Memories of a Game-Ranger by Harry Wolhuter

Memories of a Game-Ranger (Sixth Edition, Signed by the Author in 1960)

The Celebrated Memoir of an Early Kruger National Park Ranger, Signed by Harry Wolhuter

Bibliographic Specifications

• Title: Memories of a Game-Ranger
• Author: Harry Wolhuter
• Publisher: The Wild Life Protection Society of South Africa
• Publication Date: 1958
• ISBN: None Issued (Pre-ISBN Era)
• Edition Details: Sixth Edition, 1958. Signed by the author, dated 1960, beneath the frontispiece portrait.
• Binding: Publisher's green cloth boards, gilt title and lion vignette to the front board, gilt title, author and antelope head to the spine.
• Physical Format: Octavo, illustrated with line drawings in the text and an author portrait frontispiece. Title page with a drawing by Mrs Stevenson-Hamilton.
• Language: English

Official Condition Report

• The Book: Good (G)
• Exterior / Boards: The green cloth boards are clean and fairly bright, with crisp gilt lettering and pictorial blocking. The back board carries a darker patch or slight mark and a few small specks. There is slight fraying at the head and tail of the spine and some bumping to the corners. The edges of the text block are toned.
• Interior: The binding appears tight. There is light foxing and brown spotting to the page before the edition page, concentrated at the top. The pages are toned, with a slightly rippled fore-edge. The sampled text pages are clean, with line illustrations, and the frontispiece portrait of the author is present.
• Provenance: Signed by the author, Harry Wolhuter, in blue ink beneath the frontispiece portrait and dated 1960. A second blue-ink inscription in Afrikaans, dated 18/9/1960, appears on another page, reading approximately: "Van Oupa Coetzee aan Willie".
• The Dust Jacket: Not Present

Synopsis & Historical Value

Memories of a Game-Ranger is the personal account of Harry Wolhuter, one of the first game rangers in South Africa's Kruger National Park. It recalls the park's early years, when the lowveld was still a wild, trackless and little-known country.

The memoir tells of lion hunting, wildlife encounters, dogs, horses and the early days of the game reserve. Its best-known episode is the 1903 lion attack, in which Wolhuter was dislodged from his horse by two lions. His knife and the skin of the lion he killed are displayed in the Stevenson-Hamilton Library at Skukuza.

This is the Sixth Edition, published in 1958 by the Wild Life Protection Society of South Africa and illustrated by C. T. Astley-Maberly. Signed by the author in 1960, it is a desirable copy for collectors of Kruger Park history, Africana and early conservation literature.

Author Profile: Harry Wolhuter

Harry Wolhuter was a legendary ranger in the Kruger National Park, with a career of more than four decades. Before becoming a ranger he rode with Steinaecker's Horse during the Anglo-Boer War. He died in 1964.

His account of those years, Memories of a Game-Ranger, remains the best-known first-hand record of the early days of the park.