Man-eaters of Tsavo, The Great Cats

       Lions do not usually hunt men. Their normal diet is zebras, antelopes, ostriches, and other wild game of the grassland. However, occasionally an individual lion may become a man-eater. Man-eaters may be old lions that are no longer able to catch more agile game, or they may be lions that are just too lazy to hunt wandering herds. It seems that once a lion acquires a taste for human flesh he becomes a persistent man-eater. When this happens, the outlaw lion must be hunted and destroyed.      

Jinja railway station with a Uganda 
Railways diesel locamotive.

       While the British government was building the Uganda Railway in East Africa in 1898, two man-eating lions began attacking the work camps in the Tsavo area. All usual lion-hunting methods failed. The work camps were scattered along about eight miles of right-of-way and the lions raided a different camp each time. When traps were laid, the lions skirted them. When bait was staked out, the lions chose another site for their raids. Each camp was surrounded by a thick boma (thorn fence), but the lions were able somehow to break through or jump over the bomas whenever they wished. Every few nights another man was dragged from his bed by the lions.

       The workmen soon became so frightened that they went on strike, saying they had "come to work for the government, not to supply food for either lions or devils." Some of the more superstitious men really believed that the lions were devils. The few brave men who remained took elaborate precautions to keep out of the lions' grasp. They built platforms in trees, on roofs, on girders‚ any place that the lions could not reach. One man even built a three-story apartment on top of the water tank and rented bed space to his friends.

       At last it was decided that if the lions were interested only in eating men, a trap would have to be baited with men. A large two-room trap was built. Two men with guns were stationed in one of the rooms and the other room had a trap door that would swing shut when the lion entered. The men then were to shoot the beast. The plan would have worked, too, but when the lion entered the trap and the door shut, the men became badly frightened and fired wildly in all directions. They missed the lion completely, but they did manage to hit the cage bars and made an opening that allowed the lion to escape.

       The entire lion-hunting project was under the direction of Colonel J. H. Patterson, engineer in charge of the work crew. During the strike, hunting the lions was the fulltime occupation of the men who stayed. Colonel Patterson eventually killed both lions by lying in ambush and waiting for them to return to unfinished meals. Before the nine-month reign of terror ended with the death of the lions, they killed and ate 135 workers and injured many more! Warsham.

• The Lions of Tsavo. In 1924 following a public lecture in Chicago Natural History Museum, Colonel Patterson mentioned that he still had the Tsavo lion skins. President Stanley Field of the Museum bought the skins and gave them to the Museum, where they were mounted and have been exhibited ever since in Hall 22 (Carl E. Akeley Memorial Hall, African Mammals). 

The Man-Eating Lions of Tsavo by thebrainscoop