The Champawat Tiger was a Bengal Tigress responsible for an estimated 436 deaths in

Nepal Nepal (; ne, :ne:नेपाल, नेपाल ), formerly the Federal Democratic Republic of Nepal ( ne, सङ्घीय लोकतान्त्रिक गणतन्त्र नेपाल ), is a landlocked country in S ...

and the

Kumaon division Kumaon (; Kumaoni: ''Kumāū''; ; historically romanized as KemāonJames Prinsep (Editor)John McClelland ) is a revenue and administrative division in the Indian State of Uttarakhand. It spans over the eastern half of the state and is bounde ...

India India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...

, during the last years of the 19th century and the first years of the 20th century. Her attacks have been listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the highest number of fatalities from a tiger (as well as any animal). She was shot and killed in 1907 by a then 31-year-old

Jim Corbett Edward James Corbett (25 July 1875 – 19 April 1955) was a British hunter, tracker, naturalist, and author who hunted a number of man-eating tigers and leopards in the Indian subcontinent. He held the rank of colonel in the British Indian ...

History

According to Peter Byrne,

professional hunter A professional hunter (less frequently referred to as market or commercial hunter and regionally, especially in Britain and Ireland, as professional stalker or gamekeeper) is a person who hunts and/or manages game by profession. Some professional ...

and author from Nepal, the tiger began her attacks in a Rupal village in western

Himalayas The Himalayas, or Himalaya (; ; ), is a mountain range in Asia, separating the plains of the Indian subcontinent from the Tibetan Plateau. The range has some of the planet's highest peaks, including the very highest, Mount Everest. Over 10 ...

. Hunters were sent in to kill the tiger, but she managed to evade them. Eventually, the

Nepalese Army The Nepali Army ( ne, नेपाली सेना, translit=Nēpālī Sēnā), technically the Gorkhali Army ( ne, गोरखाली सेना, translit=Gōrakhālī Sēnā, label=none; see ''Gorkhas''), is the land service branch ...

was called in. Despite failing to capture or kill the tiger, soldiers organised a massive

beat Beat, beats or beating may refer to: Common uses * Patrol, or beat, a group of personnel assigned to monitor a specific area ** Beat (police), the territory that a police officer patrols ** Gay beat, an area frequented by gay men * Battery (c ...

and managed to force the tiger to abandon her territory and drive her across the border (river Sarda) into

, where she continued her killing activities in the

Kumaon District Kumaon (; Kumaoni: ''Kumāū''; ; historically romanized as KemāonJames Prinsep (Editor)John McClelland ) is a revenue and administrative division in the Indian State of Uttarakhand. It spans over the eastern half of the state and is bounded ...

. The tiger would adjust her hunting strategy so as to best hunt and evade humans—travelling great distances between villages (as much as in a day, undertaken at night) in her new territory both to claim new victims and evade pursuers. Her behaviour became more like a Siberian tiger in her habits and she created a larger territory to encompass multiple villages in the Kumaon area, with Champawat being close to the centre of her territory. Most of her victims were young women and children, who often went into the forest to collect firewood, feed livestock, and gather resources for craft work. All her kills happened in daylight (Corbett said he was not aware of a single case of a tiger killing a human during the night). Life across the region was paralysed, with men often refusing to leave their huts for work after hearing the tiger's roars from the forest. In 1907, the tiger was killed by British hunter

. The tiger had killed a 16-year-old girl, Premka Devi, in the village of Fungar, near to the town of

Champawat Champawat ( Kumaoni: ''Champāvat'') is a town and a Nagar Palika Parishad in Champawat district in the state of Uttarakhand, India. It is the administrative headquarters of Champawat district. The town was the former capital of the Kumaon Kingd ...

, and left a trail of blood, which Corbett followed. After nearly getting ambushed by the tiger while investigating the remains of its victim and scaring her off with two shots from his rifle, Corbett had to abandon the hunt, deciding to use villagers and to organise a beat the next day in the Champa River gorge. With the help of the

tehsildar In India and Pakistan, a Tehsildar or Mamlatdar is a tax officer accompanied by revenue inspectors. They are in charge of obtaining taxes from a tehsil with regard to land revenue. A tehsildar is also known as an executive magistrate of the relev ...

of Champawat, the beat was organised with about 300 villagers, and the next day, about noon, Corbett shot the tigress dead. Corbett's first shots hit the tigress in the chest and shoulder, and his last shot, made with the tehsildar's rifle to keep it from charging him after he ran out of bullets, hit her in the foot, causing it to collapse from him. A postmortem on the tigress showed the upper and lower canine teeth on the right side of her mouth were broken, the upper one in half, the lower one right down to the bone. This injury, a result of an old gunshot, according to Corbett, probably prevented her from hunting her natural prey, and hence, she started to hunt humans. Further examinations made by Corbett during his hunt for the tiger indicated that she was in healthy condition physically (other than her teeth) and was between 10 and 12 years old. "After bringing down the Champawat Tiger, Jim Corbett acquired a reputation as the leading hunter of man-eaters. This ability served him well, at a time when deforestation and diminishing prey were driving more and more tigers and leopards to hunt humans for food."

Champawat town

, near the Chataar Bridge and on the way to

Lohaghat Lohaghat ( Kumaoni: ''Loghāt'') is a town and a nagar palika in Champawat district in the Indian state of Uttarakhand. History Lohaghat and its surrounding region was earlier known as Sui, and the town has been a place of prominence since the ...

, there is a "cement board" marking the place where the tigress was finally brought down. The details about the Champawat Tigress and how she was brought down can be found in the book ''

Maneaters of Kumaon ''Man-Eaters of Kumaon'' is a 1944 book written by hunter-naturalist Jim Corbett. It details the experiences that Corbett had in the Kumaon region of India from the 1900s to the 1930s, while hunting man-eating Bengal tigers and Indian leopards. ...

'' (1944), written by Corbett himself.

In popular culture

The video game ''

Guild Wars 2 ''Guild Wars 2'' is a free-to-play, massively multiplayer online role-playing game developed by ArenaNet and published by NCSoft. Set in the fantasy world of Tyria, the core game follows the re-emergence of Destiny's Edge, a disbanded guild ded ...

'', features a tiger-themed legendary weapon and accompanying quest series named " Chuka and Champawat".

History

Champawat town

In popular culture

See also

References

Further reading