In 1898, two "Tsavo Ogres" appeared in Kenya, eating 135 workers in a year, and it was not until they were killed that the truth of cannibalism was discovered. What the hell is going on?
At the end of the 19th century, British colonies spread all over the world, calling themselves the "Empire of the Sun Never Sets", and Uganda in eastern Africa was also one of britain's many colonies. As a landlocked country in Africa, the region is rich in natural resources, especially copper, tin and other metals, in order to further use Uganda's various resources, the United Kingdom is ready to build a railway between Uganda and Kenya.
It is not an easy task to build a railway on the african land, the amount of work can be imagined, along the way through deserts, swamps, forests, etc., due to the destruction of wildlife habitat, the attack of wild animals often occurs. To this end, the British side recruited 35,000 employees, including thousands of Indians, to work together on the construction of the railway.
Indian workers are stationed in camps 13 km within a 13-kilometer radius of the Tsavo River, and for them, although the work is hard, they are satisfied with a small salary. They worked hard during the day, went to the tent at night and slept upside down, and the days were full and peaceful, but they didn't know that one night, a worker was mysteriously missing!
Two days later, another mysterious disappearance in the camp alarmed the person in charge, Lieutenant Colonel Patterson. In order to investigate the matter clearly, he led several soldiers to search the vicinity, and later found several remains not far from the river, as if they had been eaten by some large animal, if I guessed correctly, it should be a lion.
In fact, in Kenya, lions eat people often, and they are the kind of maneless male lions. Why don't these lions have manes? Lions in Kenya are often poached, and their manes are sold to Europe to be made into exquisite ornaments, and over time, the lions here seem to be protecting themselves and actively shed their manes.
According to Patterson's dictation, in 9 months, a total of 135 people were eaten by these two male lions, who were also known as the "Tsavo River Ogres", and for the safety of the workers, Patterson prepared to hunt and kill the male lions that ate people. On December 9, under Patterson's arrangement, the workers set a trap and deliberately used a donkey as bait to lure the lion to the bait.
After the lions came, gunshots rang out, and one of the lions fell to the ground in response, making up a few shots before dying, while the other lion escaped with injuries. The male lion who shot him was huge, three meters long, very strong. In order not to leave a safety hazard, Patterson continued to trap and finally successfully shot the second male lion a month later.
For a time, the news of Patterson's hunt for the "Tsavo River Ogre" caused a sensation, and he also became an international hero. Later, the fur of the two lions was peeled off by him to make a carpet, and more than twenty years later, a museum acquired the lion's skin and bones and made them into specimens.
So why do these two lions eat people? The truth behind it is heartbreaking. After Patterson hunted the lions, doctors performed an autopsy and concluded that the two lions suffered from serious oral diseases, could not catch prey normally, and could only eat some animal or human corpses, and in the long run, their "dependence" on humans deepened.
In addition to their oral diseases, the cause of lions eating people was also related to the outbreak of rinderpest in Africa at that time. At that time, there was rinderpest in many parts of Kenya, and after the onset of cattle, the mortality rate increased, and other animals had no choice, such as the large carnivorous lion, in order to fill their stomachs, they could only eat dead cattle. As the cattle number decreased, so did the lions' food source, so they aimed at people, especially the dead.
In addition, under the British colonies, Kenyan slaves were transported to other countries, and the slaves had no human rights to speak of, like livestock, and many slaves died on the road due to hunger or disease. Their bodies are not buried, but are casually left on the side of the road, where vultures and other predators come to grab them.
Especially when food is scarce, lions also join this rank and taste the sweetness, so the phenomenon of lions eating people will often occur. The Indians who were responsible for building the railway also had many deaths, most of them because of the water and soil, or suffered from malaria, and died in the mouth of lions. When the dead bodies are finished, they enter the camp and continue their search for new targets.
So did the two lions really eat 135 people? Many people questioned, and later scientists concluded after isotope measurements that the first lion ate 10.5 people, and the second lion ate 24.2 people, which is not as exaggerated as the 135 people recorded. Whatever the facts, the reasons behind lions eating people are worth pondering.
In nature, especially in the primeval jungles of Africa, lions can't eat people if they want to. When bloody capitalist colonization entered this land, countless black slaves and laborers died in this land, and they were thrown on the side of the road by the capitalists like garbage, and then they were targeted by lions. It can be seen from this that the evil capitalist colonial act was so unconscionable that it was finally judged by history!
