In 1895, the British decided to construct a railway in East Africa that would link Uganda with the Indian Ocean at Kilindini Harbor. They came up with an idea to construct a permanent bridge along the Tsavo River to replace the temporary wooden trestle. The building site consisted of several camps spread over an 8-mile area, accommodating Indian laborers. In March 1898, Lieutenant-Colonel John Henry Patterson was commissioned from India to lead the project.
He arrived days before the killings and disappearances of construction workers began. On his arrival to Tsavo, he described the place as a dense growth of impenetrable jungle, with low stunted trees, thick undergrowth and thorn.
A few days later, two of his workers disappeared. Word spread that lions were the culprits, but he did not believe the reports until two weeks later, when one of his foremen was dragged screaming from his tent into the bush. The lions would attack and later vanish through the rough terrain.
It is said that at first the lions were not always successful in their efforts to carry off a victim, but as time went on they became strategic and would stop at nothing to have their prey. Their methods became uncanny and their man-stalking skills were so perfect that the workers firmly believed they were not real animals at all, but devils in lion shape.
Some of the native laborers were convinced that the lions were angry spirits of two departed native chiefs who were protesting against the railway construction being made through their country, thus halting progress.
The terror continued for months, bringing the construction of the railway to a standstill. Finally, in December 1898, Patterson came up with a plan. He put up the remains of a donkey as bait, climbed up a tree and waited. Soon enough, one of the big cats showed up to devour the bait. He fired a bullet and one of the lions was dead.
He again set a trap for the second lion, this time using livestock as bait. The second lion fell for the trap. Patterson shot it several times, but it still managed to escape wounded. He followed the blood trail for a few days and when he found it, he shot it again, this time leaving it dead.
The construction crew returned and finished the bridge in February 1899. The exact number of people killed by the lions is unclear. Patterson gave several figures, overall claiming that there were 135 victims. In 2011, scientists examined what the lions had been feeding on before their deaths and estimated that the two lions consumed about 35 people.
After 25 years as Patterson's floor rugs, the lions' skins were sold to the Chicago Field Museum in 1924 for $5,000. The skins arrived at the museum in very poor condition. The lions were reconstructed and are now on permanent display along with their skulls.
There is still the bigger question in everyone’s mind: why did they do it? Several theories have been suggested, from food scarcity to the possibility that the lions got a taste of human flesh after feeding on carcasses of railway workers who died of natural causes. One major factor still stands out: one of the lions suffered from a serious dental infection, preventing it from hunting typical game, making humans an easier target. The other lion may simply have been guilty by association.
Famous Works
- Patterson published a book about the events in 1907 called The Man-Eaters of Tsavo.
- Three movies were made about this story, the most recent being The Ghost and the Darkness, starring Val Kilmer and Michael Douglas.
