The following reprinted article is from the Journal of the Bombay Natural History Society, 1889, Volume 4, page 149-150.
No authentic record exists of a black tiger having been seen or killed in Bengal, so I am informed. Black leopards are well known, especially in the Madras Presidency and in the Straits Settlements, and I have heard of them in Bengal, though I never saw them alive there (except in the Calcutta Zoological Gardens). But before I go hence and am no more seen, I wish to state that I and several others saw a dead black tiger at Chittagong, and from the entries in my diary, which was pretty regularly kept, I know that it was in March 1846. The news was brought into the station that a dead black tiger was lying near the road that leads to Tipperah, distant about two miles from Chittagong. In the early morning we rode out to see it; but several of the party - Sir H. Ricketts, Mr. Fulwar Skipwith, Captain Swatman and Captain Hore - are no longer alive, and I cannot produce any eye-witness to attest my statement, although several friends to whom I have written recollect that they heard something about it at the time.
I remember perfectly well that the body of the animal was lying in the low bush jungle about twenty yards south of the road, and we dismounted to go and look at it. It was a full-sized tiger, and the skin was black or very dark brown, so that the stripes showed rather a darker black in the sunlight, just as the spots are visible on the skin of a black leopard. The tiger had been killed by a poisoned arrow, and had wandered away more than a mile from the place where it was wounded before it lay down to die. By the time that we arrived the carcase was swollen, the flies were buzzing about it, and decomposition had set in, so that those of our party who knew best decided that the skin could not be saved. I was young and inexperienced, but Captain Swatman, who was in charge of the Government elephant kheddas, and Captain Hore (afterwards Lord Ruthven), of the 25th N.I, were well-known sportsmen, and had each of them killed many tigers. No doubt was expressed about the animal being a black tiger, and I have often mentioned the fact in conversation from time to time. For several weeks before we saw the dead body, the natives had reported that there was a black tiger which infested the range of hills behind the military cantonments at Chittagong. more than once, when the herdsman brought word that it had killed a cow, Captain Swatman sent an elephant and howdah for me, and we beat through the jungle in vain for it. Probably our tactics were bad, as we invariably went right up to the body of the murdered cow, and the tiger sneaked off on hearing the noise of the elephants into the extensive and impenetrable coverts. We did not attach any importance to the native statement that the tiger was black, as we supposed that this was merely an exaggeration. So also, when a report came in through the native police that a man had been killed by a black tiger in a large village about three miles to the south of the hills behind the cantonments, we supposed that the epithet "black" was only a fanciful description of the animal. When, however, we had seen the black skin of the body of the dead tiger, we concluded that the native authorities had not been drawing on their imagination when they used the epithet "black."
I cannot venture to offer any explanation why this tiger's skin was black. it is well known that there is considerable difference of colour in the skins of ordinary tigers. Some skins have almost a light yellow ground, whilst in others the colour approaches a dark chestnut-red. Some people attribute this variety of colour to the character of the jungle in which the animals have lived, and this has a sort of probability in it; but the age of the tiger may have also something to say to it, and a beast which was of a dark red in its prime may turn to a lighter colour when it grows old. It was my good fortune during the last forty years to see many more tigers, both wild and in captivity, than falls to the lot of most men in Bengal. I can testify that on the churs of the Ganges and Brahmapootra, when shooting during the hot winds in the end of march, through the remains of the brunt grass and charred stalks, that the animals seemed to vanish before our eyes. Many authorities have written that the skin of a man-eating tiger is usually mangy and dull in colour. There were two man-eating tiger caught and sent to the Calcutta Zoo, whose skins were in perfect condition and of a rich colour. There was a fine tigress about five years old with a clean and well-marked skin, whose career I had to cut short, as she had taken to preying on the villagers of a place near Dacca; so that these cases were exceptions to the general rule. But I have no doubt that it is quite true that many old and mangy tigers, with decaying teeth and claws, become man-eaters. The reason is simple. A human being is the most facile prey for a tiger. One grip on the slight neck of a woman and all is over. There is no striking with pointed horns, or kicking with sharp hooves, as the tiger finds when he is killing a deer or a cow. And who shall say whether a healthy young woman is more tender and wholesome food than the flesh of a sickly old cow, half-starved in the jungle?