Humans in the Kruger National Park – Part 3
Last month’s blog told of the early establishment of the Sabie Game Reserve, the forerunner to the present day Kruger National Park. In 1902 Major James Stevenson-Hamilton was appointed the first head ranger of the reserve and wasted no time in recruiting a competent individual to assist in the necessary conservation work. This lead him to employ Harry Wolhuter as ranger who filled the position for the next 44 years!
Wolhuter became the thing of legend after he survived a lion attack in August 1904. Returning home from a routine patrol on the Olifants River, Wolhuter had intentions of camping along the Metsi-Metsi spruit for the night. With sunset looming and daylight fading, he rode ahead of his four camp hands and pack donkeys giving instructions to rendezvous at a particular waterhole a few miles ahead. Wolhuter’s dog, Bull, whom Wolhuter described as “a large rough-haired dog of no special breed, but of tried courage” accompanied him. Upon the onset of twilight, Wolhuter’s horse was suddenly and deliberately attacked by a pair of male lions. Noticing an indistinct form on his flank in the darkness along his path, a lion emerged swiftly preparing to spring. There was no time to lift his rifle and fire; instinctively he swung his horse around and dug in his spurs thus deflecting the lion’s pounce but unseating himself in the process. The second lion took little time in joining the fray and literally caught Wolhuter in its jaws before he hit the ground.
The lion had Wolhuter by the right shoulder and standing over his prone body began dragging him to the cover of bush. Wolhuter recalls quite matter-of-factly in his memoirs, Memories of a Game Ranger, that he “… was dragged along on my back, being held by the right shoulder, and as the lion was walking over me his claws would sometimes rip wounds in my arms. I was wearing a pair of spurs with strong leather straps and these acted as brakes, scoring deep furrows in the ground over which we travelled. When the brakes acted too efficiently the lion would give an inpatient jerk of his great head, which added excruciating pain to my shoulder, already deeply lacerated by the powerful teeth.”
A common accoutrement to a ranger’s toolset is a sheath knife, one of which Wolhuter had strapped to his belt on his right hip. Using his left hand, he reached behind his back and with three deft but powerful stabs struck the lion twice in the heart and once in the neck, his final thrust severing the jugular. Upon this, the lion dropped Wolhuter who regained his feet and, with vitriolic encouragement, sent the lion into the darkness.
In an attempt to secure his safety, Wolhuter climbed a nearby tree and for fear of swooning and falling out, fastened himself to its trunk with his handkerchief and neck cloth. (This tree has subsequently died but its remains have been cemented into a plinth and marked with a memorial plaque. It can be located on the S35 Lindanda road northeast of Tshokwane Picnic Site.) The second lion, who had taken off after the horse, soon returned and gave a few ham-fisted attempts at reaching Wolhuter in the tree. Bull, however, showed his mettle and with determined barking and cheeky nips to the lion’s heels, succeeded in convincing the lion that the required effort was too much for the prize and sulkily moved off to join his wounded companion. Thereupon Wolhuter’s camp hands arrived, helped him down and set off on the four miles to their camp. Once there, they made a litter for Wolhuter and the next day carried him to Komatipoort from where a painful train journey deposited him at Barberton Hospital.
Though Wolhuter’s convalescence was a lengthy one, he nonetheless recovered fully barring a permanent disability of not being able to raise his right arm above shoulder height. The lion skin and Wolhuter’s sheath knife are both on permanent display in the Stevenson-Hamilton Memorial Library in Skukuza and are definitely worth a visit.
Summer is back in the Lowveld and the Phalaborwa region of the Kruger has already received its first rains of the season. The bush has taken on a fresh green hue and in a short few weeks the summer transformation will be complete. Next month I’ll being giving the history lessons a break and will shift back to all things zoological. ‘Til then.
