THE DEATH-ROLL OF MONT BLANC.
In these days, when it is the fashion to decry Mont Blanc, in company with a good many other old institutions, there is one thing about the mountain which is apt to be lost sight of, and that is how very fatal it has been to mountaineers. It is quite possible that the proportion of killed to those who succeed in the ascent—and the same will hold good in respect of any other Alpine peak—would not be found to be great, for probably more people have gone up Mont Blanc than any other high mountain; but no number of successful ascents will minimise the fact that there can be very real danger on Mont Blanc. The causes of danger are not far to seek. The mountain is regarded, and in fact is, comparatively easy of ascent; and from the days when Albert Smith did so much to dispel the awe with which it was once the fashion to regard it, the popularity of the expedition has grown year by year, till quite a considerable percentage of those who now go to Chamouni consider but the half of their visit accomplished if they fail to ‘do’ Mont Blanc. Thus it comes to pass that a great number of individuals are allowed to ascend who ought not to go on the mountain at all, and who, under certain conditions, may easily become a source of danger to themselves and to those who accompany them.
But the danger from this cause is as nothing compared with that which exists in the inferior quality of many of the guides. At Chamouni, every one who styles himself a guide must belong to a kind of trades-union society called the ‘Compagnie des Guides,’ and presided over by a ‘Guide-chef.’ All who enter the ‘Compagnie des Guides,’ good, bad, and indifferent, enter it on the same footing, and are compelled to take their turn for an engagement on a register kept at the office of the ‘Guide-chef’ for the purpose. Thus, a traveller who wishes to engage a guide, is not allowed—except under very special circumstances—to choose his man, but must take him whose name stands first on the list; and it may so happen that quite an incompetent individual is given charge of a party wishing to ascend Mont Blanc, while a really good guide is told off to carry a knapsack over the Col de Balme.
It is easy to imagine what may result from a system such as this. For one thing, it has had the effect of utterly demoralising Chamouni guides as a body; and it has been the means, as we shall see presently, of some of the worst accidents that have ever happened in the Alps. It is usual nowadays for members of Alpine Clubs to bring to Chamouni their own guides from other districts, rather than trust to the local men; and so it has come about that Chamouni guides have been reduced to taking casual parties up Mont Blanc, with the result, that very few of them are of any use out of their own particular district, and as regards the more difficult peaks of the range, very little even in it. In fact, it is hardly an exaggeration to say that the really good Chamouni men may now be counted on the fingers. The grave scandal occasioned by the desertion of the Russian, Professor Fedchenko, by his guides—two inexperienced boys—and his subsequent death on the Mer de Glace, called forth a severe protest against the Chamouni guide system on the part of the Alpine Club; but beyond some slight modification of the rules as regards the choosing of special men, very little has been done; and to this day the Rules and Regulations of the ‘Compagnie des Guides’ of Chamouni remain a byword with all mountaineers.
Finally, there is the danger—and this perhaps greatest of all—from weather. Easy though Mont Blanc may be as long as the weather is good, there is not a mountain in all the Alps which can become so dangerous in a storm. Every one who has had experience of climbing, knows how weather can affect a mountain, and how an ascent which is easy enough one day, may become dangerous if not impossible the next. It is quite a mistake to suppose that because a mountain offers no physical difficulties, that there is no risk attending the ascent. We have Mont Blanc as a case in point. Easiest of all the Great mountains, he has proved himself the most fatal of any.
The first accident within our knowledge which occurred on Mont Blanc was that to Dr Hamel’s party in 1820, and being the first accident to Alpine climbers, it created at the time an immense sensation. From accounts published by the survivors, it seems clear that the accident was caused by ignorance of the state of the snow—ignorance excusable enough in those days, when as a matter of fact the art of climbing was very little understood. On August 18, 1820, a Russian professor, Dr Hamel; two Oxonians, Messrs Durnford and Henderson; a Genevese named Sellique; and twelve guides, left Chamouni, and in twelve hours—about double the time now taken—reached the rocks of the Grands Mulets. Here they pitched a tent which they had brought with them, and passed the night. Bad weather came on after sunset; and as it did not clear next morning in time for them to start, they had to pass another night in the tent. It came on to rain again in the evening; but the following morning, August 20, was fine, and it was determined to make a push for the summit. At this juncture, M. Sellique was overcome with ‘scruples’ on the subject of making the ascent, and declined to accompany the others, so he was left behind in charge of two of the guides. The rest of the party set out at five A.M. The weather kept fine; but the snow—to quote one of the survivors—was found to be ‘rather too soft.’ They would appear to have followed the line of ascent usually adopted in these days, until opposite the Dome du Goûté, and on a level with it, when they branched off sharply to the left, and commenced to traverse a steep snow-slope, directing their course straight for the Mont Maudit. They were not roped, and were apparently proceeding in Indian file, when suddenly the snow gave beneath their feet, and carried them away bodily down the slope. They were all carried a great distance—some accounts say twelve hundred feet—and then the whole avalanche buried itself in a great crevasse. The three leading guides were completely overwhelmed; but the rest of the party stopped short of the crevasse, and were saved. The survivors made frantic efforts to rescue their unfortunate companions; but the poor fellows must have been buried under many tons of snow, and these efforts were unavailing.
