Historical Highlights: John Henry Patterson

Today I'm going to tell the story of John Henry Patterson, the Israeli Army's unlikely Gentile father.

John Patterson was born in Forgney, Ireland, on November 10, 1867. He was raised by a Protestant father and a Catholic mother, and became a devout Protestant, which would later fuel his pro-Jewish sympathies. He joined the British army in 1884, and was sent to India, where he became an experienced tiger hunter, a skill which would come in handy later.

In 1898 he was sent to Africa to supervise the construction of a railway along the Tsavo River in modern day Kenya. While in Africa, Patterson's workers were regularly attacked by lions, so Patterson set out to hunt the lions (known as the "Tsavo Man-Eaters") down. After several attempts, he finally killed them, and was hailed as a hero by the native population. A few years later, the British colonial governor of Kenya made him a game warden.

In 1909, he went on safari with the nobleman Audley Blyth and his wife Ethel. During the safari, Audley committed suicide, and although Patterson was not involved, he was accused of killing Blyth to have an affair with Ethel. These untrue rumors would haunt him and his military career for several years afterward.

He served bravely during the Boer War, but won his real spurs in the Middle Eastern Campaign of World War One, where he found himself commanding a Legion of Jewish Volunteers, despite being a Gentile himself. During this time, he grew to respect his Jewish soldiers and their Zionist cause, and was angered by the prejudice they faced from his superiors, so much so that he threatened to resign in order to force the high command to treat them fairly. He succeeded, but the generals held a grudge against Patterson, and he was never promoted. All the same, his Jewish Legion later became the foundation for the Israeli Army.

After World War One, Patterson continued his support for Zionism, and supported the creation of a new Jewish Brigade to fight the Nazis, although he was too old by then to command it himself. His final request before his death on June 18, 1947, was to be buried in Israel, and the Israeli government granted his request decades later in 2014.

If any man can be said to have lived the British Empire, it was John Henry Patterson.