Fearless on Everest: The Quest for Sandy Irvine

by Julie Summers

  Sandy had minutely organized the travel arrangements to Llanfairfechan. The family arrived by car, train and he by motorbike complete with sidecar, to Alec and Tur’s delight. The holiday was spent walking, scrambling and biking in the hills. Kenneth was now old enough to join in with Sandy and Evelyn. Four years younger than Sandy and five years older than Alec, he was what he as an adult described as a ‘staircase child’. He was strong, athletic and fearless with a great sense of humour and this endeared him to their friends. Sandy even let him ride his precious motorbike.

  The two youngest boys looked up to the three eldest with more than a touch of awe. Hugh was, after all, twelve years older than Alec and fourteen years older than Tur. Evelyn they adored as an older sister, but Sandy was really special to them. More than either of the other two he was fun. Alec recalled the utter thrill he felt when Sandy put him in the sidecar of his motorbike and took off up into the hills above Gladys cottage. He couldn’t see out very well but the occasion made a deep impression on him, one which in later life, when thinking about Sandy’s motorbike, he recalled with great glee.

  It was with the sidecar attached that my own happy memories are concerned. Llanfairfechan was, in those days, the centre of a number of small bridle-ways just big enough for a motor-bicycle combination. My younger brother and I were often pressed (to our great delight) in to “hold the sidecar down”. My recollection is looking over the side of the sidecar down onto the top of fir trees, and of bracken flashing by at our nose level. But I have never been back again to make the great mistake of refurbishing those early memories.

  The motorbike, a Clyno, had been acquired for Sandy two years earlier and he was very proud of it. His parents despaired of his adventures on the bike and tried, in vain, to stop him from undertaking some of his more hair-raising exploits. One day during the holiday Sandy had the bright idea that he should attempt to ride the Clyno over the Carneddau and back to Llanfairfechan, something no one had apparently attempted before. He went against the express wishes of Lilian and Willie but when he set his mind on proving something to himself he was not easily deterred. There was no mountain track up to the ridge and the way was entirely pioneered by him. On the summit of Foel Vras, the third highest of the Carneddau, he came upon a couple who were walking across the range. Unsure of his exact bearings he enquired politely whether he was heading in the right direction for Llanfairfechan. The man replied that he was and Sandy thanked them and went on his way. The couple, Noel and Mona Odell, who were on a walking and climbing holiday in North Wales, were very struck by what Odell later described as the intrepid young motorcyclist. Sandy’s feat attracted great attention locally and at least three newspapers carried the story of the young man who had been brave enough to take a motorcycle into the mountains. One of the local papers reported: ‘Mr Andrew Irvine, son of Mr Fergusson Irvine, of Liverpool, who is staying at Gladys Cottage, Llanfairfechan, has ridden a motor-cycle to the top of Foel Vras, which is 3000 ft high. There is hardly any track up the mountain which is very steep.’ Sandy, who shied away from bragging, nevertheless carried this press cutting in his wallet, which was returned from Everest by Odell after his death, so there must have been a certain amount of quiet personal pride in his achievement.

  When Odell met Sandy on top of the Carneddau he was twenty-nine and at the peak of his strength and fitness. He had been a member of the Alpine Club since 1916 and was considered to be a climber of some note, having made difficult ascents in the Alps, including the Aiguille du Tour in the Mont Blanc range in 1908 at the age of eighteen. Like many climbers Odell had begun his career in the back garden. As a very young boy he started climbing elm trees with his sisters and soon graduated to illicit roof climbing at the family house in Brighton in his early teens. On a family holiday in the Lake District when Odell was fourteen he made a secret and unauthorized ascent of Causey Pike, a fell near the western shore of Derwent Water, which he thereafter termed his ‘nursery slope’. Even this modest 2000ft hill provided a slight challenge: it was a very hot day and he became thirsty, so he took a drink for a mountain beck only to discover a few feet further higher up a dead sheep lying in the water. Needless to say on his return to the family he was considerably unwell.

