Conquistadors of the Useless

by Roberts, David, Terray, Lionel, Sutton, Geoffrey

  It will be seen that the north face of the Eiger is defended by an extraordinary accumulation of difficulties and dangers. Few will deny that its reputation for inaccessibility, which had grown over the years, was well merited. Yet these very barriers, by defending it successfully against all comers, grew into positive attractions for those who sought high adventure. From all over Europe the mountaineering elite gathered to lay siege.

  A party from Munich made the first assault in 1929. In 1934 three Germans got as far as Eigerwand Station before the leader fell, and they were saved by ropes dropped to them from the window. The first serious attempt, and one of the most remarkable, was made by two daring Bavarian climbers, Karl Mehringer and Max Sedlmayer. They had done a number of the hardest climbs in the northern limestone Alps, but this was their first visit to the really big ranges. They launched their attack in perfect weather on Wednesday August the 11th, mounting quickly as far as the foot of the Rote Fluh, where they proceeded to force directly the enormous featureless wall below the first ice field. This prodigious exploit, which still earns the admiration of connoisseurs, took up a whole day of extremely difficult climbing. Although the difficulties were less after their first bivouac the two climbers must have been tired, moving so slowly that they did not reach the second ice field until Thursday afternoon. There the stone falls were so frequent that they had to stop and bivouac again. That night a violent storm broke over the mountain, followed by snow and heavy frost. By dawn the face was plastered with snow and black ice, rendering it completely out of condition, and it remained masked in cloud all day so that it was impossible to know what was happening. On Saturday the mists cleared for a moment around noon, when the two were spotted on the small spur which limits the left end of the large ice field, but soon their agonies were hidden again from the eyes of the world.

  Their corpses were carried down by the winter avalanches and later found by parties searching for yet other victims. Two pitons now marked the new borders of the unknown. But the tragic ending of the story did not discourage others from trying their chances, and the early summer of 1936 found three more German ropes at Scheidegg. Weather and conditions were not at first conducive to an all-out attempt, so the six men set up camp and spent their time reconnoitring the face and getting fit on other mountains. In a sense the Eigerwand thus indirectly claimed a third victim when Teufel was killed on a training climb. Despite the almost incessant bad weather the four who remained made several reconnaissances, in the course of which they carried loads up to the foot of the Rote Fluh and in particular found an easier way up it. During one of these explorations a climber fell a hundred and twenty feet, but landed on snow and did not hurt himself.

  It may be as well to introduce these four young men, who were shortly to die in one of the most terrible of all mountain dramas. The first rope consisted of two young Bavarians. Toni Kurz was a professional guide who had done a number of first ascents in the eastern Alps, and Andreas Hinterstoisser had been his constant companion. Their biggest climb had been the north face of the Cima Grande. They formed a strong party in themselves, capable of confronting the most difficult rock climbs. Unfortunately the same could not be said about their two Austrian companions, Willy Angerer and Edi Rainer from Innsbruck. There is no doubt that they were competent climbers, but not yet having done any big ascents they were hardly qualified to tackle the Eigerwand.

  The weather appeared to change at last, and both parties set out at 2 a.m. on July 18th under a sky full of stars. Moving quickly, they soon reached the foot of the Rote Fluh, where Hinterstoisser led them up the new and cunning route they had discovered. This involved a very difficult overhanging crack, followed by a daring tension traverse to the left. Having reached the first snow field in good time they took five hours to climb the short wall separating it from the second, and installed their bivouac at seven o’clock in the evening. They had climbed a good half of the face that day. If the difficulties became no greater they had every chance of reaching the summit.