It was scarcely thought probable that trace of them would ever again be found; but after the lapse of nearly half a century, the glacier yielded up its dead. In 1863, or forty-three years after the catastrophe, portions of human bodies, the débris of a lantern and Alpenstock, and the leaves of a Latin book, were found imbedded in the ice on the surface of the Glacier des Bossons and near its foot. They were recognised as belonging to the lost guides of Dr Hamel’s party. Further discoveries were made in the two following years; and of the relics thus brought to light, some are preserved to this day by the Alpine Club in their rooms at St Martin’s Place.
This accident afforded strong evidence in favour of the fact of glacier motion, for the remains were found to have been carried by the ice a distance of nearly five miles from the spot where the catastrophe occurred.
Almost simultaneously with the finding of the relics of Dr Hamel’s ill-fated expedition, occurred another accident on Mont Blanc. On August 9, 1864, a young porter named Ambroise Couttet, while accompanying two Austrian gentlemen in the ascent of Mont Blanc, fell into a crevasse on the Grand Plateau. This was an accident attributable entirely to carelessness, for it appears that at the moment of the catastrophe Couttet was walking apart from the others and quite unattached. His companions did their best to effect a rescue; but the crevasse was of such great depth that they could not come near him. A party of guides subsequently went out with the object of recovering the body; but although two of their number descended ninety feet into the crevasse, they failed to reach it. It is almost certain, from the terrible nature of the fall, that the unfortunate man’s death must have been instantaneous.
There were two sad accidents on Mont Blanc in 1866. The precise cause of the first is somewhat obscure, but the facts as far as they are known are these. Sir George Young and his two brothers, unaccompanied by guides, set out to ascend Mont Blanc on August 23, and succeeded in reaching the summit in safety. They had not proceeded far in the descent, when, for some reason unexplained, one of the party slipped and dragged down the other two. They slid for a short distance, then fell a height of twenty feet or so, and were finally stopped by soft snow. Sir George and his second brother escaped serious injury; but the youngest brother, Mr Bulkeley Young, was found to have broken his neck.
The accident to Captain Arkwright’s party was of a different description, and in many respects bears a close resemblance to that in which Dr Hamel’s guides lost their lives. On the 13th of October—unusually late in the year for such an expedition—Captain Arkwright with one guide, Michel Simond, and two porters, started from the Grands Mulets to ascend Mont Blanc. At a little distance they were followed by the landlord of the Pierre Pointue, Silvain Couttet, and a porter—these two having apparently come for their own pleasure—on a separate rope. The guides, probably by reason of its being a shorter route, and, as such, likely to save time—an important matter at that season of the year—chose the route adopted by Dr Hamel’s party, and which had come to be known by the name of the Ancien Passage. They had almost reached the spot where the disaster of 1820 occurred, when the roar of an avalanche was heard. Couttet and his companion, realising the danger, fled for their lives. They were a little way behind the others, and were so fortunate as to escape; but Captain Arkwright and his guides were caught by the avalanche and swept away. This accident arose from precisely the same cause as that which happened to Dr Hamel’s party—ignorance of the state of the snow; but it differed in one respect: whereas Dr Hamel’s party started the avalanche, the avalanche which proved fatal to Captain Arkwright and his guides fell from above.
The fact of a second accident occurring at the same place and from a similar cause, has given to the Ancien Passage the reputation of being essentially unsafe. It is not necessarily more dangerous than other routes, and indeed it may even be the safest route from Chamouni up Mont Blanc. It is only really dangerous when the snow is in bad order; and this is a point upon which a guide is—or should be—competent to give an opinion. On the day of the accident, the snow was not in proper condition, and it was because a right discretion was not used, that Captain Arkwright and his companions lost their lives.