  Eventually his family was forced to acknowledge his love of climbing and in 1910, at the age of twenty, he was introduced by his father to the brothers Ashley and George Abraham of Keswick. George was a gifted and respected photographer, but he was also an able climber. Before the First World War the Abraham brothers had published a book on rock climbs in Wales that at the time had provoked something of an ideological debate. Some argued that climbers should seek routes for themselves rather than relying on publications to guide them, others were less discreet and were plainly annoyed that their territory had been invaded by ‘outsiders’, climbers from the Lake District. George arranged for Odell to be given climbing instruction by George Woodhouse, a teacher from Sedburgh School. Together they climbed many of the famous Lakeland crags including Raven Crag and Bowfell Buttress.

  With climbing skills more finely honed Odell returned to the Alps where he did twelve seasons in the company of some of the best known Alpinists of the day. It was on one of these trips that he climbed with R. A. Frazer, with whom he later made two trips to Spitsbergen, one of the Norwegian islands inside the Arctic Circle. Odell was not only admired by his fellow climbers, he was loved by them. As a man he was genial, easy-going and loyal. He never forgot his friends and was, for the whole of his life, a great letter writer.

  In the summer of 1920 Sandy again encountered Odell in North Wales. This time he was with Evelyn. According to Odell they shared a car with a mutual friend who was driving them to climb Tryfan. Strangely neither party made themselves known to the other although they both record the fact that the meeting took place. Evelyn at that stage was wearing her hair in a bob and was often dressed in shorts and was on more than one occasion taken for a boy, something she rather relished. They ran up Tryfan in plimsolls, passing Odell and his climbing partner who were better equipped with hobnailed boots and proper climbing gear. Evelyn used to love telling the story of this escapade when the two of them were seriously frowned upon by the ‘real’ climbers who were overheard to say ‘bloody young fools!’ as she and Sandy ran past them.

  The following year the family borrowed a house from a business associate of Willie’s called Crow How, a beautiful Lakeland stone house about half a mile outside Ambleside. It had ten bedrooms and extensive gardens so there was plenty of room for guests. That year they were joined by four of Evelyn’s friends from school, including Audrey Pim who was a talented amateur photographer. She captured much of the atmosphere of the holiday in her photograph album, recording meticulously all the places they visited, the excursions they made and the sports they played. Apart from tennis and golf, at which Sandy and Audrey teamed up and won convincingly, they also made their way into the hills. Typically, where Sandy was involved, these trips frequently turned into outings with an interesting added dimension. Sandy, Evelyn and Kenneth, accompanied by John Bromfield and Audrey, climbed Helvellyn via Striding Edge. The trek is a good four hours from Glenridding, at the southern end of Ullswater, and the exciting bit of the climb comes close to the end via the spectacularly precipitous Striding Edge, a rocky arête or ridge, which drops away on one side some 600 feet to Red Tarn and on the other side some 1000 feet into the valley of Patterdale. Even under the most perfect and windless conditions it is a strenuous pull uphill from Glenridding and then a very alarming few hundred feet along the ridge, which is not for the faint-hearted nor those with no head for heights. Sandy had elected to climb the arête at sunset, which added a certain drama and excitement and meant that as they ran down the back side of the mountain towards Thirlmere they were descending in the dark. It must have been pitch dark by the time they reached the summit. Audrey snapped a beautiful shot of Striding Edge from below just as the sun was disappearing over the summit horizon.

  On leavin
g Shrewsbury in 1921, Sandy applied to study chemistry at Magdalen College, Oxford. He had been preceded to Oxford by Hugh, who was reading History at Magdalen, and Evelyn, who was reading Inorganic Chemistry under the auspices of the Recognized Society of Women Students, which later became St Anne’s College.

  Sandy’s academic record was found wanting, although he had succeeded in passing his Higher Certificate in Physics, Chemistry and Mathematics. Even in the days when academic qualifications were not the only requirement for securing a place at the university, the Master, Sir Herbert Warren, felt unable to offer him a place. Sir Herbert later deeply regretted the decision but at the time Sandy was left wondering which college might accept him. He knew full well that his rowing record would count greatly in his favour and he turned to his friend and former housemaster, C.J. Baker who himself had been at Merton College at the end of the nineteenth century. Baker knew and liked Merton’s Warden, T. E. Dowman, and put in a good word for Sandy. It was agreed that he would be offered a place at the college subject to his attending a crammer for the Michaelmas term of 1921 and passing Responsions, the examination formally required to qualify for entry as an undergraduate at Oxford University.

  The crammer was run by A. Theodosius, another friend of Dowman, and was located in Merton Street, a mere throw from Sandy’s prospective college. Once there Sandy made a great effort to get to grips with Latin, Greek and modern languages but it was a struggle. At the time when he was sweating away at the crammer the selection process for the university boat crew was underway starting with the ‘Varsity Fours - in which each college enters its very best crew, including Blues, then followed by the Trial VIIIs held at Wallingford in early December. One of his overriding reasons for wishing to get to Oxford was to continue his rowing career and in December 1921 it must have looked to him as if he would have to bide his time for a whole year before taking part in trials for the Boat Race. This would have been an irritation to him, because, as usual, he had his sights set high on a place in the university crew.

  But his work at the crammer paid off and by the end of December 1921 Willie Irvine had received two letters. One was from Theodosius and the other from Dowman. Theodosius had grown to like Sandy over the term and was prepared to recommend him to Merton although he could not help mentioning to Willie the ‘meagre knowledge of Latin and French he brought with him… His French prose had some serious howlers.’ He concluded the letter: ‘The Boy is a bit overworked just now but I hope he will quickly pick up. I have liked having him – he is persona grata with us all and I have found him reliable in every way.’ Dowman was prepared to look leniently on Sandy’s application, presumably in view of what Theodosius had said about him but also because he was doubtless keen to have someone of Sandy’s athletic brilliance, which would bring benefit to the college. He wrote to Willie: ‘We are willing to admit your son into residence next term in spite of his not having passed the whole of Responsions.’ With some relief Willie relayed this good news to Sandy who took up his rooms in college on 20 January 1922, although he was made to re-sit his Responsions three times until he finally passed them all in the Autumn of 1922.

  Merton College, despite its peaceful appearance, had a reputation for gaiety which extended back to the Civil War and for many years it was reputed to have the best kitchen in Oxford. By the 1920s the college was in the capable, if at times controversial hands of H. W. Garrod, a tutor in Literature and Classics. Although Sandy had little to do with Garrod academically he knew him well from the bowls’ games on the college lawns, a regular fixture that along with chess, allowed Garrod regular contact with the undergraduates. Merton admitted about twenty new students each year, so that the total number of people in the college including the fellows and dons, numbered about 120. Sandy was given an attic room overlooking one of the courtyards. He shared a staircase and a ‘scout’ with an American called Alatan Tamchiboulac Wilder, known as ‘AT’ a fellow sportsman and subsequent close friend. The scouts were man servants who attended to the needs of the undergraduates, lighting fires in their rooms and making them breakfast each morning. The scouts were more than just mere servants and took great pride in their men and the antics they got involved in. Sandy quickly established a good relationship with his scout, Owen Brown, and soon trusted him to look after his goods and affairs on his behalf. Brown later described Sandy as a ‘kind friend’ to him.

  Sandy’s closest friend at Oxford, though, was a man called Geoffrey Milling, who had come up to Merton the previous year from Radley. Milling came from the Isle of Wight and shared with Sandy a distinguished school rowing career. They met in their first week when Sandy was offered a place in the Oxford Boat and Milling was rowing at 7. They had a lot in common, apart from their passion for rowing, and Milling was instrumental in ensuring that Sandy was quickly immersed in College life.

