KILLED BY RHINOCEROS

Taranaki Daily News, 23 March 1935, Page 22 (Supplement)

KILLED BY RHINOCEROS

AFRICAN JUNGLE TRAGEDY. » Another Kenya tragedy has been revealed by the finding in the Nyeri district of the mutilated body of Mr. Heban Carpenter, a farm manager. He is presumed to have been killed by a rhinoceros. Mr. Carpenter, who migrated from Okehampton, Devon, was a friend of Mr. Theodore Powys, son of Mr. T. F. Powys, the novelist, whose mysterious death in Kenya in 1931 has never been solved. Mr. Powys succeeded Mr. Carpenter on Lady Eleanor Coles’ farm. The deceased man had gone riding.

As he failed to return a search was made next day. First his horse was found, and later his body, devoid of clothing. It was at first thought, as it had been supposed in Mr. Powy’s case, that Mr. Carpenter had been the victim of an outrage by Samburu warriors. But a closer examination, together with medical evidence, has disproved the murder theory.

The trail of a rhinoceros was found leading to a nearby forest, and a reconstruction of the tragedy tends to show that the horse shied, throwing his rider, who was then attacked by the rhinoceros, impaled on its horns and carried through the forest and across a river. The dash through the forest was marked by broken branches and littered clothing.