We now come to an accident which ranks as by far the most terrible which has ever happened to Alpine climbers, for it resulted in the loss of no fewer than eleven lives. On September 5, 1870, a party consisting of two American gentlemen, Messrs Beane and Randall, and a Mr MacCorkendale, with eight guides and porters—with one exception, all Chamouni men—left Chamouni with the intention of ascending Mont Blanc. They passed the night at the Grands Mulets, and next morning started for the summit. Early in the afternoon, a violent storm burst over Mont Blanc; and as the weather became very bad and they did not return, it was resolved to send out a search-party from Chamouni. The weather, however, continued for some days of such an unfavourable character that it was not until the 17th, and when all hope had been abandoned of finding any of the lost party alive, that a discovery was made. The dead bodies of Mr MacCorkendale and two of the porters were first found. They were lying on the snow quite uninjured, head uppermost, a little way above the Mur de la Côte; and from the torn condition of their clothes, it seemed probable that they had slid some distance to the spot where they were discovered. Higher up, lay the bodies of Mr Beane and another porter, with the greater portion of the baggage beside them. Of the remaining six, no trace could be seen. A few small articles which must have belonged to them were picked up subsequently in the direction of the Brenva Glacier; but that was all. To this day their fate remains a mystery.
The only light thrown upon the catastrophe was that which could be gathered from the pages of a diary found on Mr Beane, and written by him. Some doubt at first was cast upon the authenticity of the entry, but there seems no reason at all for disbelieving its genuineness. What it told was as follows: ‘Tuesday, September 6.—I have made the ascent of Mont Blanc with ten persons—eight guides, Mr Corkendale, and Mr Randall. We arrived at the summit at half-past two o’clock. Immediately after leaving it, I was enveloped in clouds of snow. We passed the night in a grotto excavated out of the snow, affording very uncomfortable shelter, and I was ill all night. September 7 (morning).—Intense cold, much snow, which falls uninterruptedly, guides restless. September 7 (evening).—We have been on Mont Blanc for two days in a terrible snowstorm; we have lost our way, and are in a hole scooped out of the snow, at a height of fifteen thousand feet. I have no hope of descending. Perhaps this book may be found and forwarded.... We have no food; my feet are already frozen, and I am exhausted; I have only strength to write a few words. I die in the faith of Jesus Christ, with affectionate thoughts of my family; my remembrances to all. I trust we may meet in heaven.’
The diary ended with instructions to his family as to his private affairs.
It is to be regretted that poor Mr Beane gives us so little information of any practical value; but meagre as his diary is, it sheds light on one or two points. First, we gather that the party actually reached the summit; and next, that it was about half-past two in the afternoon, and immediately after leaving it, that the storm caught them. Now, how was it, we may fairly ask, that so little progress was made on the downward path?—for the ice-grotto of which Mr Beane speaks was constructed at an altitude of fifteen thousand feet, or only seven hundred and eighty-one feet below the summit. How was it that the guides failed completely to find a way back over ground which they had traversed so recently? Mr Beane does not tell us if any attempts were made on the 6th and 7th to find the way down—what little evidence we have tends to prove that there were none—he merely says, ‘We have lost our way.’ To sit down and wait where they were, as they appear to have done, showed a want of judgment which, without being better acquainted than we are with the facts of the case, seems quite inexplicable. Nothing is more common in the high Alps than to be overtaken by bad weather; but out of the Chamouni district there has not been an instance of a whole party perishing from this special cause. It is difficult to avoid the conclusion that the guides were not equal to their task, that they lost their heads at the very approach of danger, and gave themselves up for lost at the moment when they should have made the most determined effort to escape.
There was another circumstance, too, which was held at the time to reflect somewhat upon the conduct of the guides—not one of their bodies was found. The five bodies recovered were those of the heaviest members of the party, and there can be little doubt that they must have been left behind, while the rest made an effort to save themselves. Mr Beane, however, makes no mention of any division of the party, and it is charitable to suppose that no division actually took place until after the weaker members had succumbed to the exposure. What led to the division, will never be known; neither will it be known what motive impelled the guides to act in such an utterly incomprehensible manner. That the leaders of the party ought to have been thoroughly up to their work, is emphasised by the fact, that neither Mr Beane, Mr Randall, nor Mr MacCorkendale had had previous experience of mountaineering, and were quite incapable of giving advice of any practical value when difficulties arose. As a matter of fact, it does not appear that any one of the guides held a foremost place in his profession. Judging by their actions, they certainly proved themselves singularly wanting in many of the most important qualities of good guides; and it is impossible to believe that they could have been other than very second-rate. But should the blame of the disaster be laid to their charge? Should it not rather attach to a system which rendered such an accident only too probable?
