Hesketh Hesketh - Prichard Major Hesketh Vernon Hesketh - Prichard , DSO , MC , FRGS , FZS ( 17 November 1876 – 14 June 1922 ) was an explorer , adventurer , big - game hunter and marksman who made a significant contribution to sniping practice within the British Army during the First World War . Concerned not only with improving the quality of marksmanship , the measures he introduced to counter the threat of German snipers were credited by a contemporary with saving the lives of over 3 , 500 Allied soldiers . During his lifetime , he also explored territory never seen before by white man , played cricket at first - class level , including on overseas tours , wrote short stories and novels ( one of which was turned into a Douglas Fairbanks film ) and was a successful newspaper correspondent and travel writer . His many activities brought him into the highest social and professional circles . Like other turn of the century hunters such as Teddy Roosevelt , he was an active campaigner for animal welfare and succeeded in seeing legal measures introduced for their protection . Early life . Hesketh - Prichard was born an only child on 17 November 1876 in Jhansi , in the state of Uttar Pradesh , India . His father Hesketh Brodrick Prichard , an officer in the King ' s Own Scottish Borderers , died from typhoid six weeks before he was born , leading him to be raised alone by his mother Kate O ' Brien Ryall Prichard . She herself had come from a military family , her father being Major - General Browne William Ryall . Hesketh - Prichard and his mother returned to Great Britain soon after , and lived for a while at her parents ' house , before moving to St Helier on Jersey for several years . His nickname was " Hex " , which he would bear throughout his life . They returned to the mainland that the boy might be educated at a prep school in Rugby . In 1887 he won a scholarship to Fettes College , Edinburgh ; his entrance paper was an essay on " Summer Sports " . He excelled at sports there , particularly cricket , at which the school magazine described him as " the best bowler we have had for a long time " . He was invited to play for Scotland against South Africa , but declined as he would have been unable to play against Fette ' s rival Loretto School . After school , he studied law privately in Horsham , West Sussex . He passed the preliminary exam , though he would never practice as a solicitor . Writing and exploration . First publications . He wrote his first story " Tammer ' s Duel " in the summer of 1896 , which his mother helped him refine , and was sold soon after to " Pall Mall Magazine " for a guinea . That year he abandoned a career in law and spent the summer travelling around southern Europe and North Africa . He spent the sea - time on the trip writing or planning plots . When back in London , he and his mother wrote together under the pseudonyms " H . Heron " and " E . Heron " , and saw publication in several journals , including " Cornhill Magazine " . Hesketh - Prichard ' s circle of literary friends widened and he became acquainted with the likes of Arthur Conan Doyle and J . M . Barrie . In 1897 Barrie introduced him to the press baron Cyril Arthur Pearson , who suggested he write a series of ghost stories for his monthly " Pearson ' s Magazine " . Hesketh - Prichard and his mother created a series of stories around the character " Flaxman Low " ' , the first psychic detective of fiction , though they were disconcerted to find the tales promoted by Pearson as " real " . The collected work was published as " The Experiences of Flaxman Low " in 1899 . In 1897 , he and his mother worked on the plot of " A Modern Mercenary " , the stories of Captain Rallywood , a dashing diplomat in Germany . It was published by Smith and Elder the following year . He travelled to South America in February 1898 , seeing the construction work for the Panama Canal , but returned after developing malaria while in the Caribbean . Commissioned trips . In 1899 Pearson chose Hesketh - Prichard to explore and report on the relatively unknown republic of Haiti , wanting something dramatic with which to launch his forthcoming " Daily Express " . His mother accompanied him as far as Jamaica ; in later years she would often travel with him to remote destinations in a time when it was uncommon for a woman of her age to do so . Hesketh - Prichard travelled extensively into the uncharted interior of Haiti , narrowly avoiding death on one occasion when someone tried to poison him . No white man was believed to have crossed the island since 1803 , and his trip provided the first written description of some of the secret practices of " vaudoux " ( voodoo ) . He later wrote a vivid account of his travels in the popular book " Where Black Rules White : A Journey Across and About Hayti " . Pearson welcomed his reports , and on his return immediately commissioned him to travel to Patagonia to investigate dramatic rumours of a hairy beast roaming the land . The animal was conjectured by Natural History Museum director Ray Lankester to be a living example of the long - extinct giant ground sloth . Hesketh - Prichard ' s talent for descriptive narration enthralled the readers of the " Daily Express " . He explored the area surrounding Lake Argentino , finding one of its feeder lakes , naming it Lake Pearson after his patron , and their connecting river Caterina after his mother . Lake Pearson was subsequently renamed Lake Anita , but the Río Caterina , known for its salmon , retains the name Hesketh - Prichard gave it . The surrounding area is now part of Los Glaciares National Park . Although he found no traces of the creature after a year overseas and of travel , he did provide compelling descriptions of unknown areas of the country , its fauna and inhabitants . He acquired the pelt of an unknown subspecies of puma , naming it " Felis concolor pearsoni " . ( The puma is now considered to be a variety of the southern South American cougar " Puma concolor concolor " . ) The grass species " Poa prichardii " was named after Hesketh - Prichard after he brought back a specimen . He compiled the story of his travels in the well - received " Through the Heart of Patagonia " . In 2000 , on the hundredth anniversary of both Hesketh - Prichard ' s trip and the newspaper ' s founding , the " Daily Express " despatched his great - grandson Charlie Jacoby to retrace his footsteps . Labrador . Hesketh - Prichard first visited Atlantic Canada in August 1903 , travelling up the coasts of Labrador and Newfoundland , and donating the heads of stags he had shot to the Newfoundland Exhibition then in London . He returned in October 1904 , this time with his mother , and the cricketer Teddy Wynyard . His most ambitious trip to the region was however in July 1910 , when he undertook to explore the interior of Labrador , saying " it seemed to us a pity that such a " terra incognita " should continue to exist under the British flag " . This same territory had claimed the life of writer Leonidas Hubbard a few years earlier . He described his journey up the Fraser River to access Indian House Lake on George River in the popular " Through Trackless Labrador " in 1911 . His reputation was such that former president Theodore Roosevelt , a fellow writer , explorer and hunter , wrote to him , commending him on his latest book , which he described as the best that season , and asking to meet him . Further writing . In 1904 , the mother - and - son writing team produced " The Chronicles of Don Q . " , a collection of short stories featuring the fictional rogue Don Quebranta Huesos , a Spanish Robin Hood - like figure who was fierce to the evil rich but kind - hearted to the virtuous poor . A second collection , " The New Chronicles of Don Q . " followed in 1906 . The pair produced a full - length novel , " Don Q . ' s Love Story " , in 1909 . " Don Q . " was brought to the stage in 1921 when it was performed at the Apollo Theatre , London . In 1925 , the book was reworked as a Zorro vehicle by screenwriters Jack Cunningham and Lotta Woods ; the United Artists silent film " Don Q , Son of Zorro " was produced by Douglas Fairbanks , who also starred as its lead character . The " New York Times " rated the film one of its top ten movies of the year . In 1913 , writing on his own , Hesketh - Prichard created the crime - fighting figure " November Joe " , a hunter and backwoodsman from the Canadian wilderness . It was broadcast as a radio play by the BBC on 23 September 1970 . Despite his reputation as a hunter , he campaigned to end the clubbing of Grey Seals around the coast . Aided by his friend Charles Lyell MP , he was successful in seeing the " Grey Seals ( Protection ) Act " passed unopposed in 1914 , Britain ' s first legal protection for non - game mammals . His article " Slaughtered for Fashion " in the March 1914 " Pearson ' s Magazine " argued to protect birds from slaughter for their plumage for millinery . Cricket . Hesketh - Prichard was a talented cricketer , and played for a number of teams , including Hampshire , London County , and Marylebone Cricket Club . A right - arm fast bowler , he made his début in the first class game when he played for Hampshire against Somerset in the 1900 County Championship . He was not however a strong batsman , and would typically play in the tail of the batting order . He joined the short - lived London County in 1902 , where he was a teammate of W . G . Grace . In 1903 he played his first of several games for The Gentlemen v The Players at Lords . He would be selected for The Gentleman three years in succession . In 1904 , he joined the MCC , and took part in Lord Brackley ' s XI ' s tour of the West Indies in the 1904 / 5 season . In 1907 , he toured the United States with the MCC . A tall man , he was able to use his height and reach to his advantage when bowling . In a first - class career that lasted from 1900 to 1913 , he took 339 wickets for a total of 7 , 586 runs . A career best was 8 / 32 for Hampshire against Derbyshire in July 1905 . Military service . At the outbreak of the First World War , Hesketh - Prichard tried for a commission in the Black Watch and Guards , but both turned him down because of his age , then 37 . He was eventually successful obtaining a post as Assistant Press Officer at the War Office , and first sent to the front lines in France in February 1915 as an " eyewitness officer " in charge of war correspondent s . By this time , open warfare on the front had ceased , and had stagnated into the trench warfare that characterised much of the conflict . He witnessed there the victims of gas attack . Hesketh - Prichard was shocked to learn of the high attrition rate due to well - trained German sniper s . It was common for British regiments to lose five men a day to snipers ; he learned that one battalion lost eighteen in a single day . The German snipers could not be located , leaving them free to continue shooting from their place of concealment . He was also dismayed by the poor quality of marksmanship amongst the British troops . He set about improving the quality of marksmanship , calibrating and correcting the few telescopic sight s that the army already possessed . He borrowed more sights and hunting rifles from friends and famous hunters back home , and funded the acquisition of others from his own pocket , or donations he solicited . To investigate the quality of German armour plate , he retrieved a sample from a German trench . He discovered that their armour could only be penetrated by a heavy cartridge such as Jeffery 333 , while British plate could be easily defeated by a much smaller gun such as a Mauser . Innovations . He recognised German skill in constructing trench parapet s : by making use of an irregular top and face to the parapet , and constructing it from material of varying composition , the presence of a sniper or an observer poking his head up became much less conspicuous . In contrast , British trench practice had