Hero of Kumaon: The Life of Jim Corbett

Jim Corbett became the hero of thousands of impoverished local families in the remote Indian region of Kumaon when, throughout the 1920s and 30s, he answered their pleas to rid them of the man-eating tigers and leopards which were ravaging their populations. Man-eaters roamed a region of hundreds of square miles over several years, killing the defenceless villagers at will: for example the Champawat man-eater had killed over 434 people in six years, the Panar maneater over 400. Jim, one of 15 children, was born in 1875 to the local post-master in Nainital, and taught himself as a barefoot boy in his local jungle to become, in his spare time one, of the most skilled trackers of his day, fluent in the local dialects, patient beyond endurance and an excellent shot. Duff Hart Davis’ biography threads together the life of this very private, unassuming Indian railway clerk. Often through Jim’s own written words, Duff sets out the highlights of Jim’s adventures in sequence and in context, thus thowing light on Jim’s remarkable character. AUTHOR: Duff Hart-Davis joined the Sunday Telegraph on its inception in 1961 and later travelled extensively as a feature reporter in India, Nepal, Turkey, Caribbean, Norway, South Africa, Ascension Island. Shooting trips took him to Siberia, Poland and Hungary. Duff wrote the Country Matters column in the Independent 1986-2001. A distinguished biographer, naturalist and journalist, he is author of 17 non-fiction books on subjects ranging from Hitler’s Olympics, the adventurer Peter Fleming, to a history of the mid-Atlantic island of Ascension. He has also had eight novels published.