Kimble Bent grew up restless in Eastport in the 1840s, running away to join the Navy at 17, then using his shipbuilder father’s money to adventure overseas.

Oh, and he adventured, all right.

He joined the British Army. Deserted the British Army. Then lived as a munitions maker with a New Zealand tribe under special protection — they wouldn’t eat him, but he best not squawk when they ate someone else.

As an old man, he came out of the wild with a story to tell.

Last month, Radio New Zealand featured Bent in its new “Black Sheep” series on villains and controversial figures in the country’s history.

“Bent’s an interesting case as far as ‘villainy’ goes,” Radio New Zealand producer William Ray said. “At the time, his fellow soldiers thought he was a traitor of the worst stripe … To be honest, my basic impression is that he was a relatively normal guy, prone to making impulsive decisions but had a talent for talking his way out of sticky situations.”

In his home state, he’s who?

“I’ve never heard of him,” said Earle Shettleworth, Maine state historian.

Bent traveled to the U.K. at age 20 and after a bit of fun, didn’t have the money to get back home, according to Ray’s research, which relied in part on “The Adventures of Kimble Bent” by James Cowan, Bent’s late-in-life biographer.

Drinking in a pub one day, Bent noticed a British Army recruiter and joined up. After a stint in India, he was sent to New Zealand, where the British were fighting in the Second Taranaki War against indigenous people called Maori.

Bent, now 25, decided to bolt after a dust-up with an officer over firewood: He refused to go gather it and got prison and 25 lashes with a cat o’nine tails for insubordination.

After running away, he was reluctantly taken in by a Maori chief whom he’d discovered surveilling a British fort. Bent told Cowan the chief warned him, “All right, you come along. But you look out for my tribe — they kill you.”

After one battle ended badly for the British, Bent watched as men’s bodies were divvied up, the spoils of war.

Happening upon a fire pit, Bent told Cowen, “The cannibal cooks looked round and asked me savagely what I wanted there. They threatened that if I did not leave instantly they would throw me into the oven too and roast me alive.”

There were other adventures. Marrying a chief’s teenage daughter. Surviving an ax attack. Becoming a healer.

Chris Grosz, the writer and artist behind the 2011 graphic novel “Kimble Bent Malcontent,” is hoping to get a script development grant to turn Bent’s story into a mini-series or film.

Some 400 copies of his book, published by Random House, were distributed to school libraries across New Zealand.

For his research, Grosz visited areas where Bent lived and learned he had the nickname “The Downeaster” because of his Maine roots.

He said he marvelled at Bent’s survival skills, “living with a very volatile and warrior-coded culture that would have dispatched him at a moment’s notice for any infraction.”

“He observed everything you could imagine as a stranger in a strange land,” Grosz said. “Hunter-gathering, tattooing, fortification-building, new languages, different ways of thinking, self-preservation and survival, love, cannibalism, herbal medicine, cultivation of foreign vegetables, cartridge-making, defender of the old, young and women during conflicts.”

Ray, the radio producer, said Bent is a character to whom time has been kind. 

More than 100 years ago, soldiers “wrote a lot of angry letters to newspapers later in his life when it became apparent he wasn’t going to face any kind of penalty for his desertion,” Ray said. “From a modern perspective, it’s a bit more complicated because these days most New Zealanders think the wars fought in Taranaki were hugely unjust. It was based largely on the desire of white settlers to seize Maori land and on racist beliefs that white colonists would help ‘civilise’ the Maori. That can’t help but make people today see Bent in a more positive light.”

Bent died in New Zealand on May 22, 1916, 9,200 miles from his first home.

Give a listen to the “Black Sheep” series at www.radionz.co.nz/programmes/black-sheep, where Ray has the wicked tease: “Listen to the full Black Sheep podcast for more on Kimble Bent’s astonishing life story, including the rumours he shot and killed his former commander.”

Weird, Wicked Weird is a monthly series on the strange, intriguing and unexplained in Maine. Send ideas and photos to kskelton@sunjournal.com.

Writer and artist Chris Grosz during research for his graphic novel, “Kimble Bent Malcontent.” (Submitted photo)

Before you listen

Producer William Ray at New Zealand Radio offered a few helpful translations to anyone giving the Kimble Bent episode a listen.

Pakeha = a non-Maori person (usually European).

Ngati Ruanui = a tribe of Maori from the Taranaki region which was involved in several wars with the colonial government of NZ in the 1860s.

Pai Marire = a Maori religion which combines aspects of Christianity with traditional Maori beliefs.

Hauhau = a follower of the Pai Marire faith.

Pa = a fort.

Kainga = village.

Tapu = sacred or holy protection placed on a person or thing.

A copy of Kimble Bent’s death certificate. (Submitted image)

The cover of Chris Grosz’s graphic novel, “Kimble Bent Malcontent.” Bent was a Maine native who left the state for what would be a life of dangerous adventure in New Zealand in the 1800s. (Submitted image)

Chris Grosz’s acrylic painting titled “Survival 1,” an imagining of Kimble Bent, is part of the James Wallace Arts Trust Collection in New Zealand. (Submitted photo)

A portrait of Maine native Kimble Bent from Te Napa, New Zealand’s national museum. After he deserted from the British Army, Bent lived for decades with a Maori tribe in New Zealand, under its protection, but with the understanding that he’d better not take issue with their occasional cannibal lifestyle. Radio New Zealand recently featured Bent in its new “Black Sheep” series on villains and controversial figures in the country’s history. (Submitted image)