Fearless on Everest: The Quest for Sandy Irvine (42 page)

For a few hours, the tragedy was an entirely personal one but they knew that as soon as the news broke it would be in all the newspapers.   It was decided that Lilian should remain in Wales with the younger children whilst Willie coped with what they rightly suspected would be an avalanche of letters and press enquiries.  Willie certainly had been aware of the dangers Sandy was facing when he went to climb Everest and he had followed closely the story of the expedition, its difficulties, its dramas, all of which had been played out on a public stage.  But I think nothing prepares you for the shock of the death of one of your children and he must have been heartbroken.  He did not show it.

The following morning the story was all over the press but Willie got up and went to work as usual.  Walking across the park to the station he met an acquaintance, a Mr Angus, whom he knew slightly.  They fell into step and chatted about inconsequential matters until they arrived at the station to take their respective trains.  Angus got into his office to be confronted with the newspaper headlines detailing the deaths of Sandy and Mallory.  He was deeply shocked and could scarcely believe that he had prattled away to Willie ‘who never for an instant disclosed what must have been a terrible sorrow’.

Evelyn was taking her final exams on the Saturday morning.  After breakfast a group of Sandy’s friends, including A. T. Wilder, turned up at her boarding house in Oxford and hustled her, in a familiar cloak-and-dagger operation into the back of a cab, the windows of which were blacked out.  The spirit of the ‘kidnapping’ convinced her that it was another of their pranks and she went into the exams unaware of the news which was breaking around her.  It was only after she emerged from the room that she encountered those same friends from whom she now learned of the news of Sandy’s death.  They put her onto a train for Birkenhead where she joined her father that evening.

On the Sunday Lilian attended the local church in Llandyrnog where the family was already well known and liked, Sandy having featured twice in the parish magazine. Pink Willie led a service in which prayers were offered in his memory and in support of the family.  This was a great comfort to them all, especially Lilian, who had always sought advice and solace in her trust in God.  Pink Willie had known Sandy who, with the family, had attended services in the beautiful fifteenth-century church, and was as moved as the rest of his congregation by the news of the tragedy.  He wrote later in the parish magazine ‘The death of Mr A C Irvine Plas Ffordd Ddwr Cottage, the youngest member of the Mount Everest Expedition, has brought great grief to us all, and our deepest sympathy goes out to Mr and Mrs Irvine and family.  It is reported that Mr A C Irvine and Mr Mallory were last seen at 11 o’clock on June 8
^th
(Whit Sunday) at a height of 28,000ft and “going strong for the top”.  They have given their lives but they have not lost them.  May they rest in peace.’ 

Willie and Evelyn attended matins at St Mark’s in Birkenhead, which was full to capacity with people shocked and grieved by the news of the loss of two Birkenhead men.  Many of them knew the family well and had known Sandy since he was a little boy.  The Mayor of Birkenhead ordered the flag on the Town Hall to be flown half-mast from Saturday at 1pm and all day Sunday.  That afternoon they were joined by Dick Summers who had read of the tragedy in the newspaper in his hotel room in London.  He was due to take part in time trials that day, but he cancelled and drove straight to Birkenhead to be with Evelyn.

As the news of the Everest disaster broke, the press went crazy.  They had only the telegram sent by Norton to the Mount Everest Committee and Norton’s earlier dispatches on which to base their articles.  The lack of information led to wild speculation and dramatic headlines:  ‘The Battle with Everest: The Mountain’s Heavy Toll, ‘Victors of Everest, ‘Triumph Frustrated by Death: Two Lives Lost, ‘Did Everest Climbers Reach the Top?’   In newspaper terms it was a marvellous story and the press certainly made the most of it.  Everyone who had an opinion expressed it, the papers full of arguments for and against their having achieved the summit.  Had the oxygen given out?  Did you in fact need oxygen to climb Everest?  Did they fall, were they benighted? 

Then there were the eulogies.  People wrote of Sandy’s courage, his strength, his rowing prowess, his work with the oxygen apparatus and, above all, of his cheerful disposition.  They spoke of his youth and of what might have become of him had he lived.  A
Times
journalist concluded: ‘In accepting the offer to go to Tibet he, too, knew that he was facing inevitable risks, and for those who knew and loved him his untimely death, at so early and age, is a peculiarly tragic ending to the great adventure in which he engaged.’

