Roger 'Jumbo' Courtney was influential in the establishment of the UK Special Boat Service. When World War II began, he travelled from Africa (where he was big-game hunting) to England to join the army as a "commando folding kayaker". When his ideas were rebuffed, he joined the army as a low rank soldier. When the SOE was founded, Courtney tried to convince Lieutenant-Colonel Robert Laycock that his idea of a folding kayak brigade would be effective, with no success. Wikipedia
The definitive Wikipedia entry for Roger Courtney. Wikipedia is the biggest multilingual free-content encyclopedia on the Internet. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roger_Courtney