunn, along with Captain A Duff, Mr J L Baird of the Diplomatic Service and Lieutenant Ogilvy. There were hunting expeditions for lion, gerenuk and rhinoceros and also for the pot. Free eBook

B H Jessen

Burchart Heinrich Jessen was a Norwegian explorer who accompanied the American big game hunter William Northrup MacMillan on an expedition through Sudan and Ethiopia in 1904.

Lord William Northrop Macmillan (1872-1925) was an American soldier, knighted by the King of England, even though he was not British. He was a Scot raised in St Louis, USA. He arrived in Kenya in 1901 for big game hunting with John Boyes and later with William Judd and to explore the Blue Nile river. He bought a vast ranch in Kenya and hosted Theodore Roosevelt during his safari.

W N Mcmillan's Expeditions And Big Game Hunting In Sudan, Abyssinia & British East Africa by B H Jessen (1906) is an extremely scarce hunting and exploration classic. Jessen was an ardent hunter who made many trips through the African gamelands. He was a friend of many of the famous hunters of his day.

South Western Abyssinia by B H Jessen (1905) is an article in the Geographical Journal 25.

Isaac Charles Johnson Jr

Sport On The Blue Nile: Or Six Months Of Sportsman's Life In Central Africa by Isaac Charles Johnson (1903) is one of the scarcest African big game books which is an account of Isaac Johnson's travels through the Sudan. Free eBook

Charles Johnston

Charles Johnston (1810 - 1872) was a British Naval surgeon who was serving on a ship which was on a secret mission to Africa or India, when he decided to become an adventurer. He resigned his post and left the ship at the end of the outbound voyage. He intended to travel back to Britain on foot across Africa.

Travels In Southern Abyssinia: Through The Country Of Adal To The Kingdom Of Shoa by Charles Johnston (1844) is a 2 volume account of Dr Johnston's journey in Abyssinia (present-day Ethiopia and Somalia) to the court of Shoa, describing many customs and characteristics of local tribes. It also describes the geography of the land and traces the flow of the most important river and lakes in the region. Free eBook Vol I Free eBook Vol II

Barrie Kaye

Boa: The Memoirs Of A Banana Planter In Remote West Africa by Barrie Kaye (2000). An extremely funny and well-written book about the life of a banana planter in remote west Africa. An entertaining account of the trials and tribulations of a young man on a remote plantation, which includes much on bananas, gold prospecting and hunting.

Walter Montagu Kerr

The Far Interior: A Narrative Of Travel And Adventure From The Cape Of Good Hope Across The Zambesi To The Lake Regions Of Central Africa by Walter Montagu Kerr (1886). The author travelled to the South African diamond fields to seek his fortune. He met Frederick Selous, the pair venturing into the interior of Matabeleland. A classic African adventure book.

Kalman Kittenberger

Kalman Kittenberger (1881 - 1958) was a Hungarian traveller, natural historian, biologist, collector and big game hunter. He made six journeys to Africa from 1902 onwards and spent altogether ten and a half years in Africa. He hunted on the Athi Plains of Kenya, the region north of Lake Victoria in Uganda and the Ruvana Plains in Northern Tanganyika.

Big Game Hunting And Collecting in East Africa (1903-1926) by Kalman Kittenberger (1929) is an account of his hunting adventures particularly those describing the elephant and buffalo.

Collie Knox

It Might Have Been You by Collie Knox (1938) is the autobiography of Collie Knox who was a popular journalist and radio presenter. It includes much on big game hunting with an interesting encounter with renowned elephant hunter and game warden "Samaki" Salmon, who he refers to in the book as 'Samarki'Salmon. Though he felt he was not cut out for elephant hunting, he went hunting with Salmon and had some more than exciting elephant encounters. He wrote... ""I think," I said to this calm companion of mine, "I should like to go home, please. I don't take to such goings on." I went on, of course. Samarki was determined I should get my elephant if he had to hold the gun for me and press the trigger himself".

Thomas Wallace Knox

Thomas Wallace Knox (1835 - 1896) was an American journalist for the New York Herald during the American Civil War. After the war, he made 2 trips around the world and wrote numerous books for boys as a result.

Hunters Three: Sport And Adventure In South Africa by Thomas Wallace Knox (1895) is the account of the author's hunting expedition with his friends in South Africa. They clubbed together to buy an outfit and being successful the sale of the ivory and skins would cover all the expenses and leave a good profit to be divided at the end of the hunt.