On 5 July the
Times
published Norton’s dispatch containing the details of the last climb which he had sent on 11 June 1924.  It had been composed while he was still snowblind at Camp III on 8 June, dictated to Geoffrey Bruce, detailing the story of his and Somervell’s climb.  Once he had arrived in Base Camp he penned a footnote to his dispatch which started: ‘With the deepest regret I add these few lines continuing the above dispatch.  Mallory and Irvine perished on the mountain beyond all doubt.’  He described briefly the facts of the disappearance as he understood them, but had not at this point met up with Odell who was still on his way down from Camp III.  He described the two men as having been seen ‘going strong for the top’ by Odell at about 11 a.m.  This was the first concrete evidence about the accident and was only revised when Odell wrote up his own story three days later.  

Norton continued to send home dispatches to the
Times
in which he was able to deal in much greater detail with individual aspects of the expedition.  In one article he dealt solely with the difficulties of climbing at altitude, writing eloquently of the great effort required at high altitude merely putting on his boots or making a cup of tea.  In another he considered the possibility that Everest would one day be climbed, concluding, ‘The conquest of Everest is almost certainly assured.  Sooner or later some climber as brave and skilful as the men of the Third Expedition, and with fortune better than theirs, will penetrate the last fastnessess of the highest mountain on earth, and gaze from its utmost peak on the wondrous world beneath him.’  And in a third piece Geoffrey Bruce assessed the contribution made by the porters.  As these appeared, further articles flowed from the pens of Longstaff, General Bruce and Younghusband, amongst many others, paying tribute not only to Sandy and Mallory, but to the other members of the expedition.  Longstaff described the expedition of 1922 as a picnic in comparison to 1924.

It was Odell’s story, however, that really captured people’s imagination.  His account of the last sighting appeared in the
Times
on 10 July and what he wrote has fascinated climbers for over seventy-five years:

At 12:50, just after I had emerged in a state of jubilation at finding the first definite fossils on Everest, there was a sudden clearing of the atmosphere, and the entire summit ridge, and the final peak of Everest became unveiled.  My eyes became fixed on one tiny black spot silhouetted on a small snowcrest beneath a rock-step in the ridge, and the black spot moved.  Another black spot became apparent and moved up the snow to join the other on the crest.  The first then approached the great rock-step and shortly emerged at the top; the second did likewise.  Then the whole fascinating vision vanished, enveloped in cloud once more.  There was but one explanation.  It was Mallory and his companion moving, as I could see even at that great distance, with considerable alacrity, realizing doubtless that they had none too many hours of daylight to reach the summit from their present position and return to Camp VI, at night fall.  The place on the ridge mentioned is a prominent rock-step at a very short distance from the base of the final pyramid, and it was remarkable that they were so late in reaching this place.

This account was written before Odell had left Base Camp.  He maintained that Sandy and Mallory had probably been benighted on the mountain and would have died of exposure.  As to whether they made it to the top or not he wrote: ‘in my opinion, from the position in which they were last seen, they should have reached the summit at 4 pm at latest, unless some unforeseen and particularly difficult obstacle presented itself on the final pyramid’.

He was the only member of the 1924 expedition who held fast to the belief that Sandy and Mallory had summitted successfully.  Norton convinced himself and the others that it was unlikely, given the lateness of the hour, and he maintained that there had been a simple mountaineering accident in which they had both died.  It was this version of events that, ultimately, became most widely accepted but the debate raged on with a few notable dissenters remaining convinced that Everest had been conquered.

Mallory and Sandy became common property and the nation swallowed it up.  So great was the interest that the King’s telegram to the families was published in the
Times
under the headline ‘Everest Disaster. The King’s Message ‘Two Gallant Explorers’.  It read:

The King is greatly distressed to hear the sad news of the death of Mr. Mallory and Mr. Irvine, who lost their lives in making a final attempt to reach the summit of Mount Everest.  His Majesty asks whether you [Younghusband] will be good enough to convey to the families of these two gallant explorers, as well as to the Mount Everest Committee, an expression of his sincere sympathy.  They will ever be remembered as fine examples of mountaineers, ready to risk their lives for their companions and to face dangers on behalf of science and discovery.’

