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Tsavo maneaters
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The Tsavo maneaters were a pair of notorious man-eating male lions responsible for the deaths of a number of construction workers on the Kenya-Uganda Railway, from March through December 1898.
arch 1898, during the building of the Kenya-Uganda Railway, Engr. Lt. Col. John Henry Patterson led the construction of a railway bridge over the Tsavo River in Kenya. During the construction period, many Indian railway workers were killed by two maneless male lions, which dragged men from their tents at night and devoured them.
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Encyclopedia
The Tsavo maneaters were a pair of notorious man-eating male lions responsible for the deaths of a number of construction workers on the Kenya-Uganda Railway, from March through December 1898.
History
In March 1898, during the building of the Kenya-Uganda Railway, Engr. Lt. Col. John Henry Patterson led the construction of a railway bridge over the Tsavo River in Kenya. During the construction period, many Indian railway workers were killed by two maneless male lions, which dragged men from their tents at night and devoured them. The workers built bomas (thorn fences) around their camp to keep the maneaters out; but the maneaters were able to crawl through. Patterson set traps and tried several times to ambush the lions at night from a tree. After repeated unsuccessful endeavors, he finally shot the first lion on 9 December, 1898. Three weeks later, the second beast was found and killed. By that point, the maneaters had supposedly killed 135 workers. According to Patterson's calculations, though, railway records only recorded 28 deaths, however Patterson later said in a speech of his account that 28 Indians were killed, as well as a large number of native Africans, so the total number is closer to 135. A number of these deaths were unrecorded locals.
Patterson writes in his account that he wounded the first lion with one bullet from a Martini-Enfield, double-barreled rifle, probably chambered in .450 caliber. This shot struck the lion in the hindquarters and it still escaped. Later, it returned at night and began stalking Patterson even as he attempted to hunt it. He shot it with a .303 Lee Enfield several times, tracked it the next morning, and found it dead. In all, he had shot it 5 times. The second lion was shot five times with a .303 Lee Enfield, and it still managed to get up and charge him in severely crippled condition, whereupon he shot it twice more with the Martini double-rifle, once in the chest, and once in the head, which killed it. He claims it died gnawing on a fallen tree branch, still attempting to reach him.
After two-and-a-half decades as Patterson's floor rugs, the lions' skins were sold to the Chicago Field Museum in 1924 for a sum of $5,000 US. The lions were then reconstructed and are now on permanent display along with the original skulls. The mounted lions are smaller than the monstrous measurements Patterson reported, whether because he exaggerated their size in the field or because they had been trimmed to serve as trophy rugs in Patterson’s home.
Patterson's accounts were published in his 1907 book The Man-Eaters of Tsavo.
Possible causes of "man-eating" behavior
Theories for the 'man-eating behavior' of lions have been thoroughly reviewed by Kerbis Peterhans and Gnoske (2001). Their discussions include the following:
- An outbreak of rinderpest disease had decimated the lions' usual prey, forcing them to find alternative food sources.
- The Tsavo lions may have been accustomed to finding dead humans at the Tsavo River crossing. Slave caravans bound for Zanzibar routinely crossed the river there
To date, there has been no evidence indicating that broken teeth "force the lions to take on easier, slower, and more fragile prey".
Popular culture
Patterson's book was the basis of the movies Bwana Devil (1952) and The Ghost and the Darkness (1996) ("The Ghost" and "The Darkness" were names given to the two man-eating lions).
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