Jim Corbett (Jim James Edward Corbett) Biography

British author and conservationist, born in Naini Tal, Kumaon, India, where he was educated at St Joseph's College. Apart from a period as a railway inspector and service in France during the First World War, Corbett spent most of his life as a farmer in Kumaon. He retained a deep commitment to the welfare of the local people, on whose behalf he stalked and killed a succession of man-eating tigers and leopards. He recorded these episodes along with wide-ranging accounts of his experiences of the wilds in The Man-Eaters of Kumaon (1946), The Man-Eating Leopard of Rudraprayag (1948), and The Temple Tiger and More Man-Eaters of Kumaon (1954). In 1935 he established the first game sanctuary in India at Garhwal, which became Corbett National Park in 1957. His other works include the substantially autobiographical My India (1952) and Jungle Lore (1953). Carpet Sahib (1986) is Martin Booth's biography of Corbett.