A similar hunting expedition of two British women, went out from Walvisch Bay to South Africa. The two expeditions went in the same direction and it led to their meeting. This ended with the two women getting proposals of marriage from two of the 'hunters three'. Free eBook

George Lacy, 'The Old Pioneer'

Pictures Of Travel, Sport And Adventure by George Lacy, 'The Old Pioneer' (1899) is an account of the author's hunting adventures over many in Swaziland, Natal and South Africa. Free eBook

A Henry Savage Landor

Arnold Henry Savage Landor (1865 – 1924) was an English painter, explorer, writer and anthropologist. After studying painting in Paris, he travelled the world, including America, Japan, Tibet and Korea, painting landscapes and portraits. It was during the 1900s that he visited Abyssinia and painted a portrait of the king Menelik II.

Across Wildest Africa by A Henry Savage Landor (1907) 2 Volumes. This is an account of the country and people of Eastern, Central and Western Africa as seen by the author during a 12 month journey from Djibuti to Cape Verde. While in the Bahr-el-Ghazal region of Sudan, he hunted elephant and had a lucky escape when a large bull chased him after his rifle jammed. Free eBook Vol I Free eBook Vol II

Captain Conyers Lang

Conyers Frederick Woodroffe Lang (1891 - 1969) changed his name from Laing and was a British army captain. Lang hunted buffalo near Narok in Kenya, and was badly gored by a bull buffalo which he eventually manages to shoot dead. His planned drive from the Cape to Cairo had to be abandoned, and he spent four months in hospital in Nairobi recovering from his injuries.

Big game hunter, Count Zsigmond Szechenyi was in the hospital with dystentry and malaria, at the same time as Lang. He wrote in his book 'Land Of Elephants' of Lang, "A wounded buffalo tossed him, played the devil with him altogether, breaking his pelvis, several ribs, one leg and both arms. There were not many bones in him unbroken. The doctors consider him a miracle, for he survived against all the rules of the game. Now he is whistling cheerfully too, even shuffling about on crutches, impatient to be let loose again on the buffaloes."

Buffalo: The Lone Trail Of A Big Game Hunter by Captain Conyers Lang (1934). The author's intention was "to buy a car in Capetown and drive it up through Africa on a long shooting trip with Cairo as the eventual goal". A very well written and most interesting account of overland travel and big game hunting in Africa in the late 1920s or early 1930s.

'Langa Langa'

Harry Baldwin Hermon-Hodge (1885 - 1947) was a British Political Officer in Nigeria for 10 years. 'Langa Langa' was his name given by local Nigerians and may mean 'marvelous' or 'almighty'.

Up Against It In Nigeria by 'Langa Langa' (1922) is a collection of memoirs from the author's experiences in Nigeria from 1908 until the end of the First World War, which he fought with the Nigerian Frontier Force. Includes much big game hunting. Free eBook

Captain Edgar George Dion Lardner

Soldiering And Sport In Uganda 1909-1910 by Captain E G Dion Lardner (1912) is the tale of a year's attachment to the King's African Rifles in Uganda which included extensive travel, big game hunting and a frontier expedition. Free eBook

Andreas E Laszlo MD

Doctors, Drums And Dances by Andreas E Laszlo MD (1955) is an account of the author's time, in the now former Portuguese colony, Angola where he, with his companion George Wurzburger, explored the ancient customs of such native tribes as the Cunhamas. It includes an interesting chapter about stalking a herd of giant sable (Hippotragus niger variani) in order to film them - the giant sable was royal game and hunting them was not allowed. There is also an account of the author hunting a leopard which was terrorising a village - killing dogs first before taking a child. There is much about the vast numbers of elephants in Angola at that time. Free eBook

A E Leatham

Albert Edward Leatham (1859 - 1948) was a British professional cricket player and big game hunter.

Sport In Five Continents by A E Leatham (1912). The author hunted throughout the world, including Africa where he travelled to Somaliland in 1896 and collected lion. In 1900, he was in British East Africa hunting lion near Lucania Hill, hippopotamus on the Athi River and buffalo near the heights of the Donio Sabuk. He also includes a chapter on hunting and identifying various types of antelope including oryx. He also includes stalking gaur in the Neilgherry Hills and tiger in the Philibeet District of India as well as hunting goral and tufted deer near Ichang along the Yangtze River in China. Of North American interest are his hunts in British Columbia, Manitoba, and Rocky Mountains for grizzly bear, elk, mountain sheep and goat. Additionally, he describes hunting for red stags and fishing for trout in New Zealand. Free eBook

Somaliland, 1896 by A E Leatham (1896) is the handwritten journal of the author's hunting safari expedition to Somaliland with his relatives Edward North Buxton and Alfred Pease. All three men were already renowned big game hunters and wrote about this safari in their own publications. Buxton's account of this safari is in his book, 'Short Stalks: Second Series'. Pease wrote about his experience in his article, 'Some Account Of Somaliland', published in Scott Geographical Magazine 14 in 1898 and Leatham recounts part of this Somaliland safari in Chapter 11 of his book, 'Sport In Five Continents' - however he only gives the account of a lion hunt after he split up from the rest of the hunting party. Other members of the safari included Helen Ann Fowler, Alfred Pease's first wife, Celestin Passet, a French mountain hunting guide, who hunted with Buxton on earlier expeditions, and Joseph Haich, a dragoman or interpreter from Syria.

