George Mallory

George Herbert Leigh Mallory (June 18 1886 – June 1924) was a British mountaineer.

Mallory was born in Mobberley, Cheshire, the son of a clergyman. He was the elder brother of Trafford Leigh-Mallory, the Royal Air Force commander. In what is perhaps his most famous moment, having been asked repeatedly by reporters in New York City while on a lecture tour why he wanted to climb Mount Everest, to one he replied testily with the statement, "Because it is there"; now forever associated with both himself and the mountain.

Education and family

In 1896, George attended boarding school in Eastbourne after completing preparatory school in West Kirby. At the age of 14, he won a mathematics scholarship to Winchester College. In his senior year at Winchester, he was introduced to rock climbing by a master, who took a small number of pupils climbing in Wales each year. In October of 1905, Mallory entered Magdalene College, Cambridge to study history. During his time there, he became friends with John Maynard Keynes.

He became a teacher at Charterhouse school in Godalming where there is now an expedition group named in his memory. Among his pupils there was Robert Graves who in his autobiography Goodbye to All That fondly remembers how he was introduced to mounaineering by Mallory. On July 29, 1914 he married Ruth Turner, the daughter of Thackeray Turner, a local Arts and Crafts Movement architect in Godalming. As Britain was about to become embroiled in World War I, an Alpine honeymoon was out of the question. Instead they went camping. locals became suspicious about two young people in the woods and according to tradition the couple were subsequently questioned on suspicion of being German spies.

George served as a gunner of the Royal Garrison Artillery in World War I, attaining the rank of First Lieutenant before he returned home in 1919 after the Armistice. Before being allowed to join up (schoolmasters were automatically exempt from service) he wrote a pamphlet called "War Work for Boys and Girls".

On September 9, 1915, George's first daughter, Frances Clare, was born. His second daughter, Beridge Ruth, was born on September 16, 1917. His son John was born on August 21, 1920 – half an hour before George returned from a climbing trip in the Alps.

Climbing history

In 1904, Mallory and a friend attempted to climb Mont Vélon in the Alps but turned back shortly before the summit due to altitude sickness. In 1911, Mallory climbed Mont Blanc.

By 1913 he was at the peak of his rock-climbing powers and on Pillar Rock in the English Lake District ascended, with no aid or assistance, what is now known as "Mallory's Route" – currently graded Hard Very Severe 5a (American grading 5.9). It is likely to have been the hardest route in Britain for many years.

In 1921 he participated in a reconnaissance mission exploring routes up to the North Col of Mount Everest, intended to produce the first accurate maps of the region around the mountain. Although he was accompanied by several senior members of Britain's Alpine Club and of surveyors based in India, the debilitating effect of altitude meant that Mallory, his climbing partner Guy Bullock and EO Wheeler of the Survey of India performed most of the exploration of the slopes. Under Mallory's leadership, and with the assistance of around a dozen Sherpas, the group climbed several lower peaks near Everest, including the North Col of Everest (7,066m or about 23,000') to gain an understanding of the region's geography. His party were almost certainly the first Westerners to view the Western Cwm at the foot of the Lhotse face, as well as charting the course of the Rongbuk Glacier and discovering the previously-unknown East Rongbuk Glacier.

In 1922, Mallory returned to the Himalaya as part of the party led by General CG Bruce and climbing leader E I Strutt, with a view to making a serious attempt on the summit. Eschewing their bottled oxygen, which had proved too unreliable to justify its weight, Mallory led his climbing team of Somervell and Norton almost to the top of the North-East ridge. Despite being hampered and slowed by the thin air, they had achieved a record altitude of 26,985' (8,225m) before weather conditions and the late hour forced them to retreat. After a second party reached in excess of 27,000' (8,229m) using bottled oxygen, Mallory organised a third attempt on the summit, departing as the monsoon arrived. While he was leading a group of climbers on the lower slopes of the North Col of Everest in fresh, waist-high snow, an avalanche swept over the group, killing seven Sherpas. The attempt was immediately abandoned, and Mallory returned home to face criticism for the outcome of the third expedition.

On June 8, 1924 George Mallory and Andrew Irvine attempted to climb to the top of Mount Everest via the North Col route. Keen-sighted expedition colleague Noel Odell reported seeing them at 12.50 p.m. ascending one of the major "steps" on the ridge and "going strongly for the top" but no evidence thus far has proved conclusively that they reached the summit. They never returned to high camp and died somewhere high on the mountain.

In 1995, Mallory's grandson, George Mallory II, reached the summit of Everest.

Lost on Everest

On May 1, 1999, a German-American expedition, sponsored in part by Nova and the BBC, found the frozen body of George Mallory at 8,000 metres (27,000') on the north face of Mt. Everest. However, they could not locate either of the two cameras that the two had apparently carried with them. Experts from Kodak have stated that if one of the cameras is ever found, there is a good chance that the film could be developed to produce "printable images". This is thanks to the nature of the black and white film that was used and the fact that it has been in continual "deep freeze" for over three-quarters of a century. In 2004, another expedition was made to search for the cameras and for other clues that either had reached the summit, but found no new evidence. A third search expedition was made in 2005, which also proved futile.

In 1975, a Chinese climber named Wang Hongbao reported seeing the body of an "old English dead" (Englishman) near the summit. Tragically, he was killed in an avalanche a day later, before the location could be precisely fixed. Current information indicates to most analysts that the body he saw would have been Mallory's (see Hemmleb & Simonson, "Detectives on Everest").

