Happy Birthday to the World
most famous Hunter-turnedconservationist Jim Corbett
Happy Birthday Jim Corbett the messiah for many in the jungles
of British India specially at United Province. A
Conservationist and naturalist with human heart. Author of
some of the finest Books on Jungle and man eaters.
James Edward “Jim” ‘Corbett CIE VD (25 July 1875 – 19 April
1955) was a British-Indian hunter and tracker-turnedconservationist, author and naturalist, famous for hunting a
large number of man-eating tigers and leopards in India.
Corbett held the rank of colonel in the British Indian Army
and was frequently called upon by the government of the United
Provinces, now the Indian states of Uttar Pradesh and
Uttarakhand, to kill man-eating tigers and leopards that were
preying on people in the nearby villages of the Garhwal and
Kumaon regions.
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Corbett was an avid photographer and after his retirement
authored Man-Eaters of Kumaon, Jungle Lore, and other books
recounting his hunts and experiences, which enjoyed critical
acclaim and commercial success. Later on in life, Corbett
spoke out for the need to protect India’s wildlife from
extermination and played a key role in creating a national
reserve for the endangered Bengal tiger by using his influence
to persuade the provincial government to establish it. In 1957
the national park was renamed Jim Corbett National Park in his
honour.
Jim Corbett resided in the Gurney House along with his sister
Maggie Corbett. They sold the house to Mrs. Kalavati Varma,
before leaving for Kenya in November 1947. The house has been
transformed into a museum and is known as the Jim Corbett
Museum.
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After 1947, Corbett and his sister Maggie retired to Nyeri,
Kenya, where he continued to write and sound the alarm about
declining numbers of wild cats and other wildlife. Corbett was
at the Tree Tops, a hut built on the branches of a giant ficus
tree, when Princess Elizabeth stayed there on 5–6 February
1952, at the time of the death of her father, King George VI.
Corbett wrote in the hotel’s visitors’ register:
For the first time in the history of the world, a young girl
climbed into a tree one day a Princess, and after having what
she described as her most thrilling experience, she climbed
down from the tree the next day a Queen—God bless her.
Corbett died of a heart attack a few days after he finished
his sixth book, Tree Tops, and was buried at St. Peter’s
Anglican Church in Nyeri. His memories were kept intact in the
form of the meeting place Moti House, which Corbett had built
for his friend Moti Singh, and the Corbett Wall, a long wall
(approximately 4.5 miles (7.2 km)) built around the village to
protect crops from wild animals.
Man-eaters of Kumaon was a great success in India, the United
Kingdom and the United States, the first edition of the
American Book-of-the-Month Club being 250,000 copies. It was
later translated into 27 languages. Corbett’s fourth book,
Jungle Lore, is considered his autobiography.
The Jim Corbett National Park in Uttarakhand, India was
renamed in his honour in 1957. He had played a key role in
establishing this protected area in the 1930s.
In 1968, one of the five remaining subspecies of tigers was
named after him: Panthera tigris corbetti, the Indochinese
tiger, also called Corbett’s tiger.
In 1994 and 2002, the long-neglected graves of Corbett and his
sister (both in Kenya) were repaired and restored by Jerry A.
Jaleel, founder and director of the Jim Corbett Foundation.
India too put a tribute to this evergreen youngman of jungle
by setting up a national park under his name.
Jim Corbett National Park, which is a part of the larger
Corbett Tiger Reserve, a Project Tiger Reserve lies in the
Nainital district of Uttarakhand. The magical landscape of
Corbett is well known and fabled for its tiger richness.
Established in the year 1936 as Hailey National Park, Corbett
has the glory of being India’s oldest and most prestigious
National Park. It is also being honored as the place where
Project Tiger was first launched in 1973. This unique tiger
territory is best known as the father who gave birth of the
Project Tiger in India to protect the most endangered species
and the Royal of India called Tigers.
