Memorials & Monuments
on the Isle of Wight
- Biography -
- George Henry R Hurst -

Name

George Henry R Hurst, son of Charles F and Agnes M Hurst, of Ryde.
 
Service details

Sergeant George Henry R Hurst, Thorneycroft's Mounted Infantry (South Africa 1899 - 1901)

Captain George Henry Hurst, M.C., East African Mounted Rifles, (East Africa, 1914 - 1919)

Date of Death :

1 October 1923

George Henry R Hurst attended The Isle of Wight College during the 1890s and he volunteered for service in South Africa between 1899 and 1901 - his name appears on the Ryde South Africa Roll of Honour.

George Henry Hurst was born in Cardiff in 1878, where his father was a bank official. The family moved to Lichfield, and later to the Isle of Wight, where they lived at 4 Belvedere St, Ryde (1901 Census). Charles F Hurst was a Bank manager by this time, and it appears that he was moved around the country in his work.

During the First World War, Hurst served in Africa with the East African Mounted Rifles. He was awarded the Military Cross for his services against the German forces there. Following the War, he took up residence in a disused farmhouse :

"[J.A.Hunter] a young Scotsman, camped in Ngorongoro Crater, as a guide and professional Hunter to two American clients. Whilst in the Crater, Hunter paid a visit to a dilapidated farmhouse on the hillwash of the Crater wall, between the wall itself and the Lerai Forest, and almost directly below the site of the present Crater and Wildlife lodges which stand on the Crater rim.

The neglected farm contained little but a pack of equally neglected Australian Kangaroo hounds. Their master, Captain G.H.R. (George) Hurst, had moved into Ngorongoro as a rancher soon after the First World War, hoping to persuade the Custodian of Enemy Property to let him buy a farm on the far side of the Crater, appropriated from its German owner.

His dream of living out his life in that wild and glorious arena was brought to a very tragic end, for his application for legal ownership was turned down on favour of Sir Charles Ross. Hurst, perhaps to alleviate his disappointment, set off on a hunting safari and was killed by an elephant, on the Tanganyika coast."

from http://www.ntz.info/gen/n00252.html

Hurst was actually killed while trying to photograph a charging elephant. He was noted for his wildlife photography. The Ngorongoro Crater is in present day Tanzania. At the time it was in German East Africa.