Camas Prairie chronicle. [volume] (Cottonwood, Idaho) 1901-1917, 1909-08-13
DISASTERS ON MONT BLANC.
The Worst of Many Occurred In 1870
and Cost Eleven Lives.

The Worst of Many Occurred in 1870
and Cost Eleven Lives.
In the long list of disasters which
darken the history of Mont Blanc the
worst, according to Edward Whymper,
the famous mountain climber. oc-
Cured to a party IN 1870.
The amateur alpinists were two
Americans, Mr.. Randall and Mr.. Nc
Bean, and a Scotch minister, the Rev.
G.. McCorkindale, Of Gourock They
took with them as guides or assist
ants no fewer than eight persons from
Chamonix, a quite sufficient number.
AS is usual, they passed the night in
the inn upon the rocks which are
called the Grands Mulets.
On the next day, writes Prof. Whym-
per in the Strand, number Of per
sons below watched their progress
through telescopes. They were seen
to arrive on the summit and to begin
the descent. By that time the weather
had changed. The wind was some
thing frightful.
Even 10000 feet below 1t was seen
whirling the snow about SO that the
members of the party were obliged
to throw themselves down to avoid
being carried away by it. Then the
summit became clouded and was not
seen again for eight days.
No one came back and on September
fourteen men from Chamonix start
ed out to try to leahf-ssmething. Bad
weather came on again and it was not
until the 18th that the fate of the
party was ascertained. When the
rescue party got up they found Mr.
McCorkindale and two of the porters
about $50 below the top, with their
heads right way up, but with their
clothes somewhat torn, as If they had
slipped and fallen.
About three hundred feet higher VI
other porter sitting down, the former
with his head leaning on one hant
and the elbow on a knapsack, ropes
coiled up, .batons, axes and knapsack'
round about them still containing {
little food.
Upon Mr.. Mclean a note book wal
found containing several entries in re
spect to- the occasion. All the fivt
corpses were hard frozen. They wer,
put into sacks and dragged down t.
Chamonix 1t took three days to trans
port them. The bodies of the 81,
others have not yet been recovered
but they will probably come to ligh
in the course of few years.
One Of the earliest avalanche acc
dents on Mont Blanc occurred in 1926
when DR.. Hamel, Russian, set on
on Aug. Is to go up Mont Blanc az
companied by, TWO Englishmen an
eight guides. They had assembled t
a height of more than $4,000 fee
with five guides in front, who wer
cutting or making steps, when all 6
once the snow above them gave wa
and the entire party was carried dow
a thousand feet over the slopes u
which they had toiled.
, Snow again broke away above an
more or less covered up the who
party. Some of them struggled on
but three of the leading guides wei
hurled into a crevasse and buried u
I der an immense mass of snow.
o Ten years afterward, when conduc
9 ing another tourist up Mont Blanc /
the same route, one of the survivir
i guides pointed to the crevasse al
9 said to his employer, They are there
He was wrong. At that time (183(
the bodies were no doubt a conside
. able distance from the spot where Il
y accident occurred, for the dismembe
ed remains of the three unfortunat
i commenced to reappear at the low
u end of the Glacier des Blossoms in 18(
more than four miles away in dire
I, line from the place where they peris
I ed, and must have travelled down
Q an average at the rate of 500 feet p
II annum.