  Much has been made of the hedonistic atmosphere that pervaded Oxford in the 1920s and the image of the cultivated, fun-loving student from an upper-class background for whom university was nothing but a ‘sort of passionate party all the time’. Louis MacNeice, a contemporary of Sandy’s at Merton, wrote in his autobiography: ‘I had not gone to Oxford to study; that was what grammar-school boys did. We products of the English public schools went to Oxford either for sport and beer-drinking, in which case we filled in time deriding the intellectuals, or for the aesthetic life and cocktails, in which case we filled in time deriding the athletes.’ That is not however the whole picture and Sandy, anyway, did not belong to the group of aesthetes on whom this rather idyllic image is based. During the 1920s there was a growing number of students who were silly of a set purpose, which confused the dons who could not understand why such young men blessed with a keen logic should occupy themselves so much with idiosyncrasies of manners and dress.

  For Sandy the change from public school to Merton appeared never to be a problem. First, the regime at Shrewsbury had been somewhat more enlightened and relaxed than in other public schools and, secondly, there can be no doubt that coming into Merton with an outstanding rowing career behind him he was quickly included in the elite of the college. He became something of an instantaneous celebrity when he was offered, in his first week, a place in the university boat – a singular honour and distinction for a freshman and a mark of his strength as an oarsman. The decision taken by 1922 President of the Oxford University Boat Club (OUBC), D. T. Raikes, to include Sandy in his crew was a bold one. What led to its being taken is not recorded but he clearly felt confident in requisitioning the untried freshman, who had missed the Trial VIIIs in December by not yet being a member of the university. By all accounts he was not disappointed. Sandy was singled out by the local press who, whilst observing the training in February, deemed him to be a decided acquisition. Training for the Boat Race was neither as scientific nor as arduous then as it is now, nevertheless it was a punishing schedule and the crew had only two and a half months to prepare before they were to race Cambridge on 1 April. During that time the crew were relieved of their studies and trained first in Oxford and then Henley, where they stayed in the Leander Club, before moving down to the tideway at Putney at the beginning of March for the final days of training.

  The Oxford and Cambridge Boat Race predates the Henley Royal Regatta by ten years. It has been rowed on the tidal Thames in London since 1830 and from Putney to Mortlake, a distance of 4 miles 374 yards in a time of about 20 minutes since 1845. In the nature of all such events, the Boat Race is a private challenge match between the two universities concerned and as such has only its own rules. The formal challenge is made annually and the conditions of the race do not change except by mutual agreement. The popularity of the Boat Race was ascribed by Gully Nickalls, President of the OUBC in 1923, to the Englishman’s innate respect and affection for routine, at any rate as regards his sporting fixtures. The fact that it is rowed in March, a month when the country can expect anything from bright sunshine to a blizzard, may too have something to do with its popularity. ‘The sigh
t of sixteen young men rowing up the river in the minimum of clothing’, Nickalls wrote, ‘is a hopeful and encouraging sign; a harbinger of the warm days of summer which, ever optimistic, we believe are waiting for us in a few weeks’ time.’ From the point of view of the oarsmen, past and present, it was and is a singular honour to be asked to take part in the Race and to be a member of a winning crew is a matter of lifetime pride. This was very much the case in the 1920s, when Sandy was rowing, all the more so because Oxford had not won the Race since 1913 and it was becoming something of a concern to the OUBC that they were consistently outperformed by their rivals.

  The OUBC in 1922 was able to draw on the expertise of three immensely experienced coaches, Dr Gilbert Bourne, E. D. Horsfall and Harcourt Gold, who worked hard and uniformly together. They succeeded in impressing the rowing journalists who reckoned the 1922 crew were almost up to the standard of the 1912 crew, the last but one to beat Cambridge. In the Race Oxford did not live up to their early promise and were beaten by Cambridge in a fast time by four and a half lengths. The critics held that the Oxford crew lacked experience and that the younger men would have to be worked hard if their form was to improve. Of Sandy, one testy correspondent wrote: ‘Irvine is quite promising, and he will finish more firmly when he has more experience.’