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About John Henry Patterson
Lieutenant-Colonel John Henry Patterson was a British Army officer, hunter, and author best known for his book The Man-eaters of Tsavo (1907), which details Patterson's experiences during the construction of a railway bridge over the Tsavo River in the East Africa Protectorate from 1898 to 1899. The book went on to inspire three films: Bwana Devil (1952), Killers of Kilimanjaro (1959), and The Ghost and the Darkness (1996). During the First World War, Patterson served as the commander of the British Army's Jewish Legion, which has been described as the first precursor to the Israel Defense Forces.
Biography from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. Photo via Wikimedia Commons.
Authors like John Henry Patterson
Sources: book lists and dates from Wikidata and Open Library, ratings from Open Library readers, free texts from Project Gutenberg. Last updated September 2026.