MacCreagh was the son of Scottish parents, possibly born in Perth, Indiana in 1889 while his father, an anthropologist, was visiting the United States to study Native Americans.
Mistakenly believing he had killed a fellow student in a German sabre duel, he fled to Southeast Asia, where he lived for several years.
[2] MacCreagh worked in Calcutta, Darjeeling, the Malay Islands, Tibet, China and Burma, where he collected animal specimens.
After the book's publication, MacCreagh was made a "Knight of the Empire" by Emperor Haile Selassie.
It is possible that MacCreagh was the inspiration for the fictional character of Indiana Jones.