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PHOTOGRAPHS FROM THE FIRST ASSAULT ON EVEREST In 1921, the year that Lieut. Col. C. K. Howard-Bury led the first reconnaissance expedition to Mount Everest, no European had been within a range of fifty miles of the world's highest peak. The mountain had been discovered and measured from a distance of around 150 miles in the mid 19th century and the nearest photographs had been taken from Khampa Dzong, a distance of one hundred miles. Tibet and Nepal were both inaccessible to western travellers. The assault made by Howard-Bury and his team was allowed after months of negotiations conducted between the governments of Britain and India and the Dalai Lama. Howard-Bury travelled to India in 1920 and persuaded the reluctant Charles Bell, Political Agent for Sikkim, to ask the Dalai Lama for permission for the reconnaissance to proceed. The purpose of this expedition was not to attempt the summit, but to find out where it was and how best to reach it. It is hard now to imagine the importance of such a journey which was, in 1921, a walk into the unknown. The significance of the expedition was recognised by Lord Hunt who wrote "It was the quest on which Howard-Bury and his companions embarked in 1921 which set the scene and started the lengthy process towards the eventual triumph thirty years onwards. It was they who prospected the approaches to the mountain, assessed the prospects of climbing its great ridges, its northern and eastern precipices, and first glimpsed the hidden approach from Nepal by which we reached the top in 1953" (foreword to Everest Reconnaissance, London, 1991). Photographs were made by several members of the team and a selection was printed on their return by the Autotype Company using the carbon process. This process allowed prints to be made in a range of different monochromatic hues. It was also a permanent process, not subject to the fading associated with the more common silver-based processes of the time. A list of fifty-seven titles of prints available for either 15/- per copy for approx. 17 x 14 in. or 10/- per copy for approx. 11½ x 9½ in. was published before May 1922. Howard-Bury kept a manuscript diary throughout the trip in which he entered observations on many of the views which he photographed and these comments are included with the descriptions of his photographs given below. He refers to the problems associated with the water which was full of sand, the rolls of Panoram film which he describes as badly made and coming to pieces, and the tremendous winds which caused dust to gather on everything including negatives. On June 25, he wrote that he was "badly gassed from the fumes of the Kodak Acid Hypo and I have nearly lost my voice." Despite the difficulties he noted that he was able to make both gas light prints and silver prints while on the expedition. The appendix listing scientific equipment taken on the expedition describes "an old and well-seasoned 7½ x 5 Hare Camera", a Sinclair Una and another Sinclair quarter-plate camera, a Panoram Kodak with films 12 x 4 in., a No. 1 Autograph Kodak and two Vest Pocket Kodaks. The Panoram Kodak was used by Colonel Howard-Bury, who also used his own 7 x 5 inch Kodak, not one of the cameras provided specifically for the expedition.

Details

EVEREST EXPEDITION TEAM (photographers). Everest Peaks; Everest Snow Ridge; North East of Mount Everest from Chug La and Lhakpa La, 1921

Three carbon prints, 420 x 304 mm., 420 x 305 mm. and 305 x 418 mm., each with Copyright Mt. Everest Committee stamped in margin, titled and numbered in pencil on verso. (3)

Lot Essay

In his diary entry for September 19, 1921, Howard-Bury wrote "A couple of hundred feet below the camp was a big white glacier which descended from the Lhakpa La. The day was gloriously fine, and we obtained magnificent views of Mount Everest".

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