The journal gives an detailed account of the safari including information that was not published, such as Leatham's somewhat disparaging observations about the hunting methods used by Pease and Buxton - perhaps this was the reason Leatham left the group to hunt alone. The journal also contains original photographs and useful information on hunting etiquette, hunting clothes, provisions, camp furniture, etc.

Sidney J Legendre

Sidney Jennings Legendre (1903 - 1948) was an American big game hunter and traveller. His wife Gertrude (Sanford) was a keen big game hunter herself. They married after she invited Sidney to hunt in Abyssinia for the American Museum of Natural History in 1929.

Okovango Desert River by Sidney J Legendre (1939). The author's adventurous safari hunting big game and exploring, following the Okovango River through South West Africa.

Land Of The White Parasol And The Million Elephants: A Journey Through The Jungles Of Indo-China by Sidney J Legendre (1936). Illustrated with photographs by Gertrude Legendre.

Marcel Le Roy

Land Of The Niamoo: Travels In The Forests Of Equatorial Africa by Marcel Le Roy (1954). The author was a prospector in the Upper Guinea, Liberia and the Ivory Coast and this book is about his travels and observations, primarily anthropological. Includes two chapters on big-game hunting.

David Leslie

David Leslie (c.1838 - 1872) was a Scotsman who arrived in Durban in 1849 at the age of 11 years. He learnt to speak the Zulu language so proficiently that he became an interpreter in the law courts. However he badly wanted to hunt big game, so as an impecunious 19 year old, he walked to Zululand and traded and hunted enough with the Zulus to buy an ox wagon. In 1871 he wanted to explore the gamelands of northern Zululand and Mozambique, so he and his men rowed 35 mile up river from Lorenco Marques into Tongaland. In poor health with fever, he then returned to Britain via Durban and later in 1872 died from a severe lung condition aged 35.

W H Drummond was assisted by David Leslie when he made his expeditions which resulted in his book The Large Game and Natural History of South and South-East Africa. He paid tribute to David Leslie..."to his kindly placing at my disposal, during my expeditions, the large number of hunters and natives in his service, I owe many of my opportunities for observation. Nay, I must add, that it is chiefly to his skill, attention, and kindness in illness, and to his assistance in many of the dangers and difficulties incident to travel and hunting among the natives in the interior, that I attribute my having ultimately returned alive to this country."

Among The Zulus And Amatongas: With Sketches Of The Natives, Their Language And Customs; And The Country, Products, Climate, Wild Animals, Etc by David Leslie & edited by W H Drummond (1875) was published posthumously. It is about the life of David Leslie who lived among the Zulus as a trader and hunter for most of his short life. "His acquaintance with the languages, politics, customs and feelings of the natives of Natal, and of the important semi-independent States lying between the British and Portuguese possessions on the East Coast, was probably greater than that of any other man." Free eBook

Lionel A D Leslie

Captain Lionel Alastair David Leslie (1900 - 1987) was was a sculptor, author and explorer. He was the son of Leonie Leslie, sister of Winston Churchill's mother, making him Churchill's cousin. Winston was also Lionel's godfather.

Lionel Leslie served with the Cameron Highlanders in India and Burma from where he set off on the first of his expeditions to China. After leaving the army in 1926, he attempted to walk across Africa accompanied by a Masai warrior.

Wilderness Trails In Three Continents: An Account Of Travel Big Game Hunting And Exploration In India, Burma, China, East Africa And Labrador by Lionel A D Leslie (1931). Winston Churchill wrote the foreword of this book and says that it "tells a plain tale in a lively and agreeable fashion, and should be welcomed most of all by those who will envy the author his enjoyable, though sometimes dangerous, roamings." The big game hunting included bear, Indian elephant, cheetal, blackbuck and bison in India, tsaine (banteng) in Burma and lion and rhino in Africa. There was no hunting in Labrador.

