22 Facts About Percy Powell-Cotton

Major Percy Horace Gordon Powell-Cotton, FZS, FRGS, FRAI, JP was an English explorer and hunter.

Percy Powell-Cotton is most noted for the creation of the Powell-Cotton Museum in the grounds of his home, Quex Park in Birchington-on-Sea, Kent, England.

Percy Powell-Cotton made a large number of films including ethnographic, documentary and wildlife films.

Percy Powell-Cotton was born on 20 September 1866, in Garlinge, Margate, to Henry Horace Powell-Cotton and Matilda Christina.

Percy Powell-Cotton had two siblings: a sister, Ida and a brother, Gerald.

Aged fifteen, Percy Powell-Cotton helped his father modernise Quex House, before the family returned to live there.

Whilst living there, Percy Powell-Cotton began breeding chickens, hunting rabbits and photographing wildlife.

Percy Powell-Cotton kept meticulous records of these endeavours, a habit that would follow him into later life.

Percy Powell-Cotton joined the Militia Battalion of Northumberland Fusiliers in 1885, and attended the Hythe School of Musketry for training.

However, at the outbreak of World War I in July 1914, Percy Powell-Cotton offered himself up for military service.

Percy Powell-Cotton was turned away as, at 48, he was considered too old to serve.

In lieu of serving in the war, Percy Powell-Cotton offered his home, Quex House, to the Birchington Volunteer Aid Detachment to use as an Auxiliary Military Hospital.

Percy Powell-Cotton embarked on over 28 expeditions between 1887 and 1939, across Africa and Asia, gathering various zoological and ethnographic specimens.

In 1900, Percy Powell-Cotton met with Emperor Menelik II, who granted him permission to hunt across Ethiopia.

In November 1905, whilst on an expedition in Kenya, Percy Powell-Cotton married Hannah Brayton Slater in Nairobi Cathedral.

In 1907, still on his honeymoon expedition, Percy Powell-Cotton was badly mauled by a lion he had thought incapacitated by a precious shot.

Percy Powell-Cotton escaped relatively unharmed due to a rolled up copy of Punch magazine in his breast pocket protecting him from the majority of the lion's attacks.

The lion, the suit that Percy Powell-Cotton was wearing and the copy of Punch are now all on display at the Percy Powell-Cotton Museum.

Whilst on an expedition through India in 1896, Percy Powell-Cotton enlisted his brother Gerald to oversee the construction of the Powell Cotton Museum on the grounds of Quex House.

Whilst on his expeditions, Percy Powell-Cotton created a wide range of ethnographic documentary films about the peoples and animals of the countries he visited.

The wide range of animal specimens that Percy Powell-Cotton returned with from his travels have proved to be a valuable resource in taxonomic research, even in the present day.

Consequentially, Percy Powell-Cotton has several species named in honour of him.