Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Africa New Karamojo Bell Book

Bell likely killed just as much game with his .256 bores as he did with his .275 bores.
but people have a lock-on obsession with his Rigby whenever his name comes up.

His long barrelled George Gibbs of Bristol .256 was his dedicated do-all workhorse plains game gun.
and the thing got a regular solid workout...at times when he didn't see elephant for periods sometimes
a month, his Gibbs was still working hard collecting large piles of hides for trading currency.- Suffice to say,
he killed more plains game in his career than he did DG.

Then for a good time, his Daniel Frazer .256 carbine was his DG rifle.

" That Gibbs certainly had a full time job to do....It was a round-the-clock rifle"

-Karamojo Safari -(page 12 of prologue)

Bell states he acquired his Gibbs .256 and Rigby .275 at about the same time, the Rigby being the first rifle
he had specially made for himself, with the purchase of the Dan Frazer .256 some time after those. -Prior to
all that, he had invested in two Daniel Frazer sporterised Lee .303s used for everything from DG to PG on his
first ivory safari.

- He did peruse the fancy literature of the bespoke English makers promoting their big calibre rifles before
deciding on the .303 pair, but based his rifle & calibre decision on past field experience hunting lion for British Rail
with a Lee Metford .303 and solids and his Boer War .303 experience, rather than such sales material.

Yes, I am one of the 275 Rigby Bell lovers. Guilty as charged. I have always loved the sporter Mauser's. Especially the 275 and 416 Rigbys.I also like very much the M96 6.5x55Swede. Something about those old Mauser advertisements of the day always got to me. Well,as close as I will ever get is finding a nice post war 7x57 and maybe a surplus Carl Gustav sporter conversion. And yes, his 256 was always kept busy. He used a 318 for awhile too I believe.

Well love is often blind and then you hear of people falling in love.

Blind and then stumbling and falling, kind of explains things doesn't it?...

no worries, knock yourself out!

One of the things about Bell that I've always found appealing, to me anyway, was his use of multiple calibers. Although most people want to connect him and the 7X57, and perhaps rightfully so, he used other cartridges with pretty good results also. Maybe not all on elephant, but his shooting wasn't just limited to hunting ivory, as he had quite a crew of hungry mouths to feed. The 303, 256, 318, 275 Rigby, as well as a few more that he mentioned, were all used by him. But, he referred to the 275, and the German ammo, as the one who never let him down. He was one man I'd loved to have talked with.

Re: Bell, the .256 and the .275:

"Speaking personally, my greatest successes have been obtained with the 7 mm. Rigby-Mauser or .276 [sic], with the old round-nosed solid, weighing, I believe, 200 grs. It seemed to show a remarkable aptitude for finding the brain of an elephant. This holding of a true course I think is due to the moderate velocity, 2,300 ft., and to the fact that the proportion of diameter to length of length of bullet seems to be the ideal combination. For when you come below .276 to .256 or 6.5 mm., I found a bending of the bullet took place when fired into heavy bones.

Then again, the the ballistics of the .275 [sic] cartridge, as loaded in Germany at any rate, are such as to make for the very greatest reliability. In spite of the pressures being high, the cartridge construction is so excellent that trouble from blowbacks and split cases and loose caps in the mechanism are entirely obviated. Why the caps should be so reliable in this particular cartridge I have never understood. But the fact remains that, although I have used almost every kind of rifle, the only one which never let me down was a .276 [sic] with German (D.W.M.) ammunition. I never had one single hang-fire even. Nor a stuck case, nor a split one, more a blowback, nor a miss-fire. All of these I had with other rifles.

...

I have never heard any explanation of the undoubted fact that our British ammunition manufacturers cannot even yet produce a reliable rifle cartridge head, anvil and cap, other than that of the service .303. On my last shoot in Africa two years ago, when W. and I went up the Bahr Amuck, the very first time he fired at an elephant he had a miss-fire and I had identically the same thing. We were using .318's with English made cartridges. Then on the same shoot I nearly had my head blown off and my thumb severely bruised by an English loaded .256. There was no miss-fire there. The cartridge appeared to me almost to detonate."