A G Lewis

Sport, Travel And Adventure edited by A G Lewis (1915) is an excellent anthology of hunting and exploration stories culled from the finest works of the early 20th century. Elephant and lion hunting in Africa, adventures in the Polar regions, mountaineering in Tibet, bear hunting in the American West and travels in Siberia.

J Leyland

Adventures In The Far Interior Of South Africa: Including A Journey To Lake Ngami by J Leyland (1866). Leyland made three trips into the interior of south Africa between 1848 and 1852, trading with the native people whilst hunting big game en route to Lake Ngami and Bechuanaland. The book includes an account of a meeting with Dr. Livingstone in 1850. Free eBook

Captain Augustus Lindley

Augustus Frederick Lindley (1840 - 1873) was a British adventurer and writer. He served a short time in the Royal Navy before becoming an officer of a trading steamer in China. In 1868, Lindley and a group of friends landed at Durban to undertake a gold-hunting expedition in the Transvaal. No gold was found so they travelled and hunted extensively in southern Africa.

After Ophir: Or A Search For The South African Gold Fields by Captain Augustus Lindley (1870) includes adventurous accounts of hunting leopard, lion, elephant, rhino and other game almost 150 years ago. The author and his fellow gold hunters visited Zululand and Matabeleland, and had an interview with a young Cetywayo, then king of the Zulus. ('Ophir' refers to region mentioned in the Bible, famous for its wealth). Free eBook

Jack F Lipscomb

John Francis 'Jack' Lipscomb (1901 - 1988) became a British settler in Kenya just after World War I. By 1923 he had acquired a small portion of land and planned to go into farming. Realising his lack of farming experience he went back to Britain to study dairy farming at Reading University before occupying his 100 acres at Kinangop.

From The Beginning: The Work and Achievements Of A Kenya Settler by J F Lipscomb (1947) is his account of farming in Kenya near Lake Naivasha from the late 1920s based on his own farm with much detail of buildings, setting up, cattle, crops, problems and successes.

Those Days Before Yesterday by Jack F Lipscomb (1978) is an account of a settler's hunting and farming life in Kenya in the 1920s.

William Lloyd-Jones

Havash! Frontier Adventures In Kenya by William Lloyd-Jones (1925). Early hunting (lion, elephant and rhino) and military memoirs in Northern British East Africa, Somaliland and southern Abyssinia in the years before World War I.

K.A.R: Being An Unofficial Account Of The Origin And Activities Of The King's African Rifles by William Lloyd-Jones (1926) is a history of this East African British Army Regiment including its activities in the Great War African Campaign. Includes all its active service from 1893 with a roll of honour of its British Officers and NCOs.

Frederick Lort-Phillips

Frederick William Alfred Herbert Lort-Phillips (1872 - 1944) was a British banker who was also known as 'Frederick Gillet'. Gillett was his father's name but he wrote his book under his mother's maiden name.

The Wander Years: Hunting And Travel In Four Continents by Frederick Lort-Phillips (1931). The author was given five hundred pounds by his father to study fruit growing in America. He went travelling and big game hunting instead, travelling round the world to Norway, Persia, Somaliland, Newfoundland and Canada and Tian Shan.

Lt Col Henry Cecil Lowther

Sir Henry Cecil Lowther (1869-1940) was an officer in the Scots Guards during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

From Pillar To Post by Lt Col Henry Cecil Lowther (1911) is the author's memoirs of travelling to Somaliland where he hunted lion in the Haud region, encountered Teddy Roosevelt in British East Africa and hunted elephant. There are stories about working on a Montana cattle ranch, travelling to Ceylon and serving in South Africa during the Boer War.

Thomas J Lucas

Camp Life And Sport In South Africa by Thomas J Lucas (1878) is an account of a soldier's experiences in the eighth (1850-1853) Cape Frontier Wars. (These wars were also known as the 'Kaffir Wars' or 'Xhosa Wars' which were a series of nine wars (from 1779 to 1879) between the Xhosa Kingdom and European settlers in the Eastern Cape). The author served as a Cape Mounted Rifleman throughout the hostilities, and writes of the joys, the hardships, big game hunting, angling and the dangers of campaigning in an ever-troubled border region and of the day-to-day life of a colonial officer.

Lieutenant Colonel B G Lynn-Allen

Bulkeley Garbutt Lynn-Allen (b. 1899) served with the Welch Regiment (an archaic spelling of 'Welsh') and was an East African ornithologist and sportsman.

Shot-Gun And Sunlight: The Game Birds Of East Africa by Lieutenant Colonel B G Lynn-Allen (1951) is about all the game birds of East Africa described from a sportman's point of view.

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Page Updated: Nov 2021