Mount Everest--Ruttledge, Hugh

FIRST EDITION, 8vo (254 x 173mm.), xvi, 390pp., 4 maps [3 folding], 59 photographic plates, original dark blue cloth, photo-illustrated dust-jacket

Sir William Henry Ingilby, armorial bookplate

Yakushi (1994) R413a

In 1933, Tibet granted permission for a fresh British expedition to Mount Everest, nine years after the failure of Mallory and Irvine, who had both been lost in their attempt in 1924. Ruttledge was selected to lead an almost entirely new team. Unfortunately, disagreements amongst them around the establishment of Camp V caused the expedition to miss its chance to improve significantly on the height reached by the 1924 expedition. Dr Raymond Greene, the principal medical officer in the party, remarked of the Camp V incident several decades later, "it may be that we lost not two days but twenty years" (ODNB).