The Man-Eaters of Tsavo

📖 The Scoop

The historic true account of how two man-eating lions wreaked havoc amongst the workers on the Tsavo railway bridge project in the present- day Kenya. The basis of the film The Ghost and the Darkness (1996), starring Val Kilmer.

In 1898, the British East Africa Company commissioned Col. John H. Patterson to oversee the construction of a railway bridge over the Tsavo River in present-day Kenya. Almost immediately after his arrival, lion attacks started to take place on the workers, with the lions dragging men out of their tents at night and feeding on their victims. Despite taking various precautionary measures to curb the attacks, the carnage escalated dramatically, and eventually the bridge construction stopped due to a mass exodus of the workers. The superstitious workers became increasingly hostile and many of them were certain that the lions were evil spirits who came to punish the bridge builders.

With his reputation, livelihood and personal safety at stake, Patterson realized that he had to confront this crisis in the only way he knew how - hunt the man-eaters down and kill them.

Genre: Biography & Autobiography / Adventurers & Explorers (fancy, right?)