Wanderings of an Elephant Hunter, Chapter 15, Safari Press, 1989.

Elsewhere in his writings, Bell repeatedly expresses his admiration for D.W.M ammunition; caps, powder and bullets. He does not admire "English made" ammunition at all, other than military ball, as noted above, for the .303.

I know that I had some old military Mausers made by Deutsche Waffen und Munitionsfrabiken in Berlin that were pretty darn well made. I would strongly suspect that their ammo would have been no different.

"For years after that I continued to use the -275 and the -256 in all kinds of country
and for all kinds of game." - W.O.A.E.H. (page 6.)

"I was using at that time a very light and sweet- working Mann.-Sch. carbine, -256 bore and weighing only 5\ lb.
With this tiny and beautiful little weapon I had extraordinary luck, and I should have continued to use it in preference
to my other rifles had not its Austrian ammunition developed the serious fault of splitting at the neck. After that discovery
I reverted to my well-tried and always trusty 7 mm. Mauser." - W.O.A.E.H. (page 94.)







the following from -Karamojo Safari- (page 14-19 of prologue)

" As prosperity descended upon me, resulting from my hunting, I began to arm myself with rifles of various calibers
embodying my own fancies and requirements. Among these there arrived for me in Central Africa, after many months
of travel and many difficulties, a very refined little Mannlicher-Schonauer .256 with a goodly store of solids. I meant to
try it out as an elephant gun. It weighed five pounds empty by dint of some machining-away of the action and cutting-
down of the barrel. -Of all the weapons I have owned, this was certainly the most beautiful. The stocking, bluing, and
sighting had been done by an artist—Fraser of Edinburgh..... I shall never forget the unpacking of that .256 in the wilds
of the African bush, the ripping open of that tin- lined case that looked so incredibly small. There, wrapped in grease-
proof paper, lay the oily little rascal. Out in the hot sun it was but a moment's work to strip off the mercurial grease Fraser
used for protecting his steelwork on tropical voyages. What a thrill just to handle it. As it happened, we were in the midst
of good elephant bush..."

"...Examining each case, as I always did, I filled my belt. Finding no faulty cases, I strode joyfully off into the bush,twirling
around that dandy little gun. -Well, luck was in and we came on a party very intent on working a wild orchard of heavily
laden trees. -Under-foot all grass had been burned off and was now replaced with numbers of wild, sweet-smelling flowers.
-Their scent, mingled with elephant dung, urine, and the buzz of countless insects, seemed to make a quivering jelly of the
air, quite intox-icating to the hunter. -The elephant were rather scattered and on the move from tree to tree, so they did not
give the rifle the chance that a slumbering group all bunched together would have afforded. -Nevertheless that little .256
laid them low with a shot apiece— all brain shots. Was I delighted? -Here was the perfect rifle,strong enough for the heaviest
game and yet small enough for the tiniest antelope, or for shooting the heads off guinea fowl. -There was one survivor from
that first encounter.- The .256 and I legged it after him. In a surprisingly short run he brought us among another lot, also
somewhat scattered, and all listening intently to what the rather flustered new arrival had to tell them. -Whether he had not
much to say or whether they disbelieved what he told them, I don't know, but at any rate they were not alarmed enough to
take flight and only stood around listening from time to time and, occasionally, evacuating.- I had killed twelve good bull
elephant with one shot each in the brain from all angles except the stern quartering shot when a large bull elephant was seen
in open bush. -The ground was so clear that I actually sat down to take the shot forty paces distant from the animal—a most
exceptional thing to happen.- Usually there is something intervening and almost always the shooting is off-hand in Africa.
- I made absolutely certain of that grand bull and squeezed off. Click! A misfire!........For several years after this affair I stuck
firmly to the 7 millimeter for elephant. Always loaded with solids,....For some years I continued to use the five-shot 7 millimeter
Mauser with a ten-shot .303 as a sort of reserve."