Two details noted when Mallory's body was discovered are tantalising, although not conclusive in their own right:

Firstly, Mallory's daughter has always said that Mallory carried a photograph of his wife on his person with the intention of leaving it on the summit. This photo was not found on Mallory's body. Given the excellent preservation of the body and its garments, this points to the possibility that he may have reached the summit and deposited the photo there.

Secondly, Mallory's snow goggles were found in his pocket, indicating that he died at night. This suggests that he and Irvine had made a push for the summit and were descending very late in the day. Given their known departure time and movements, had they not made the summit, it is unlikely that they would have still been out by nightfall.

From where it is commonly believed they started their climb – although the 1924 expedition cameraman John Noel maintained to his death that he knew they had departed from a higher camp than is usually believed – it would have taken them around eleven hours. They only had about eight hours of oxygen available, so – although this depends on the flow rate, which could be controlled and was not necessarily used on full flow – may have run out before they got there.

Many experienced modern climbers also disagree on whether Mallory was capable of climbing the fierce and infamous "Second Step" on the North Ridge, now surmounted by an aluminium ladder permanently placed by the Chinese in 1975 in order to avoid the problem. However, Mallory is known to have "swarmed up" a very similar obstacle in alpine conditions on the Swiss Nesthorn, and his companions were under no illusions about either his considerable ability or his visionary, idealistic self-motivation. Initially, Noel Odell believed he had seen Mallory ascend the Second Step, but later confessed to doubts as to whether that was the case.

The Second Step was first climbed "free", i.e. by using only the natural hand- and footholds of the rock, by Catalan climber Oscar Cadiach in 1985. He rated the 15-foot crack that forms the crux 5.7-5.8 (5+ UIAA grading). Austrian Theo Fritsche repeated the free climb solo, i.e. without rope protection, in 2001, confirming Cadiach's rating of 5.7-5.8. Fritsche completed the climb without supplementary oxygen (as Cadiach did), wearing only a light down jacket. He now believes that Mallory could have summitted in his clothing on a good day. As for climbing difficulties, Mallory is known to have climbed in the 5.8-5.9 range in Wales.

Harry Tyndale, one of Mallory's climbing partners, said of Mallory: "In watching George at work one was conscious not so much of physical strength as of suppleness and balance; so rhythmical and harmonious was his progress in any steep place ... that his movements appeared almost serpentine in their smoothness."

His close friend and mentor Geoffrey Winthrop-Young, the most accomplished alpine climber of his day, held Mallory's ability in awe:

"His movement in climbing was entirely his own. It contradicted all theory. He would set his foot high against any angle of smooth surface, fold his shoulder to his knee, and flow upward and upright again on an impetuous curve. Whatever may have happened unseen the while between him and the cliff ... the look, and indeed the result, were always the same – a continuous undulating movement so rapid and so powerful that one felt the rock must yield, or disintegrate."

Informed of Odell's belief that Mallory had climbed the Second Step, Winthrop-Young was convinced he made the summit. He wrote:

"After nearly twenty years' knowledge of Mallory as a mountaineer, I can say that difficult as it would have been for any mountaineer to turn back, with the only difficulty past, to Mallory it would have been an impossibility."

Commentary

Even if evidence is eventually uncovered proving that George Mallory and/or Andrew Irvine reached the summit of Everest on that fateful day in 1924, a small minority questions the view that history should be changed to state that they made the first ascent. A few mountaineers maintain that a successful first ascent not only involves reaching the top but also includes returning to the bottom. Indeed, George Mallory's own son John Mallory, who was only three years old when his father died, said:

"To me the only way you achieve a summit is to come back alive. The job is half done if you don't get down again".

However, it is known that John Mallory had considerably mixed feelings about his dead father's celebrity status, explaining understandably that he would far rather have had a father than a legend. A similar perspective was echoed by Sir Edmund Hillary who asked:

"If you climb a mountain for the first time and die on the descent, is it really a complete first ascent of the mountain? I am rather inclined to think personally that maybe it is quite important, the getting down, and the complete climb of a mountain is reaching the summit and getting safely to the bottom again."

In conclusion, Chris Bonington, the widely respected British Himalayan mountaineer, summed up the view of many mountaineers all over the world:

"If we accept the fact that they were above the Second Step, they would have seemed to be incredibly close to the summit of Everest and I think at that stage something takes hold of most climbers... And I think therefore taking all those circumstances in view... I think it is quite conceivable that they did go for the summit... I certainly would love to think that they actually reached the summit of Everest. I think it is a lovely thought and I think it is something, you know, gut emotion, yes I would love them to have got there. Whether they did or not, I think that is something one just cannot know."

References

Mallory as a Young Man

External links

MountainWorld Photography – The photographer website from the 1999, 2001, & 2004 Mallory & Irvine Research Expeditions.
Lost on Everest – In January 2000, PBS broadcast the story of the 1999 Nova expedition to locate the bodies of George Mallory and Andrew Irvine.
Alpine History – Overviews of the 1999 and 2001 research expeditions and findings, plus remarks on subsequent search attempts.
2004 Expedition to find the cameras
The British Hero Who Died on Everest
Mount Everest 1924 photographs – John Noel's photographs from the 1924 expedition.
BBC: Replica clothes pass Everest test