  During the night the weather started to change, and heavy clouds began to trail across the face. No doubt because of this dubious outlook the party did not set out from the bivouac until 6.45 a.m., cutting steps slowly across the ice field towards the left. The fog grew thicker and thicker until the watchers on the Kleine Scheidegg lost sight of the climbers. Not until the following morning could the second bivouac site be seen: it was almost exactly the same as that used by Sedlmayer and Mehringer. Nobody could understand why progress had been so slow on the second day, and it was generally supposed that the party must be exhausted and would therefore retreat. At eight o clock in the morning, however, the men were observed advancing once more. After a few hours they turned back, and it could be seen that one of them had a wound on the head.[1] The first bivouac site had almost been reached when further clouds obscured it from view. A clearing at about 5 p.m. revealed the party descending the wall between the two ice fields. All due precautions were being taken, and two men were looking after the injured one, so that it was not until nine o’clock at night that they reached the lower ice field.

  By the following morning the weather was definitely bad, and it rained and snowed abundantly. Voices could be heard on the face from dawn onwards, and at 11 a.m. the four men were seen at the foot of the first ice field. At noon the stationmaster climbed out of the Stollenloch and heard the party in action some six hundred feet above him. Thinking that they would be descending to the observation gallery, he went off and made tea. As they still did not arrive he went out again and managed to make contact with them by shouting. They said they were all safe and sound. Two hours later he tried again, but this time there was nothing to be heard but cries of distress. He therefore telephoned the Eigergletscher Station for a rescue party, where the guides Hans Schlunegger and Christian and Adolf Rubi happened to be on the spot and were quickly sent up on a special train. That day the three guides reached a point about three hundred feet below Toni Kurz, who was half hanging from a rope, half holding himself on to the vertical face by small holds. He called down that he was the sole survivor and that as he had no more pitons he could descend no further. In this terrible position he passed his fourth night on the wall. Next morning the rescue party set out again at 4 a.m., augmented by the guide Arnold Glatthard, and reached the foot of the Rote Fluh. Kurz was tied on some hundred and twenty feet above them, and they had no trouble in speaking to him. He called out:

  ‘I’m the only one left. Rainer died of cold higher up, Hinterstoisser fell off last night, and Angerer’s hanging on the rope strangled.’

  Kurz then carried out a series of tasks at the behest of his rescuers that gave proof of his exceptional toughness and courage. His only chance was to free the rope to which he was tied, so that he could then pull up pitons and a rope to rappel on. To this end he descended as far as Angerer, who was hanging some forty feet lower down, cut him clear, then climbed back up the rope to the tiny stance he had just left. Despite his frostbitten hands he spent several hours untangling the forty feet of rope he had thus recovered, joining it to the rest until it was long enough to lower for the equipment he needed. After six hours of perseverance he was finally able to start sliding down the rope, and it seemed that the incredible was about to come true. He had almost descended to the point where it would have been possible to reach him with an ice axe when all movement ceased, his arms opened, and his head fell back. Toni Kurz was dead, after having fought for his life with almost superhuman energy.

  Nobody will ever know what happened between the stationmaster’s second and third tours of inspection. Probably the party tried and failed to get back across the Hinterstoisser traverse, and was attempting a direct descent when it was hit by falling stones. The climbers may have all been knocked off, but held by the pitons through which their ropes were passed.

  After the dramatic endings of the early attempts it might have been believed that the Eigerwand was indeed unclimbable, yet the
best climbers of the time were more or less unanimous in considering it possible. One thing, however, was certain: a successful party would need all-round technique, indomitable energy and plenty of luck.

  The siege began again the following summer. Germans, Italians and Swiss contenders appeared, and it is no exaggeration to suggest that some ten ropes were seriously interested. In spite of the Federal Council’s fatuous decision to make the climb illegal numerous climbers were prowling around the foot of the face, and a veritable competition began as in the case of the north face of the Grandes Jorasses not long before.

  It has been said that the German, Italian and Austrian climbers were not motivated solely by sporting considerations. This will always remain a vexed subject, and there is no doubt that certain parties were subsidised. It is even probable that the eventual victors were rewarded. But everyone who actually knows the great German and Italian climbers is nowadays of the opinion that political and material considerations played no vital part in the affair, any more than they did in the ascents of the other last great problems. More than twenty years after the first ascent, when there is no longer any possibility of profit, glory or political prestige, young climbers continue to come from every country in search of pure adventure, whatever the risk. The true explanation of the swarms of candidates must be sought rather in the high level of technique already attained at that time in the eastern Alps, and in the warlike and adventurous instincts of the German race. This species of daring was very rare in those days among French mountaineers.