" I had, besides my .275, a .303 with a ten-shot magazine—an excellent elephant rifle." -Karamojo Safari-(p.62)

"About ten per cent of bulls shot in the head received a second shot when using the .275, and this per-centage
was appreciably reduced when the .318 was used.- I put this down to the fact that the 250-grain bullet of the .318
held a truer course than the 170-grain bullet of the .275. - I know, too, that in the case of slanting shots from
behind where the bullet would have to traverse the im-mense neck muscles to reach the brain, the .318 long
250-grain bullet was more uniformly successful than the .275."

-Karamojo Safari- (p.242-243)

"Broadly speaking, the best bullet for killing elephant is one which combines a good weight (it will not be easily deflected),
long parallel sides (this will help it keep course), good sectional density (not too much diameter to length), and a good but
not excessive velocity. - In my opinion the 250-grain .318, although far from perfect, approaches most nearly the big game
hunter's ideal bullet, followed by the 7.9 mm. or 8 mm. Mauser."

- Karamojo Safari- (appendix p.291)


Some conclusions on Bells calibres:

> The .256, .275 and .303 were all competent reliable performers for various angles on the brain except for slanting shots from behind.
> The .256 may have likely remained his DG rifle of choice were it not for splitting necks in Austrian ammunition.
> The .303 was in some circumstances the preferred rifle over .256 and .275 due to superior function/reliability and capacity.
> Bell did form personal rifle/cal. preferences based on pragmatic reasoning, but which didn't necessarily mean all other
rifles/cals were inferior.

He simply chose to carry the smoother action .275 more often than the more agricultural .303...Several times when 10-shot
capacity would have been an advantage on herds, he happened to have instead his 5-shot .275 in hand... At other times he
was in two minds whether to take his .275 or .303

" I still had the .303 ten-shot rifle and wondered if I should require it this time".

-Karamojo Safari - (p.138)

" The morning found us up and about, fresh and eager for the hunt.- This time I carried the .303 ten-shot rifle and hope ran high.
Scarcely had we gone a couple of miles when we ran into elephant."

-Karamojo safari - (p.156)

"In my search for the ideal weapon for my purpose I had accumulated a number of quite good rifles. I had a double .400 by
Fraser of Edinburgh, a beautiful weapon but delicate. Then there was a .303 from the Army and Navy, a splendid gun with
which I had killed over two hundred elephant........Finally I decided on the three .303's..."

- Karamojo Safari- (p.203)

The high capacity .303 seems to have also been the preferred choice when facing the perils of 2 legged dangerous game:

"With some twenty-five Sniders and a very limited stock of ammunition, together with my half dozen personal rifles,...
...They were scared stiff and so was I, but I did not show it. Instead I seized my ten-shot .303 and a lot of ammunition"

- Karamojo Safari- (p.183)

" Nowhere else in Africa where I have hunted was the ivory so good as in Karamojo. -The average over hundreds of tusks came out at the astonishing
weight of 53 pounds per tusk. -And the quality was number one. -The average over two hundred and ten head of bull elephant killed in the Lado came
out at only 23 pounds per tusk, while Ubangi and Lake Chad gave an average of 27 pounds per tusk."

-Karamojo Safari- (p.258)


"That is a funny thing about ivory. -It is not what meets the eye that makes the weight; it is the hollows in the socket.-And so in this case it suddenly burst
on me that the weights were going to eclipse anything I had hitherto got in a single day.- Al though I had killed twelve in a day, the highest bag for a single
day had stood at 1,340 pounds. -Now as I entered the weights in the ivory book, it began to look as if the present lot of nine elephant with one tuskless one
was going to top the record lot. -And so it did. -The combined weights of the fifteen tusksplus the two stumps totaled 1,463 pounds fresh weights. -When,
months after, they were sold in London at Hale's auction rooms, they had only lost seven pounds in drying and they realized the astonishing price of nine
hundred pounds......- In the whole of my hunting career I never overtopped this total of 1,463 pounds. -The nearest I came to it was when I killed nineteen
bulls in an afternoon in the Lado Enclave, but they totaled only 1,440 pounds on the scales in spite of the fact that they all had two teeth. -Two other bags of
fifteen each just fell short of 1,400 pounds."

