A WHITE RULER.

Hawera Star, Volume XLV, 6 October 1925, Page 6

A WHITE RULER.

OF 500,000 SAVAGE WARRIORS. MANY YEARS’ ADVENTURE. One of the most romantic figures in the present history of East Africa— Mr. John Boyes, the White King of Wa-Kikuyu—has just returned to England. It is 14 years since he was hast in this country. His adventures in the Dark Continent were then revealed for the first time —how for years he had liv'j among the savage and warlike trihys of Kenya, where at attained the kingship of Kikuyu, with 500,000 warriors at this command. Born in Hull on May 11, 1847, Mr. Boyes early ran away to sea. under the inspiration of Rider Haggard’s story, “Allan Quatermain,” and made his way to Africa, where lie travelled the route that the hero of the novel was supposed to have, taken to Lake Nainasha. Fought as Trooper. With the late Mr. Seious, the great game hunter, he took part as a trooper in the Matahele. war. When Mr. Boyes first went to the Kikuyu country only two white men had been there. The Government had sent a number of parties, hut all had been massacred. Mr. Boyes persuaded the natives it was impossible to kill him, and he made good use of some effervescing salts. The natives thought it was boiling water, and he told: them it was his custom to drink boiling water, because lie was “iron-lined.” A shining clock and a. photograph, which they thought was a great spirit boxed up, completed his conquest, and at length he became king of the tribes, whom hd united' in a sort of blood brotherhood.

Some of the chiefs with whom lie entered into brotherhood, he said, have passed away, while their sons drive about in £SOO motor cars. Karuri, whom Mr. Boyes met as a savage warrior chief, attained a position of importance under British administration. He had 70 wives when he died. His son, Katehukia, who has. taken his father’s (Kavuri’s) place as head oil one of the tribes, was saved from death by Mr Boyes in the early days of his connection with the Kikuyu. Returning home after a fierce battle with another tribe, Mr. Boyes was told that the young chief had been killed. He went hack, and found the man with a spear through his chest, hut still alive.