  During the summer of 1937 the north-east face of the Eiger, as distinct from the north face proper, was the scene of various misadventures to ropes who were training on it for the Eigerwand. The Salzburg mountaineer Gollaker died of exhaustion, and his companion Primas had both feet frostbitten. But despite the number and ability of its assailants the mountain retained its mystery throughout the season, efficiently guarded by bad weather and conditions. Only Rebitsch and Vörg got far up it.

  Having reconnoitred and equipped the face as far as the first ice field, they attacked on the 11th August, reaching a point slightly higher than Sedlmayer and Mehringer’s last bivouac. At this point they were surprised by bad weather, and only got down again after three days of struggle. Thanks to their all-round experience and exceptional class they were the first to reach the central part of the face and return alive.

  With the summer of 1938 the attempts began again, still more numerous and more obstinate than before. On the 22nd June two excellent Italian climbers, Mario Menti and Bartolo Sandri, were killed by stone fall at about the level of the Eigerwand Station. Both of them were mountaineers of the first rank, as they had shown on the south face of the Torre Trieste, the south ridge of the Aiguille Noire de Peuterey, and other grade VI climbs.

  But at last human perseverance was rewarded. The Germans Andreas Heckmair and Ludwig Vörg, and the Austrians Fritz Kasparek and Heinrich Harrer, climbed the gigantic wall for the first time from 21st to 24th July 1938. Perhaps these protagonists should be introduced before we proceed to the story of their ascent. All four were climbers and mountaineers of exceptional class, with experience in the Dolomites, the western Alps and the Caucasus, and were well known even before the Eigerwand.

  Heckmair was a professional guide in the Bavarian Alps. As early as 1930 he had done, among others, two of the longest and most difficult climbs in the Dolomites at that time: the Solleder route on the Civetta and the east face of the Sass Maor. These were respectively the fifth and second ascents. The following year he had laid siege to the north face of the Grandes Jorasses, but all his attempts were foiled by weather and bad conditions. While in the area he also did the second direct ascent of the north face of the Grands Charmoz.

  Ludwig Vörg, who came from Munich, was also a specialist of the eastern Alps, but in addition he had taken part in two expeditions to the central Caucasus, where he had done two climbs, among others, which were quite remarkable both for length and for difficulty. In 1934 he did the first south-north traverse of Ushba at the price of four bivouacs, and in 1936 he made the first ascent of the gigantic west face of the same mountain. The following year he and Matthias Rebitsch had made the third ascent of the north face of the Gross Fiescherhom, and also, as we have seen, an attempt on the Eigerwand which got farther than any others up to that time.

  It will be seen that the Bavarian rope was one of the strongest that could have been imagined, particularly for the ascent of the Eigerwand. Its members were both rock climbers of the first order, and experienced mountaineers into the bargain. Above all, with Rebitsch away, Vörg was the only man who knew the lower part of the face.

  The second rope was also composed of doughty men. Fritz Kasparek, from Vienna, was one of the finest climbers ever to come out of the eastern Alps, and the list of his amazing feats in pure rock climbing is so long that it would be boring to quote it. We need only mention the first ascent of the north face of the Dachl, the third of the north face of the Cima Ovest di Lavaredo, and in particular the first winter ascent of the Comici route on the Cima Grande, which he did as a training climb for the Eiger.

  The youngest member of the party was the academic Heinrich Harrer, who has since become famous also for his adventures in Tibet and for his writings. He too had done numerous difficult ascents.

  The Austrians formed a remarkable team of tough and daring climbers, but in my opinion they had far less chance of success on the Eigerwand than the Bavarians because, like the first eight victims of the face, they had too little experience on ice and in higher mountaineering. As will presently be seen, they would probably not in fact have got up without the assistance of the German pair.