-Karamojo Safari- (p.244)


"Now for a trail line-out of everything that had to be moved: three hundred and fifty-four tusks of an average weight of 53 pounds each from one hundred
and eighty head of elephant; time spent on the actual hunting, six months; average number of elephant per month of hunting time, thirty; total time of safari,
fourteen months; wage bill per month, one hundred and fifty pounds; for the whole safari, twenty-one hundred pounds; bonus toeach boy of three months'
wages, four hundred and fifty pounds; cost of stock and trade goods, say four hundred pounds; total expenditure, say three thousand pounds. -Against this
set the value of ivory, all first-rate stuff, salable on the spot to the Indian merchants at seven rupees per pound, say ten shillings per pound, equals nine thou-
sand pounds sterling. - After deducting something for drying out, shrinkage, and allowing for extras, the total profit came out at about six thousand pounds,
and we still had a full-power safari."

-Karamojo Safari - (p.282)


"At the time of which I write Mumias was a town of some importance. -It was the base for all trading expeditions to the Lake Rudolph basin, Turkana, Dabossa
and the Southern Abyssinia country. - In the first few years of the trade in ivory this commodity was obtained for the most trifling sums; for instance, a tusk
worth £50 or £60 could be bought for two or three shillings’ worth of beads or iron wire. -As time went on and more traders flocked to Karamojo to share in the
huge profits of the ivory trade, competition became keener. -Prices rose higher and higher. -Where once beads and iron wire sufficed to buy a tusk, now a cow
must be paid. - Traders were obliged to go further and further afield to find new territory until they came in violent contact with raiding parties of Abyssinians
away in the far North. - When most of the dead ivory in the country had been traded off the only remaining source was the yearly crop of tusks from the elephants
snared and killed by the native Karamojans. -For these comparatively few tusks competition became so keen and prices so high that there was no longer any profit
when as much as eight or ten cows had to be paid for a large tusk, and the cows bought down at the base for spot cash and at prices of from £2 to £5 each"

- W.O.A.E.H.- (p.21)


" That safari was one of my most successful. - We "shucka'd" or went down country, with over 14,000 lbs. of ivory -- all excellent stuff."

-W.O.A.E.H.- (p.77)

I saw over on Guns International, listed under BRNO rifles that Cabelas is trying to sell a 275 Rigby BRNO Mauser. $1500 or so. That's how I envision BEll's Rigby to look exactly like. Sorry, I am new here and don't know how to post GI webpage info.

Pre-war Rigbys in .275 bore, didn't have the sights,barrel,stock, or bolt handle like that frankenstein mauser you point out.

This is an actual Rigby .275 once owned by WDM Bell. He purchased six of them over the yrs, this particular one
ordered/sold in 1922-23. His last ivory safari was some yrs prior to that purchase.

The scope is a Lyman Alaskan 2.5x fitted at the request of PH Harry Selby, side-mount screws were already installed when the rifle
was obtained from Westley Richards, London. . If I understand correctly, the rifle ended up at WR as part of the WDM Bell estate.







The only elephant that I know of which that .275 has killed, was the one taken by 14 yr old Gail Selby, while guided by her father,
in northern Botswana....Heart-shot from 80yd, made it about 40yd before collapsing which is about ballpark. Bell writes that
heart-shot bulls would typically go 20-60 yds before going down.

That rifle has been used by Robert Ruark(who purchased it from WR), Harry Selby, Mark Selby and naturally Gail Selby, to take
elephant, buffalo and a host of plains game. Mark who was given it by Ruark, later moved the rifle onto Holland & Holland where
its whereabouts then became unknown. Most recent known owner is said to be a Mr.Mike Evans, who has also hunted with it in Africa.