In the same year (1870) there was yet another accident on Mont Blanc. A gentleman and two ladies, accompanied by a guide and a porter, were out on the mountain; and the gentleman wishing to go further than the ladies cared to, took the guide, and left them in charge of the porter. With what object, it is not known, the porter promptly proceeded to conduct his charges across a snow-field which was well known to be honeycombed with concealed crevasses. Under these circumstances, it would have been only wonderful if an accident had not occurred, and unfortunately that took place which might have been predicted. The porter had given his arm to one of the ladies, and was leading her across, when the snow gave way beneath them, and they both fell headlong into a deep crevasse. Here was a case of two lives wantonly sacrificed. That any one calling himself a guide should have shown such gross ignorance of the very first principles of mountaineering as this porter did, is almost inconceivable. It is perfectly clear that he did not understand his business, and was certainly not a fit person to have been sent on expeditions above the snow-line.
A still later accident on Mont Blanc took place on the south side. On the 30th August 1874, Mr J. A. G. Marshall, with two Oberland guides, Johann Fischer and Ulrich Almer, left Courmayeur with a view to attempting the ascent of Mont Blanc by way of the Brouillard Glacier, an ascent which had not at that time been effected. They camped out upon the mountain at a height of about ten thousand feet, and the following day worked their way a considerable distance upwards till they found themselves finally stopped by an impassable wall of rock. This occurred somewhat late in the afternoon, too late, indeed, to attempt any other route, and accordingly they turned back. The descent was difficult, and night overtook them before they reached the spot where they had bivouacked the previous evening. They were crossing the last bit of glacier, when Fischer inquired the time, and Mr Marshall drew out his watch, while the others came up to him with a light. As they stood thus close together, the snow gave way beneath them. Fischer fell first into a crevasse which at this point was some thirty feet deep and five feet in width; and Mr Marshall was dragged on to him; while Almer alighted upon a hummock of snow but a few feet below the mouth of the crevasse. Mr Marshall’s head came in contact with the side of the crevasse, and in his case, death must have been instantaneous; while Fischer’s injuries were of such a character that he, too, could not have lived for any time after the fall. Almer escaped with a severe shaking, but was rendered insensible by the shock of the fall. Upon coming to himself, he found that both his companions were beyond help; and as soon as there was sufficient light, he struggled down to Courmayeur with the intelligence of the accident. The dead bodies were recovered the same evening, and brought back the next day to Courmayeur.
Of all the accidents which have happened on Mont Blanc, this was perhaps the one most deserving the term. Mr Marshall and his guides were first-rate mountaineers, and it was scarcely from any fault of their own that the catastrophe occurred. From a sketch of the spot taken by M. Loppé the artist a few days after the occurrence, the crevasse looks curiously narrow, and if the party had only been standing but a few paces to right or left, they would have been in perfect safety. Moreover, the scene of the catastrophe was not five minutes’ walk from the moraine.
Thus Mont Blanc is responsible for the loss of no fewer than twenty-four lives; but it is when we compare him with other mountains that we realise how much more fatal he has been than any of his fellows. The following table, compiled from the Alpine Journal, will best bring home this fact:
| Accidents. | Lives lost. | |
| Mont Blanc | 7 | 24 |
| Matterhorn | 3 | 6 |
| Lyskamm | 2 | 6 |
| Monte Rosa | 2 | 4 |
| Monte Cevedale | 1 | 4 |
| Dent Blanche | 1 | 3 |
| Haut de Cri | 1 | 2 |
| Titlis | 1 | 2 |
| Jungfrau | 1 | 2 |
| Wetterhorn | 1 | 2 |
| Aiguille Blanche | 1 | 2 |
Single lives have been lost upon each of the following mountains: Riffelhorn, Gross Venedeger, Schreckhorn, Piz Tschierva, Diablerets, Blumlis Alp, Piz Bernina, Grandes Jorasses, Meije.
Of accidents which may fairly come under the head of Alpine accidents, such as accidents upon glaciers and subsidiary peaks, there appear to have been thirty-five—making a total loss since 1859, when climbing became a recognised form of amusement, of ninety-eight lives, or, inclusive of Dr Hamel’s accident, one hundred and one. When we come to consider that Mont Blanc is responsible for nearly one-fourth of the whole, we may well question whether the depreciation of the mountain is quite justified. Is it not rather a case of underrating the enemy?
No reasonable person can deny that there is at times danger on Mont Blanc, and when we consider from what a variety of causes it may arise—from weather, from the state of the snow, from the unfitness of many of those who attempt the ascent, and last, but not least, from the guide system of Chamouni—we feel inclined to wonder not, indeed, that the loss of life has been great, but rather that the death-roll is not much greater.