During his life Richard Meinertzhagen, a soldier, spy and naturalist, was admired by Winston Churchill and TE Lawrence (of Arabia), hailed as one of Britain's greatest ornithologists and even inspired James Bond.
In death, however, Meinertzhagen's reputation took a spectacular battering. Today, he is most likely to be described as a fraud, a thief and a murderer.
Rejecting employment with the family banking business in favour of the military, Meinertzhagen proved himself an able and ruthless army officer in British East Africa (now Kenya).
He crushed one native revolt in 1905 by shooting the leader of the uprising while actually shaking his hand as they met to negotiate.
According to his diaries. he was the architect of the famous Haversack Ruse" of World War I, in which a bag containing false British battle plans was allowed to fall into enemy hands.
His conquests as a naturalist include the discovery of the giant forest hog and Afghan snowfinch.
He wrote a seminal book on Arabian birds and amassed a globally important collection of 25,000 bird specimens.
However, in the 1990s it was discovered that Meinertzhagen had stolen his finest specimens from other collections and forged his field notes. Birds of Arabia turned out to be based on another ornithologist's unpublished work. And he probably had nothing to do vith the Haversack Ruse, ither - if it happened at all.
his field notes. Birds of Arabia turned out to be based on another ornithologist's unpublished work. And he probably had nothing to do with the Haversack Ruse, either - if it happened at all.
Modern birders have a word for people who fabricate records. Were Meinertzhagen alive today, though, it would take a brave soul to call him a 'stringer' to his face.
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Main image: www.phthiraptera.org, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons