Edward Whymper FRSE (27 April 184016 September 1911) was an English mountaineer, explorer, illustrator, and author best known for the first ascent of the Matterhorn in 1865. Four members of his climbing party were killed during the descent. Whymper also made important first ascents on the Mont Blanc massif and in the Pennine Alps, Chimborazo in South America, and the Canadian Rockies. His exploration of Greenland contributed an important advance to Arctic exploration. Whymper wrote several books on mountaineering, including Scrambles Amongst the Alps.

Early life

thumb|left|Painting by [[Lance Calkin]]

Edward Whymper was born at Lambeth Terrace on Kennington Road in London on 27 April 1840 to the artist and wood engraver Josiah Wood Whymper and Elizabeth Whitworth Claridge. He was the second of eleven children, his older brother being the artist and explorer Frederick Whymper. He was trained to be a wood-engraver at an early age. In 1860, he made extensive forays into the central and western Alps to produce a series of commissioned alpine scenery drawings. Among the objects of this tour was the illustration of an unsuccessful attempt made by Professor Bonney's party to ascend Mont Pelvoux, at that time believed to be the highest peak of the Dauphiné Alps.

In 1861, Whymper successfully completed the ascent of Mont Pelvoux, the first of a series of expeditions that threw much needed light on the topography of an area which at the time was very poorly mapped. From the summit of Mont Pelvoux, Whymper discovered that it was overtopped by a neighbouring peak, subsequently named the Barre des Écrins, which, before the annexation of Savoy added Mont Blanc to the possessions of France, was the highest point in the French Alps. As a result of his Alpine experience, he designed a tent which came to be known as the "Whymper tent" and tents based on his design were still being manufactured 100 years later.

The Matterhorn

thumb|upright|Title page of the 6th edition (1936) of Scrambles amongst the Alps

Professor John Tyndall and Whymper emulated each other in determined attempts to reach the summit of the Matterhorn by the south-western, or Italian, ridge. It can be deduced that Taugwalder had no other choice but to use a weaker rope, as the stronger rope was not long enough to connect Taugwalder to Douglas. The account of Whymper's attempts on the Matterhorn occupies the greater part of his book, Scrambles amongst the Alps (1871), in which the illustrations are engraved by Whymper himself. Whymper spent a night on the summit of Cotopaxi and made first ascents of Sincholagua, Antisana, Cayambe, Sara Urco and Cotacachi. In 1892, he published the results of his journey in a volume entitled Travels amongst the Great Andes of the Equator.

Canadian Rockies

In the early 1900s, Whymper visited the Canadian Rockies several times and made arrangements with the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) to promote the Canadian Rockies and the railway in his talks in Europe and Asia. In exchange, the CPR agreed to pay transportation costs for him and his four guides. According to the surveyor and mountaineer A. O. Wheeler, Whymper was hired to “conduct explorations and surveys in the interests of the Canadian Pacific railway company” (Wheeler, 1905). In 1901, Whymper and his four guides (Joseph Bossoney, Christian Kaufmann, Christian Klucker and Joseph Pollinger) made the first ascents of Mount Whymper and Stanley Peak in the Vermilion Pass area of the Canadian Rockies.

His brother Frederick also has a mountain in British Columbia named after him, from his days as artist illustrator with the Robert Brown's Vancouver Island Exploring Expedition in 1864.

Illustrator

When not climbing, Whymper pursued his profession as an engraver of illustrations for books and periodicals. Among the books he illustrated was his fellow-mountaineer Florence Crauford Grove's The Frosty Caucasus (1875) Whymper also illustrated and engraved John Tyndall's "Hours of Exercise in The Alps" (1871) and Augusta Bethell's Helen in Switzerland (1867).

He illustrated books for Isabella L. Bird but his brother Charles Whymper was the designer of the Henrietta Amelia Bird memorial clock tower in Tobermory, Isle of Mull, Scotland. It was built in 1905, funded by Isabella Bird (Mrs. Bishop) in memory of her sister.

Final years

thumb|upright=1.1|Whymper's Grave in [[Chamonix, France]]

On 25 April 1906, aged 65, Whymper married Edith Mary Lewin aged 23 (born 1883) at Emmanuel Church in Forest Gate, Essex (now London). The service was presided over by Canon J. M'Cormick, who had assisted the mountaineer after the Matterhorn accident.

Shortly after returning to Chamonix from another climb in the Alps, Whymper became ill, locked himself in his room at the Grand Hotel Couttet, and refused all medical treatment. Whymper died alone on 16 September 1911, at the age of 71. A funeral was held four days later. He is buried in the English cemetery in Chamonix. .

  • Chamonix and the Range of Mont Blanc: A Guide. London: John Murray, 1896.
  • The Valley of Zermatt and the Matterhorn: A Guide. London: John Murray, 1897.
  • The Apprenticeship of a Mountaineer: Edward Whymper's London Diary, 1855–1859. Ed. Ian Smith. London: London Record Society, 2008. .
  • Among the Tibetans by Isabella L. Bird (1894, as illustrator)

References

Bibliography

  • Peter H. Hansen, 'Whymper, Edward (1840–1911)', Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004