Last Hours on Everest: The gripping story of Mallory and Irvine’s fatal ascent

Last Hours on Everest: The gripping story of Mallory and Irvine’s fatal ascent
Graham Hoyland

Литагент HarperCollins

Contents

Cover (#u0553975d-9c19-5588-92d8-d3851714f638)

Title Page (#litres_trial_promo)

Preface (#ulink_b09e8d1b-d7ec-5054-b7b9-5413c7216f8b)

Prologue (#ulink_18fdf758-a490-5dbb-9d00-161b16e76090)

1 Start of an Obsession (#ulink_ef7defd3-41b2-5a7c-87f6-635b7050e480)

2 Getting the Measure of the Mountain (#ulink_01e4e77b-8a5d-5d08-b71d-b9eed1aa6e98)

3 Renaissance Men (#ulink_86bd9722-ac74-57b8-81cf-4b23da4d1844)

4 Galahad of Everest (#ulink_bb67df26-5dff-5a87-8756-df383e9df79f)

5 The Reconnaissance of 1921 (#ulink_af799936-8373-5da5-862a-9226b3ec0687)

6 The Expedition of 1922 (#ulink_c45c8bfa-fbb7-5793-b187-3627c3f71769)

7 1922, and the First Attempt to Climb Mount Everest (#litres_trial_promo)

8 ‘No trace can be found, given up hope …’ (#litres_trial_promo)

9 A Pilgrim’s Progress (#litres_trial_promo)

10 John Hoyland and a New Clue (#litres_trial_promo)

11 I First Set Eyes on Mount Everest (#litres_trial_promo)

12 High Mountains, Cold Seas (#litres_trial_promo)

13 The Finding of Mallory’s Body (#litres_trial_promo)

14 When Did Everest Get So Easy? (#litres_trial_promo)

15 Why Do You Climb? (#litres_trial_promo)

16 What Does Mount Everest Mean? (#litres_trial_promo)

17 The Theorists and Their Theories (#litres_trial_promo)

18 Wearing Some Old Clothes (#litres_trial_promo)

19 Perfect Weather for the Job (#litres_trial_promo)

20 Utterly Impregnable (#litres_trial_promo)

21 What Was in His Mind? (#litres_trial_promo)

22 Weighing the Evidence (#litres_trial_promo)

23 The Last Hours (#litres_trial_promo)

Postscript: Goodbye to Everest (#litres_trial_promo)

Chronology (#litres_trial_promo)

Notes (#litres_trial_promo)

Credits (#litres_trial_promo)

Acknowledgements (#litres_trial_promo)

Picture Section (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Author (#litres_trial_promo)

Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Publisher (#litres_trial_promo)

Preface (#u06d386a6-a3b9-55cb-b70d-5a5c09aa74c9)

Mount Everest has been my arena. I have spent over two years of my life on the mountain, returning there again and again. I am drawn back because I see there the extremes of human experience played out in the most dramatic surroundings: greed and betrayal, loyalty and courage, endurance and defeat. It is a moral crucible in which we are tested, and usually found wanting. It has cost me my marriage, my home and half my possessions. Twice Everest has nearly killed me. But I find it utterly addictive. And so did George Mallory.

This volume is going to add to the vast pile of books about Mount Everest, a pile that must now must be higher than the mountain. I make no apology for this, for I think I have finally solved the mystery of what happened there on 8 June 1924, when Mallory and his young companion Sandy Irvine disappeared into clouds, climbing strongly towards the top.

My family had a unique relationship with Everest, and this helped me to climb the mountain and to find clues to what happened to Mallory, its most famous opponent. I spent a long time looking for his body, and then I spent a long time trying to prove that he climbed his nemesis before it killed him.

This is going to be a personal story, a detective thriller, a biography and a history book.

I hope it will set the record straight about how Mallory was found. It is about other things, too, such as why we believe in gods and mountains.

Most of all, though, it is about my life-long hunt for an answer to the greatest mystery in mountaineering: who first climbed Mount Everest?

Prologue (#u06d386a6-a3b9-55cb-b70d-5a5c09aa74c9)

Dawn broke fine on that fatal day. A couple of thousand feet above the tiny canvas tent the summit of the world’s highest mountain stood impassively, waiting for someone to have the courage to approach.

Inside the ice-crusted shelter, two forms lay as still as death. Then there was a groan, a stirring, and eventually the slow scratch of match against sandpaper. Low voices shared the high-altitude agonies of waking, the heating of water and the struggle with frozen boots.

As the sun rose through wisps of cloud beyond the Tibetan hills to the east, one of the men emerged through the tent flaps. It was a fine morning for the attempt, with only a few clouds in the sky. The two of them stood for a while, shuffling their feet and blowing into their hands. Inside the tent lay a mess of sleeping bags and food. The men lifted oxygen sets onto their backs, then turned towards the mountain and stamped off into history.