Pelorus Jack (fl. 1888 – April 1912) was a Risso's dolphin that was famous for meeting and escorting ships through a stretch of water in Cook Strait, New Zealand, for 24 years between 1888 and 1912. Pelorus Jack was usually spotted in Admiralty Bay between Cape Francis and Collinet Point, near French Pass, a notoriously dangerous channel used by ships travelling between Wellington and Nelson.
How he got his name is uncertain. It is recorded in the book Breverton's nautical curiosities : a book of the sea that he was named after the pelorus, a marine navigational instrument. However, Te Ara - the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, says the name came from Pelorus Sound because it was at the entrance to that stretch of water where he would regularly meet ships to accompany them.
Pelorus Jack was shot at from a passing ship, and was later protected by a 1904 New Zealand law.