  Having heard that Vörg was off to the Himalayas, Heckmair had come to an agreement with Rebitsch to climb together. In the end Rebitsch was chosen for the Himalayan expedition rather than Vörg, and Heckmair and the latter only met and decided to form a team quite a short time before their ascent. They began training in the Kaiserge-birge on 20th June, planning to leave for Switzerland on 10th July, but they found it difficult to stick to this decision in view of the news from Grindlewald where Kasparek and others were already installed at the foot of the face. As soon as they seemed sufficiently fit they went straight to Munich to buy equipment. Thanks to the support of the Orgenburg-Sonthofen organisation they were able to get everything they needed, and they chose equipment suitable not only for rock but particularly for ice climbing, which Vörg reckoned to be the crux of the problem. Then they set out at last for Grindelwald and pitched their camp on the grassy slopes around Alpiglen.

  After waiting several days for fine weather they attacked on 20th July, but they were so heavily laden that they had to bivouac in a hollow at the foot of the Rote Fluh. Next day the outlook was doubtful, and they were getting ready to descend when they saw Kasparek and Harrer climbing towards them, followed by the Viennese Fraisl and Brankowski. This unexpected development did not, however, cause them to change their minds. The weather was definitely dubious, and anyway they deemed it unwise to have six on the face at the same time. But, in their own words:

  ‘As we descended the weather got finer and finer, and our faces longer and longer’.

  They reached the foot of the face at 10 a.m. in a state of despair. From Alpiglen they could follow the slow progress of the four Viennese, and before long Brankowski’s rope turned back after he had been injured by a stone. After telephoning to Berne for a weather forecast they decided to attack again, and spent the afternoon stuffing themselves with food. They were off by three in the morning, making ground at fantastic speed. They passed their previous bivouac at four, and by ten o’clock were across the Hinterstoisser traverse. An hour later they reached Kasparek’s bivouac site in the eastern part of the second ice field, and thanks to the latter’s freshly-cut steps caught him up by 11.30 a.m.

  A short discussion followed in which they decided to join forces. Then they went on stea
dily until they reached the ultimate point attained by the earlier attempts, a sort of rocky rib which divides the main ice field into two distinct parts. Thinking of Sedlmayer and Mehringer they kept on towards the eastern end of the Gelbewand, which they rightly believed to be its weak point. This section of the climb, which they called ‘The Ramp’, is a kind of slanting gangway, not very difficult at first. Subsequently it fades out in a step split by a vertical chimney which narrows to a crack. The right wall was yellow, loose and overhanging, and they considered it out of the question. The other side was vertical and smooth. Just to improve matters, a waterfall was coming down the chimney itself. As it was seven o’clock in the evening, too late to be tackling pitches of this kind, they decided to bivouac on the spot.

  Twelve hours later they started up the chimney, in which the waterfall was now replaced by solid ice. They got up it at the cost of two falls and a desperate struggle only after bringing into play every resource of modern technique, including artificial climbing on ice pitons. Above the chimney the Ramp reappeared, this time in the guise of a steep slope of ice. As soon as they could they traversed off it in the direction of the Spider, along an outward-sloping ledge of extremely rotten rock. A delicate sixty-foot wall then led to another long, exposed ledge, which finally ended in the Spider itself.[2]

  The weather, having held out so far, now began to change for the worse. Thunder could be heard, and Heckmair therefore decided to unrope temporarily from the Austrians, who were holding him up, in order to see as much of the upper part of the face as possible before the clouds got too thick. He cramponned straight up the Spider and had reached the central couloir when the storm broke in earnest. Not long afterwards an avalanche of hail swept the whole of the slope below. The Germans, who had escaped through being in a sheltered place, thought that their friends must have been carried away, but by a miracle the latter had only a moment before put in an ice piton which enabled them to hold on. The storm soon abated, and despite an injury to Kasparek’s hand the two ropes were able to reunite. The whole caravan then continued on up the steep central couloir, which was heavily iced over.