been to give a military - straight neat edge to the parapet top , making any movement or protrusion immediately obvious . An observer was vulnerable to an enemy sniper firing a bullet through his loophole , but Hesketh - Prichard devised a metal - armoured double loophole that would protect him . The front loophole was fixed , but the rear was housed in a metal shutter sliding in grooves . Only when the two loopholes were lined up — a one - to - twenty chance — could an enemy shoot between them . Another innovation was the use of a dummy head to find the location of an enemy sniper . The tempting target of a realistic papier - mâché head was raised above the parapet on a stick running in a groove on a fixed board . To increase the realism , a lit cigarette could be inserted into the dummy ' s mouth and be smoked by a soldier via a rubber tube . If the head was shot , it was dropped rapidly , simulating a casualty . The sniper ' s bullet would have made a hole in the front and back of the dummy ' s head . The head was then raised in the groove again , but lower than before by the vertical distance between the glasses of a trench periscope . If the lower glass of a periscope was placed before the front bullet hole , its upper glass would be at exactly the same height as the bullet had been . By looking through the rear hole in the head , through the front hole and up through the periscope , the soldier would be looking exactly along the line the bullet had taken , and so would be looking directly at the sniper , revealing his position . Training snipers . Hesketh - Prichard was eventually successful in gaining official support for his campaign , and in August 1915 was given permission to proceed with formalised sniper training . By November of that year , his reputation was such that he was in high demand from many units . In December he was ordered on General Allenby ' s request to the Third Army School of Instruction and was made a general staff officer with the rank of captain . He was Mentioned in Despatches on 1 January 1916 . In August 1916 , he founded the First Army School of Sniping in the village of Linghem , Pas - de - Calais . Starting with a first class of only six , in time he was able to lecture to large numbers of soldiers from different Allied nations , proudly proclaiming in a letter that his school was turning out snipers at three times the rate of any such other school in the world . In October of that year he was awarded the Military Cross , the citation of which read : " For conspicuous gallantry and devotion to duty . He has instructed snipers in the trenches on many occasions , and in most dangerous Circumstances , with great skill and determination . He has , directly and indirectly , inflicted enormous casualties on the enemy . " His friend George Gray , himself a champion shooter , told him that he had reduced sniping casualties from five a week per battalion to forty - four in three months in sixty battalions ; by his reckoning , this meant that Hesketh - Prichard had saved over 3 , 500 lives . He was promoted to major in November 1916 . By this time in the war , his contributions to sniping had been such that the former German superiority in the practice had now been reversed . Later war years . Hesketh - Prichard was taken ill with an undetermined infection in late 1917 and was granted leave . His health remained poor for the rest of his life , and he spent much of it convalescing . It was during this period of leave that he learned that he had been awarded the Distinguished Service Order , for his work with the First Army School of Sniping , Observation , and Scouting . For his wartime work with the Portuguese Expeditionary Corps , he was appointed a Commander of the Military Order of Avis . He continued to write and hunt when his health permitted him . In 1920 , he wrote his account of his war time activities in the critically acclaimed " " ( full - text available on Wikisource and as a PDF document ) , which is still referenced by modern authors on the subject . The following year he wrote " Sport in Wildest Britain " , in which he shared his experiences of bird shooting , particularly in the Outer Hebrides . Family life . In 1908 , he married Lady Elizabeth Grimston , the daughter of James Grimston , 3rd Earl of Verulam , whom he ' d met through friends . They had three children : Michael ( born 1909 ) , Diana ( 1912 ) and Alfgar ( 1916 ) . His son Alfgar Hesketh - Prichard was later recruited to the Special Operations Executive during the Second World War , where he became the first head of its Czech Section , training agents to conduct the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich . He died on service in Austria in December 1944 , for which he was posthumously awarded the MC . Later years . In July 1919 Hesketh - Prichard was elected Chairman of the Society of Authors , of which he had been a member for many years . Poor health forced him to resign in the following January . Hesketh - Prichard died from sepsis on 14 June 1922 , at the ancestral home of his wife at Gorhambury , Hertfordshire , England . His obituarists ascribed this to an obscure form of blood poisoning brought on by gassing in the trenches during his war service . However , all of his ailments — fatigue , heart – digestive – neurological disorders , appendicitis , cognitive problems , depression , anxiety — are recognised today as differential symptoms of malaria . Left untreated they sometimes lead to organ failure and death . His body was cremated and the ashes interred in the family vault at St Michael ' s Church , St Albans . His mother survived him for some years , dying in 1935 . His wife Elizabeth , later becoming Woman of the Bedchamber to Queen Mary , lived until 1975 . His biography was written two years after his death by his friend Eric Parker , who encapsulated his many accomplishments within its title : " Hesketh Prichard D . S . O . , M . C . : Explorer , Naturalist , Cricketer , Author , Soldier " .