Jimmy James (tracker, 1913-1991)


Jimmy James OAM was an Aboriginal Australian and member of the Pitjantjatjara people, who was best known as an Aboriginal tracker who helped South Australian Police in tracking criminals over a forty-year period.

Background

Born near Ernabella in northern South Australia to his parents, Warlawurru and Kaarnka, he spent his late childhood at the Ooldea Mission.
He left the area in 1945, being wrongfully arrested in the case of the Mount Dare station manager found guilty of assault and maltreatment of Aborigines. He moved to the South Australian Riverland, where he assisted in the establishment of the Gerard Mission.
In 1948, James began his career as a tracker for police and landowners, and gained much of his reputation tracking criminals and lost persons. The Sundown and Pine Valley murders in 1957 and 1958 were his most publicized cases. In 1966, he found the nine-year-old Wendy Pfeiffer after she was abducted near Mylor and left for dead in the woods. He led this man-hunt alongside Daniel Moodoo. In January 2019, SBS interactive launched a documentary about this affair, Wendy Pfeiffer now being 60 and wishing to thank Jimmy James for being alive.
In 1982, he found the dangerous escapee James Beauregard-Smith.
He was in favor of teaching traditional lore to Aboriginal children, and could narrate stories in bushcraft. He was a boomerang-maker.
In 1987, he suffered several strokes that crippled him and destined him to a wheelchair for his old days. He died on 27 October 1991. He is buried with his family in the Gerard Reserve Cemetery at the Gerard mission. After his death, a granite memorial to Jimmy James was erected in Berri, South Australia.

Recognitions

Jimmy James married Lilian Disher in 1947 at the Gerard Mission. Lilian Disher was the unofficial adopted daughter of Jimmy James, another tracker from whom Jimmy James took his occidental name. They had four children but Jimmy James outlived all of them who suffered alcoholism and loss of tribal traditions.