I see on GI under Pre War Mauser Sporters there are a few much more like the above sample only one has a single trigger in 7x57 and a few others with double triggers. A few nice other ones in different calibers. All quite nice in my obvious untrained eye. And just out of my financial reach. I would have a fit if one of those rifles was lost in luggage hell going to Africa. And yes the BRNO sample is a "Frankenstein", but a beater that wouldn't mind a few bumps and scratches that inevitability happen in the course of a few safaris.

He was indeed a fearless young chap, globetrotting and travelling into remote areas as a teenager, with basically no support.
I too have speculated on his upbringing, with no parents and only older brothers and sisters in a large stately home.

Plainly he was unhappy at home, and attacking seniors with a cricket bat as a ten year old, and running away from schools constantly does point to something other than innocent wanderlust. But I can't say if he came from a strict or even violent household, equally possibly he may have been governed with a very light hand and he may have just got away with murder as a young man

His last 'elephant' rifle was a Springfield take-down in .318 Westley Richards with a ghost ring aperture sight. This rifle was bought for a return to Africa in 1939 by aeroplane, but WW2 came up and the trip was cancelled.

The famous take-down Rigby Mauser pictured above was bought for the motor vehicle trip with the Forbess in 1923 (take-down rifles, to English sportsmen anyway, at that time were marketed specifically for packing and carrying by vehicle, so it makes sense.)
As Starman pointed out above, Bell wrote there was no serious hunting down on that trip, and it could well be that the elephant shot by Gail Selby in the photograph was the only elephant that rifle has shot. We can never know - unless he wrote more about that trip in this new book that is coming out.

Out of personal interest I would like to read more about what he wrote about red deer stalking in Scotland. I have his article about the neck shot, but he did write something more of it, I have seen the manuscript pages listed in an auction, from memory it was a description of the stalking season of 1928.

I just finished reading "Death in the Silent Places" by Capstick. It has a chapter on Bell. Did you all know that he served as a pilot in the English Air Corps during WWI and shot down a German fighter with one bullet when his gun jammed? He also shot down a French ally when that plane accidentally fired on him first.

Quite a character. Can you imagine what he would say about this country's snowflakes of today?

Yup, quite the man. They sure don't make 'em like him anymore. I honesty don't think he would give the snowflakes very much thought. He would have felt they don't merit the effort to be thought of. Would love to in my next life to maybe be fortunate enough to sit next to him in a pub or on a train and have a delightful chat about just about anything.

DaveO

Bell was mentioned in several military despatches and finished with the rank of Captain. His first military flying role was in Tanganyika.
His malaria was I understand contracted during his later war service in the Balkan region, which affected millions of servicemen.

Bell spent some yrs after the war recuperating from illness , before venturing back to Africa in 1921 for was to be his last dedicated
ivory safari conducted in west and central Africa, around the Niger and Bahr Aouck rivers.



I think those same type of spirited & driven individuals are still out there, but the world has changed, Africa and the world is no longer what it was then,
with the loss of natural habitat and animals numbers, along with all the red tape and regulation of todays regions, which btw the effects of which were
already creeping in on Bell...He avoided Sth Africa ,because he was already aware its animals stocks had been decimated by white Europeans. In other
parts with worthwhile elephant numbers, regulation already required a fee to be paid by ivory hunters to the colonial power, and only allowed a small
quota, additional fees were required if they wanted to take more elephant...but in other regions, Bell only had to negotiate(and trade) with the native
rulers of the lands he wanted hunting access to. Along with regulated areas came of course the associated corruption of colonial rep. staff and officials.

Also, I dont know how a 13 yr old boy today in a western 1st world country from an established family name , could just run away from home and school
to join the navy...whereas it was only in 1900, that UK raised the minimum legal age of boy miners working in horrendous underground coal-mines to 13.