Another announcement appeared in the
Times
a day or so later:  ‘The dance at the Speaker’s House on July 11, for which Mrs. Whitley had sent out invitations, is cancelled, owing to the death on Mount Everest of Mr. A. C. Irvine, who was a close personal friend of a large number of the guests invited.’

Memorial services for Sandy and Mallory were held all over the country, at their old schools and universities and in their home town of Birkenhead. 

In the mean time Willie and Evelyn were busy fielding the hundreds of letters and cards of condolence which came flooding in from everyone who had known or claimed to have known Sandy.  So great was the volume of correspondence that Evelyn called Aunt Ankie to come over to Birkenhead to help out with the task.  Every letter was read, listed and replied to by one of the three of them.  The list runs to over 500 and contained amongst it a beautiful letter from Ruth Mallory, a moving tribute from General Bruce’s wife, letters from Unna, Longstaff, Noel, from his school masters and university tutors and a simple but extraordinary letter from Peter Lunn, Sandy’s runner-up in the Strang-Watkin Challenge Cup in Mürren in January 1924.  Peter was nine and his father, Arnold, told Lilian that the letter was written entirely without input from himself or his wife.

‘Dear Mrs Irvine,

I am so sorry that Mr Irvine was killed on Mt Everest.  I think that it is much worse for you than for Mr Irvine.  For it is quite likely he died a painless death and now he is quite happy in heaven with Mr Mallory and other great explorers like himself.  Besides, perhaps he has the honour in Heaven of having climbed Mt. Everest.  He was constantly admired at Mürren, especially by me.

I admired and loved him for that great gift, which many who are as great as he cannot control, that gift of modesty.

At Mürren in the skiing he was always so cheery.  He took bad luck and misfortunes in the skiing line so quietly.  He kept away from all praise if he could and he would not let anybody get into any skiing book the fact he was going on Everest.

At the Palace he and I were next door, so he explained to me all about compasses, barometers, oxygen etc. without showing any sign of getting bored of my questions.  I especially loved that side of his modesty that enabled him to speak to me as though I were a grown up.

I am very sorry for you at having lost your son, for having a mother, I know what it would be like.

Your affectionate Peter Northcote Lunn’

This letter, more than any of the other seventy-odd which Willie chose to keep, catches me out every time I read it.  I found it in May 2000 and sought Peter’s permission to publish it.  He had no recollection of writing the letter but his memories of Sandy are still very strong and he feels sure that it accurately reflects the admiration and sadness he felt when he learned of Sandy’s death.  It seems to say everything about Sandy and to say it so bluntly and honestly that I really feel there is nothing in any of the other letters, some of which are deeply compassionate and moving, that can add to Peter’s sentiments.

The first memorial service for Sandy was held in Merton College Chapel on 26 June 1924.  The immediate family was represented by Sandy’s younger brother Kenneth, who was already in Oxford.  He wrote to his mother the following day: ‘People at Oxford were very nice to me indeed.  I stayed up for the service but it was too much for me – I don’t think I can face the Shrewsbury Service next Sunday evening after it.’ He listed all the people who were at the Merton Service including several Irvine aunts and uncles and a whole host of Sandy’s friends including Milling, Ian Bruce, George Binney and A. T. Wilder.  Kenneth concluded: ‘If there is anything that I can do to help in any way, and in any fraction to strive to fill the gap, do let me know.’

Willie and Lilian were not at the Merton service as they had chosen to go with Evelyn to a local one, one which for them was probably the most deeply moving of any of the services dedicated to the memory of Sandy and Mallory.  It was held in St John’s Church, Birkenhead on the same day.  It opened with the hymn ‘For Ever with Thee Lord!’ and the lesson was taken from Revelation 7, verses 9 to the end, which concludes ‘For the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters; and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.’  Mallory’s father, the Revd Herbert Leigh-Mallory, took the service.  ‘How much braver can you be,’ Evelyn once asked my father with her back turned in typical Irvine fashion, ‘than to take the memorial service for your own son?’