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Books
Jim Corbett with the slain Bachelor of Powalgarh.Jungle
Stories. Privately published in 1935 (only 100 copies)
Contents: Wild Life in the Village: An Appeal, The Pipal Pani
Tiger, The Fish of My Dreams, A Lost Paradise, The Terror that
Walks by Night, Purna Girl and Its Mysterious Lights, The
Chowgarh Tigers
Man-Eaters of Kumaon. Oxford University Press, Bombay 1944
Contents: Author’s note (causes of man-eating), The Champawat
Maneater, Robin, Chowgarh Tigers, The Bachelor of Powalgarh,
The Mohan Maneater, Fish of my dreams, The Kanda Maneater, The
Pipal Pani tiger, The Thak Man-eater, Just Tigers
The Man-eating Leopard of Rudraprayag. Oxford University
Press, 1947
Contents: The Pilgrim Road, The Man-Eater, Terror, Arrival,
Investigation, The First Kill, Locating the Leopard, The
Second Kill, Preparations, Magic, A Near Escape, The Gin Trap,
The Hunters Hunted, Retreat, Fishing Interlude, Death of a
Goat, Cyanide Poisoning, Touch and Go, A Lesson in Caution, A
Wild Boar Hunt, Vigil on a Pine Tree, My Night of Terror,
Leopard Fights Leopard, A Shot in the Dark, Epilogue
My India. Oxford University Press, 1952
Contents: Dedication & Introduction, The Queen of the Village,
Kunwar Singh, Mothi, Pre Red Tape Days, The Law of the Jungle,
The Brothers, Sultana: India’s Robin Hood, Loyalty, Budhu,
Lalajee, Chamari, Life at Mokameh Ghat
Jungle Lore. Oxford University Press, 1953
Contents: Introduction by Martin Booth, Dansay, Learning to
Shoot, Magog, Looking Back, Jungle Encounters, Categories,
Jungle Lore, Calls of the Jungle, School Days / Cadets, Forest
Fire & Beats, Game Tracks, Jungle Sensitiveness
The Temple Tiger and More Man-eaters of Kumaon. Oxford
University Press, 1954
Contents: The Temple Tiger, The Muktesar Man-Eater, The Panar
Man-Eater, The Chuka Man-Eater, The Talla Des Man-Eater,
Epilogue
Tree Tops. Oxford University Press, 1955 (short 30-page
novella)
Jim Corbett’s India – Selections by R. E. Hawkins. Oxford
University Press, 1978
Contents: Introduction, Kunwar Singh, Schooldays, Loyalty,
Life at Mokameh Ghat, Mothi, The Law of the Jungles, The
Muktesar Man-eater, The Panar Leopard, Goongi (previously
unpublished), The Pipal Pani Tiger, The Pilgrim Road, Terror,
Vigil on a Pine Tree, The Chowgarh Tigers, The Bachelor of
Powalgarh, The Fish of My Dreams, Robin, Wild Life in the
Village-An Appeal (previously unpublished), The Mohan Man-
Eater, Just Tigers, On Man-Eating, Looking Back
My Kumaon: Uncollected Writings. Oxford University Press, 2012
Contents: Publisher’s Note; Timeline; Preface: ‘How I Came To
Write’; A Life Well Lived: An Introduction To Jim Corbett By
Lord Hailey; Section One: The Unpublished Corbett—The Night
Jar’s Egg; ‘One Of Us’; From My Jungle Camp; The Rudraprayag
Letters; Corbett On The Man-Eating Leopard Of Rudraprayag; The
Making Of Corbett’s My India: Correspondence With His Editors;
‘Shooting’ Tigers: Corbett And The Camera; Wildlife In The
Village: An Environmental Appeal; An Englishman In India; Life
In Kenya; Section Two: Corbett And His Audience-‘The
Artlessness Of His Art’; The Man Revealed: Corbett In His
Writings; The Universal Appeal Of Jim Corbett: Letters And
Reviews; Deliverance For Rudraprayag: Reactions To The Slaying
Of The Man-Eating Leopard By Corbett; Corbett’s Influence:
Man-Eaters Of Kumaon And The Chindwara Court Case; Epigraph