Charles Granville Bruce

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Charles Granville Bruce, portrait by George Percy Jacomb-Hood (1913).
Charles Granville Bruce, Ready to Mountaineering in the Himalayas (1916)
Brigade General Charles Granville Bruce

Charles Granville Bruce , CB , MVO , (born April 7, 1866 in London , † July 12, 1939 there ) was an officer in the British Indian Army and a Himalayan pioneer. Among other things, he led the British Mount Everest expeditions in 1922 and 1924 .

Military background

Charles G. Bruce began his military career in 1887 with the light infantry in Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire . He did his first active service with the military police in Burma . Since then, he has spent most of his professional life in northern India . In 1889 he was transferred to the 5th Gurkha Rifles , a regiment that consisted of Nepalese Gurkha fighters who were paid for by the British Army. He was promoted to Brevet Major, initially as adjutant, later as deputy commander ("second-in-command") , before he was promoted to lieutenant colonel and regimental commander in 1913 . Shortly before the beginning of the First World War he was transferred to the 6th Gurkha Rifles , with whom he fought on the Suez Canal . From 1915 he commanded battalions of the 29th British Division (which included the Gurkha Regiments) at the Battle of Gallipoli . During the battle, he was badly wounded in the leg. When he was released from the hospital, he was admitted to the generalship . From 1916 to 1919 he commanded the Independent Frontier brigade in Bannu in what is now Pakistan and served in the Third Anglo-Afghan War of 1919. In the following year he was finally awarded the honorary rank of brigade general (“honorary rank of brigadier-general ”) released from the army.

Alpinism

Bruce developed his passion for mountaineering early on in the local Welsh mountains, which he carried over to the Alps in later years. During his time in the British-Indian Army, he used holidays to explore the Himalayas . He climbed a total of over 50 peaks in the Himalayas.

In 1892 he took part as deputy expedition leader in William Martin Conway's Karakoram expedition, which took him to the area of ​​the Baltoro Glacier and thus to the foot of K2 . Bruce was accompanied by four Gurkha soldiers, so Bruce initiated the tradition of using local porters (later mainly Sherpas and Hunzukuc ) in the Asian high mountains . In 1895 he accompanied the British mountaineer Albert F. Mummery to Nanga Parbat . This venture, which ended with the crash of Mummery and his two Gurkha bearers, is considered to be the beginning of serious mountaineering on eight-thousanders . In 1907 he went on an expedition to the Garhwal Himal with Tom Longstaff . A knee injury prevented his participation in the first ascent of the 7120  m high Trishul . During this ascent, oxygen devices were used for the first time . Intended for leadership in 1921, Bruce was finally able to realize his great dream in 1922 and lead an expedition to Mount Everest . From 1923 to 1925 Bruce was chairman of the British Alpine Club . He also led the British Mount Everest Expedition in 1924 , but due to a severe malaria infection he had to hand over the leadership to Edward F. Norton and start the return journey.

Awards

In addition to numerous military awards and medals, Bruce was awarded honorary doctorates by four universities . Bruce was also an honorary member of the Swiss Alpine Club and the American Alpine Club. As part of the 1924 Winter Olympics , he and the entire 1922 expedition team were awarded the newly created Prix ​​olympique d'alpinisme .

Publications

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Bruce, Charles Granville on thepeerage.com , accessed September 16, 2016.
  2. ↑ a b c Stephen Venables: Everest. The story of his exploration. Frederking & Thaler 2007, p. 84.
  3. ↑ a b c d Obituary for Charles G. Bruce in the American Alpine Journal 1940 (AAJO), p. 123ff. Retrieved September 3, 2014.
  4. ↑ Joachim Hoelzgen / Reinhold Messner: 25 years of climbing K2. In: Messner / Gogna: K2. Mountain of mountains. BLV (n.d.), p. 156.
  5. ↑ Reinhold Messner: Diamir. King of the mountains. Frederking & Thaler, 2008, p. 15ff.
  6. ↑ Report on the use of supplemental oxygen at Trishul
  7. ↑ Brig. Gen. Hon. Charles Granville Bruce on thepeerage.com , accessed September 16, 2016.
personal data
SURNAME Bruce, Charles Granville
BRIEF DESCRIPTION British officer and Himalayan pioneer
DATE OF BIRTH April 7, 1866
PLACE OF BIRTH London
DATE OF DEATH July 12, 1939
Place of death London