Denys Finch Hatton

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Denys Finch Hatton.

Denys George Finch Hatton (born April 24, 1887 - † May 14, 1931 in Voi , Kenya ) was an English big game hunter in the former crown colony of British East Africa (now Kenya) and a lover of the Danish farmer and author Karen Blixen .

Childhood and youth

Finch Hatton (he insisted on the spelling of his surname without the hyphen) was born the second son and third child of Henry Stormont Finch-Hatton , 13th Earl of Winchilsea , and his wife Anne Coddrington . The father had invested money in Australian mines, lived in Australia for a few years, but Denys was raised by his mother in Haverholme , the family seat near the hamlet of Ewerby in Lincolnshire . He was mother's avowed favorite.

His father Henry Finch-Hatton (1852–1927)

Haverholme was sold to a US citizen in 1926 that the building brick by brick after the US translocate wanted. The stones reached the port of Liverpool when the buyer was killed in a train accident. No stone made it to the US, instead they were used to build more docks in the port. Today only a tower and an ornate balustrade of the original building can be seen.

In Eton College in Eton Denys was a popular student, but less so in the actual teaching, but rather in the cultural and sports activities at school. He was actively involved in cricket , golf and soccer, as well as singing, theater, drawing and storytelling. He graduated from Brasenose College in Oxford with extremely moderate success.

Life in africa

In his entire life, the tall, blond and handsome man successfully played the role of humorous and witty conversation partner. At 40 he was already bald, but this did not disturb the “cat-like elegance of the movement of the brilliant charmer” which many have described.

In 1911 he made his first trip to South Africa with relatives. As an uncle died and left him money, he traveled in the same year by British East Africa ( British East Africa , BEA) and bought near Eldoret a farm. He never managed this farm himself, but left that to a partner. He himself worked as a big game hunter who shuttled his whole life between British East Africa and England: In autumn and winter he lived in Africa, in spring and summer in England. Women seem to have been rare in his life, at least nothing is known of affairs.

During this time he also designed a house. It was built and later bought by Karen Blixen as her first house "Mbagathi". A dairy farm owned by Mama Ngina is now located in the building. In Out of Africa ( Out of Africa ), the film adaptation of Karen Blixen's life, Mbagathi was used as her farmhouse.

During the First World War , Finch Hatton worked as an adjutant for a general in British East Africa. Then he was transferred to Egypt, where he planned to get the license. A foot injury prevented the project. The long friendship with Kermit Roosevelt , son of the American President Teddy Roosevelt , also dates from this time .

In 1920 he left Africa for more than a year and sold his farm out of financial difficulties. In 1922 he returned with new money, which he transferred to the land development company Kiptiget Ltd. invested, back.

In 1925, Finch Hatton took up the professional big game safari across East Africa to make money. Among his many famous customers was the Prince of Wales twice (1928 and 1930). In articles and petitions, he advocated regulated big game hunting in Africa.

Liaison with Karen Blixen

Karen Blixen, 1913
Karen Blixen's apartment on the plantation (now a museum)

On April 5, 1918, Finch Hatton and Karen Blixen met at the Muthaiga Club in Nairobi . After his return from England an intense friendship began with her and with her husband, Baron Bror von Blixen-Finecke . After Karen Blixen separated from her husband, an intense love affair developed between her and Finch Hatton. Denys was very likely bisexual, in any case Blixen mentions homosexuality more often in her letters to her family. It wasn't until Finch Hatton's longtime friend Berkeley Cole died of "blackwater fever" ( malaria ) that he found more time for her. He doesn't seem to have had any serious intentions to marry.

During this time he was often on safari , i. H. big game hunting, etc. a. also with Bror. When Bror and Karen were divorced in 1925, Finch Hatton, who from 1922 lived in a cottage in the Muthaiga Club (which was common for farmers at the time), moved in with her in Mbogani, now the museum in the Karen district of Nairobi. Karen had miscarriages in 1923 and 1926.

Big game hunter and bush pilot

Edward, Prince of Wales, 1919
The Gipsy Moth - in the film Out of Africa

In 1928 the Prince of Wales , who later became King Edward VIII , came to East Africa to hunt big game for the first time. Finch Hatton ran his safari. In November Blixen had the prince in her house (Mbogani) as a guest and also invited Bror von Blixen-Finecke, who was living in Tanganyika at the time and who accompanied the prince on safari as a hunter. The hunting party met on November 17th in Arusha (Tanganyika), where a city festival was held in honor of the prince.

In 1929 Finch Hatton took flying lessons and in the summer of 1930 bought a Gypsy Moth in England , a small airplane that was widely used at the time. After brushing the treetops on a flight on his brother Toby's farm and having to repair the plane, he shipped it to British East Africa. He flew a lot here, taking Karen Blixen and other settler friends with him, including the famous aviation pioneer Beryl Markham , with whom he is said to have another liaison. The friendship with Blixen was increasingly strained by their different life plans, and a final separation was in sight.

In May 1931 he flew to his holiday home on the coast of Mombasa, where he had also been with Blixen. On the return flight he landed in Voi , which is now an important stop on the Nairobi - Mombasa route and in the Tsavo National Park. Together with his Somali helper Hamisi, he looked for elephants from the air. On May 14, 1931 he started again with Hamisi on a reconnaissance flight, which was his last. The engine failed and both died in the crash.

Finch Hatton's body was turned over to Karen Blixen, despite her estrangement. According to his wishes, she buried him with his friends in the Ngong Mountains , where she could look from her farmhouse.

Denys Finch Hatton's tomb is located on the Ngong Hills near Nairobi (GPS coordinates: -1.413419, 36.662500).

Memories of Finch Hatton

The plaque on the grave
  • Today you can visit the grave of Denys Finch Hatton in the Ngong Mountains. The obelisk that Deny's brother Toby had erected carries a (renewed) bronze plate with a sequence from a favorite poem by Denys, “ The Rime of the Ancient Mariner ”, by Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834): “He prayeth well, who loveth well / Both man and bird and beast ".
  • In what is now the museum in Rungstedlund , Denmark , the former home of Karen Blixen, Denys Finch Hatton's favorite chair made of dark wicker and the RCA Victor gramophone that Denys gave to Karen Blixen in the 1920s are in the green room. They loved listening to Mozart on it.
  • In the Karen Blixen Museum in Nairobi , the former “Mbogani” farmhouse of Karen Blixen, you can also find furniture that Denys had made, such as the bookshelves and the rifle rack. You can also see the lantern Karen always hung out to announce to Denys that she was home. The gramophone is copied.
  • Deny's brother Guy had this plaque installed in the church of Ewerby : "Erected by his brother in proud and ever loving memory of Denys George Finch Hatton, 2nd son of the 13th Earl of Winchilsea and Nottingham, born 24th April 1887, killed flying in Kenya, 14th May 1931. "
  • A luxury safari camp in Tsavo West, not far from the crash site, now bears his name.
  • In the film Out of Africa ( Out of Africa ), he was by Robert Redford portrayed.
  • The fashion brand "Fynch-Hatton" is dedicated to him.

literature

  • Errol Trzebinski: Silence will speak. A study of the life of Denys Finch Hatton and his relationship with Karen Blixen , Mandarin, London 1993, ISBN 0-7493-1568-7
  • Sara Wheeler : Too Close to the Sun. The life and times of Denys Finch Hatton , Vintage Books, London 2007, ISBN 978-0-09-945027-6

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