The Bengal tiger which ultimately became the mounted Leeds Tiger in Leeds City Museum originally inhabited the Deyrah Dhoon, near Dehradun; a valley near Mussoorie hill station in Uttarakhand, northern India. The animal was shot in March 1860 by Colonel Charles Reid (later General Sir Charles Reid, GCB) of the Sirmoor Battalion (2nd Gurkhas). Reid was a sportsman who, on one 1872 afternoon in Elginshire, bagged 25.5 brace of grouse. He wrote to a friend about the tiger kill:I had a tiger... which is now in the museum at Leeds, which was the largest tiger I ever killed or ever saw. As he lay on the ground he measured 12 feet 2 inches – his height I did not measure – from the tip of one ear to the tip of the other 19 inches. I never took skull measurements, nor did I ever weigh the tiger... The three tigers mentioned are the largest I ever killed – all Dhoon tigers.
