More on Big Ivory

Having read with great interest Gregor Woods’s ivory saga involving Harry Manners and Wally Johnson (May, June & July editions) I look forward to reading more.

That Harry embellished the narrative to make a better story does not surprise me, as in my experience, the hunting fraternity does tend to attract many ‘Walter Mitty’ types who seem able to fashion remarkable tales based on the flimsiest of experiences. Some old hands may also fall into the category believing that “the older I get, the better I used to be” as famously claimed by that great golfer, Lee Trevino. With all the evidence of a remarkable hunting life at hand, putting a little gilt on the gingerbread is excusable in my opinion.

During the mid-1950s, as a youngster in Umtali, Rhodesia, I met Wally Johnson and saw him on many occasions when, between safaris in Mozambique, he stayed with friends of mine living at the end of our street. His four-square figure driving an open Jeep around the neighbourhood certainly aroused my interest in hunting as a career.