He gained considerable knowledge about the conflicts between the Zulus and British in South Africa as a child as he accompanied his father, an amateur historian himself, as he interviewed Zulus in the local community to obtain their accounts of the conflict, some of whose forebears had fought in those wars.
He was a fellow of the Royal Geographical Society in London, and his annual lectures there are reported to have been always well attended.
Rattray, aged 48, was shot dead on his farm in KwaZulu-Natal on 26 January 2007 during an armed robbery attempt by six men.
[2][3] His funeral was held at Michaelhouse, a boarding school in Balgowan where two of his sons were scholars at the time, and his ashes are interred on the family property at Rorke's Drift in the Natal Midlands.
Five of the gang, including the murderer, were subsequently arrested and sentenced to life imprisonment.