The Epic of Mount Everest. Francis Edward Younghusband
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which showed that men could climb to 27,000 feet. Lastly, came the second attempt which ended so tragically but in which men, with no adventitious aid, climbed to 28,100 feet.
These are the three phases of the high adventure; and it is with the first that we will now deal.
Before any great idea can be put into execution there are usually a number of preliminary barriers which have to be removed. In this case the first barriers were human. The Nepalese barred the way to Mount Everest from the south. The Tibetans had hitherto barred it on the north. Could the reluctance of the latter to admit strangers be overcome? That was the first matter to be tackled. It was a question of diplomacy and that art had to be exercised before an expedition could be launched.
A deputation composed of members of the Royal Geographical Society and the Alpine Club waited on the Secretary of State for India to acquaint him with the importance which the two bodies attached to the project and to enlist his sympathy. Should that sympathy be forthcoming, and he have no objection to an Everest Expedition being sent to Tibet, provided the sanction of the Government of India and the Tibetan Government were obtained, the two Societies proposed inviting Colonel Howard Bury to proceed to India to negotiate the matter with the Government of India. This was the representation that was made to him.
By a strange coincidence the deputation (which was headed by the President of the Royal Geographical Society) was received by Lord Sinha, who was then Under-Secretary of State. He was a Bengali, from whose native Province Mount Everest can be seen. Perhaps he himself was not particularly enthusiastic about the scheme. But speaking as the mouthpiece of the Secretary of State he said that no objection would be raised by the India Office.
This was one barrier out of the way. And it might have been insuperable. For a previous Secretary of State had raised objections to Englishmen travelling in Tibet. He held the view that travellers caused trouble and should be discouraged.
To remove the next barrier Colonel Howard Bury was dispatched to India. He was an officer of the 60th Rifles who after service in the Great War had just retired. Before the War he had served in India and been on shooting expeditions in the Himalaya. And being interested in the Everest project put himself at the disposal of the Royal Geographical Society. He proved an excellent ambassador. He inspired Lord Chelmsford, the Viceroy, and Lord Rawlinson, the Commander-in-Chief, with enthusiasm for the idea, and he got a promise of their support if the local agent, Mr. Bell, should think the Tibetans would raise no objection. Colonel Howard Bury then proceeded to Sikkim and saw Mr. Bell and got him also interested. And, fortunately, Mr. (now Sir Charles) Bell had great influence with the Tibetans. The result was that by the end of 1920 news came to London that the Tibetan Government had granted permission for an Expedition to proceed to Mount Everest in the following year.
Diplomacy having achieved its object and human obstacles being overcome it was possible to go full steam ahead organizing an Expedition. And climbing Mount Everest was a matter which interested both the Royal Geographical Society and the Alpine Club. It interested the former because the Society will not admit that there is any spot on the earth’s surface on which man should not at least try to set his foot. And it interested the latter because climbing mountains is their especial province. It was decided, therefore, to make the Expedition a joint effort of the two societies. And this was the more desirable because the Geographical Society had greater facilities for organizing exploring expeditions, while the Alpine Club had better means of choosing the personnel. A joint Committee, called the Mount Everest Committee, was therefore formed, composed of three members each of the two societies. And it was arranged that during the first phase, while the mountain was being reconnoitred, the President of the Royal Geographical Society should be Chairman; and in the second phase, when the mountain was to be climbed, the President of the Alpine Club should preside.
Thus constituted the Mount Everest Committee was composed of the following:
As ever, the first necessity was money—and Everest expeditions are expensive matters. Neither of the two societies had any money at their disposal; so all had to be raised by private subscription. And here the Alpine Club were extraordinarily generous—or anyhow they were made to be by the compelling Captain Farrar. If a single member had a single sovereign to spare Farrar forced him to disgorge it. In the Geographical Society there still lingered the notion that climbing Mount Everest was sensational but not “scientific.” If it were a matter of making a map of the region, then the project should be encouraged. If it were a question merely of climbing the mountain, then it should be left to mountaineers and not absorb the attention of a scientific body like the Royal Geographical Society.
This narrow view of the functions of the Society was strongly held by some fellows—even by an ex-President. It was a survival of times when the making of a map was looked upon as the be-all and end-all of a geographer. But it was now laid down from the very first that the attainment of the summit of Mount Everest was the supreme object of the Expedition and all other objects subsidiary to that. Climbing the mountain was no mere sensationalism. It was testing the capacity of man. If he could pass the test of climbing the highest mountain he would feel himself capable of climbing every other peak that did not present insuperable physical obstacles; and the range of geographers would be extended into new and unexplored regions of the earth.
As to the map: that would follow right enough. Let it be known that we were out on a great adventure, and map-makers, geologists, naturalists, botanists and all the rest would come flocking in. That was the view put before the Society and which the Society adopted.
Concurrently with collecting the money the Mount Everest Committee concerned itself with collecting the men and purchasing the equipment and stores. And the composition of the party was determined by the primary object with which the first Expedition would be dispatched; and that object was reconnaissance. For it must be explained that up till now little was known of the mountain itself. Its position and height had been determined by observations made from stations in the plains of India more than a hundred miles away. But from the plains only the tip of it can be seen. A little more can be seen from the neighbourhood of Darjiling, but even then only at a distance of 80 miles. From the Tibetan side Rawling and Ryder had approached to within about sixty miles and Noel perhaps closer. Still, all this did not tell us very much about the mountain. The upper portion looked reasonably practicable. But what it was like between 16,000 feet and 26,000 feet no one could say.
Douglas Freshfield and Norman Collie, who had both climbed in the Himalaya and who both had a keen eye for mountain topography, were, therefore, strongly of opinion that a whole season should be devoted to a thorough reconnaissance of the mountain so that not only a route to the summit but also that route which would indubitably be the best should be found. For it was certain that it would only be by the easiest way up that the summit would ever be reached. And it would be disastrous if a party, after toiling up one route and failing to attain its object, were afterward to find that a better route was all the time available.
Reconnaissance being the object of the first Expedition it was necessary to choose a man to lead the climbers who was a good judge of a mountain—a man of wide experience in mountaineering who would be able to give an authoritative opinion on the vital question of the route Mr. Harold Raeburn had this experience and he had, as it happened, on the previous year been climbing in Sikkim. He was somewhat old, but he would not be expected to climb to any great heights and it was hoped that his experience would compensate for his age.
For the higher climbing that might be necessary, and for the real attempt which would be made on the following year, one name was immediately mentioned by the Alpine Club members, and that name was Mallory. There was no question in their mind that he was the finest climber they had. George Leigh Mallory was then a master at Charterhouse. There was nothing remarkable in his appearance. He was of the ordinary type of young man that you see in thousands every day. He was not like Bruce was at the same age, a giant of strength and bursting with physical energy. Nor was he of the wiry, vivid, alert type we see among Frenchmen and Italians. He was certainly good looking, with a sensitive, cultivated air. And now and then he would speak in a sudden, perhaps rather jerky impatient way, showing that there was more going on within him than met