His family were in part correct that Africa had already been shot out of elephant and thus discouraged him from wanting to hunt African
elephant. But he was aware of other regions without that problem, and disregarded their sweeping statement.


THROUGH THE SUDD OF THE GELO RIVER

"AT the time of which I write, about 1908, the wild countries flying around the western and south-western base of the Abyssinian plateau seemed to us
to present the most favour- able field of operations. And as the boundaries had not yet been delimited between Abyssinia and the Sudan on the one
hand and Abyssinia and Uganda on the other, we felt that there would be more scope for our activities in that region than elsewhere. The object was
elephant hunting.

In order to reach this country we were obliged to cross Abyssinia. -We took steamer to Djibuti on the Red Sea, ascending thence by railway to the then railhead,
Dirre Doua, and then by horse, camel and mule to Addis Abeba, the capital. Here, the only trouble we had was from our own legation.- Our representative regar-
ded every English traveller in the light of being a potential source of trouble to him personally, and was at little pains to conceal his thoughts. -Luckily, we had
been recommended financially to the bank, and this fact smoothed our path. Apparently, in these matters the main question is whether one is the possessor of a
few hundred pounds or not. If so, zeal in helping the traveller on is forthcoming ; but if not, every obstacle is put in the way of his ever making any progress.
In one of our colonies I was once asked bluntly by the Government representative if I had any money. Of course, the poor man was merely trying to do his duty ;
but before I could think of this I had replied, " Precious little." Throughout my stay in his province he regarded me with the gravest suspicion.

Along the route from Addis Abeba to Gore in the west we were much pestered for presents by the Abyssinian military governors.

We had been warned about this and were supplied with some auto- matic pistols. They invariably turned these down and tried to get our rifles, but as invariably
accepted the pistols. These gentry have to be reckoned with, as it is within their power to hold up the traveller by simply declaring the road to be dangerous."

-W.O.A.E.H-(page 78)

I don't think he ran away from school at 13 years old to join the Navy, rather his family arranged for him to go to sea on merchant vessels. He sailed on clipper ships, and passed through Tasmania and New Zealand.

Bell actually returned to England some time around 1910 and joined a flying school. In Africa he was inspired by news of a flying race, and came up with the idea of using a flying machine to spot elephant from the air. He wrote to his sisters and asked them to send him out a flying machine and fuel to run it. His family wrote back advising him that apparently flying an aeroplane required 'some tuition'. He came back and joined a flying school in order to learn, but there was hardly any flying done, they mostly just taxied around on the ground and he became disillusioned with it and went back to Africa. This foreshadowed his joining the RFC when the war broke out, and explains how he went straight into flying.

He once shot at a German plane, and his gun jammed after firing a single round. The Hun plane flew off into a cloud. Some people on the ground saw a plane crash that same day and his commanding officer wrote it up as an aerial victory over Bells objections.
He did shoot a French plane down though...it was a special version of a Spad, fitted out for high altitude flying in order to get a German reconnaissance plane. Bell and his friend Wynne-Eyton (who later went with him on his next African safari after the war) both mistook the French plane for the German reconnaissance plane and shot him down. The French pilot survived the crash, and was very pissed, started shooting at them with his pistol when they landed behind him, so they quickly took off again and pretended they didn't know what happened...
He doesn't mention it but he was the first to score an aerial victory in his Squadron, and finished as a Captain and a Flight Commander, with the Military Cross and bar.

He wrote that he had a reoccurrence of his old African illnesses to get over at the end of the war, (no doubt meaning malaria) implying this was the cause of his medical discharge, but in fact his discharge certificate states that he was discharged for 'nervous asthma', which must be interpreted as battle fatigue. It brings the realities of that war a bit closer to home when you realise that this confident youngster who travelled the world; this young man who explored unknown Africa amongst cannibal tribes; who shot a thousand elephant with a deer rifle, was brought to a state where he couldn't sit in an aeroplane without hyperventilating from fear.