John "Pondoro" Taylor - African Ivory Poacher:

Old mate /gunsmith Rod introduced me to Ponduro Taylor in a comment added to the recent post about DUM DUM bullets and the sometimes laughable archaic English 'sporting rules' of life..

Well I Googled the man - who it seems was Dublin born & Irish (not American, Rod) and he seems to have been a character and the last of the African 'Ivory Hunters'.

 - 'Pondoro' shot a lot of elephant for commercial ivory harvesting and admits that many of them (and rhinos) - were poached and illegally taken.

John Howard 'Pondoro' Taylor 1904-1969.

So .. according to the record anyway - self confessed ivory poacher, professional hunter and alleged homosexual - Taylor was also a very good writer with an extensive knowledge and love of traditional English large bore Double Rifles - and other dangerous game large caliber Mauser bolt-actions. - For very good reasons:

"The lions vitality and tenacity-to-life is incredible. There is an authentic case of a party of men putting no less than 17 bullets from modern high power rifles into a lion before they succeeded in killing him. I've seen a lion come on for 8 or 10 paces with a gaping hole where his heart should have been."

He wrote half-a-dozen books himself - and others wrote about him. I have only found one book so far for my Kindle, - 'African Rifles And Cartridges' (1948) and I'm enjoying it's experience-based assessments of what worked and what failed at critical moments. - He spins a good tale.

Yes I know that I deride the classic pistol 'big bores' and the magnums as "fabled" stoppers while personally preferring the tighter bores in civilian social use .. But if I were expecting to face tigers, lions, or enraged elephants while on foot in the warmer nations - I too would select a BIG BORE of some kind to help keep those teeth and tusks out of my face .. possibly even a rocket grenade launcher !

He is also much appreciated by many shooters for his development of ..

  The Taylor Knockout Scale:

TKOF=frac{m_{Bullet}cdot v_{Bullet}cdot d_{Bullet{7000} (Equation 1)

(is there an imputation in this table that if I were to fire a bullet from a .500 S&W into a brain .. it would be 42 times deader than if I'd used a .25 ACP ?)

“The type of weapon you prefer and in which you have most faith,is the best for you.” : Pondoro Taylor.

Pondoro Taylor was apparently chased-out of Nyasaland  (around 1957? - modern Malawi in Africa) for his activities of various types, - and found little in the way of a warm welcome or employment offered in London - where he died poor in 1969.

Marty K.