Shebbeare Edward Oswald

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Biografie:
Edward Oswald Shebbeare (1884 – 1964)
E. O. Shebbeare, who died on August 11 last, won a notable place for himself as a Transport Officer on Himalayan expeditions in the 1920's and 1930's. He had been a member of the Alpine Club since 1925.
Born on March 3, 1884, he was educated at Charterhouse and joined the Forest Department, Government of India, in 1906. He had become quite a legendary character by the time he retired, as Senior Conservator of Forests, Bengal, in 1938, when he went to Malaya as Chief Game Warden. He was a prisoner of war in Japanese hands from 1942-45, when he resumed his post, finally retiring in 1947.
In I924 he was appointed as Transport Officer to the Everest Expedition and did so well that in 1929 and 1931 the German expeditions to Kangchenjunga picked him for the same role, as did Ruttledge in 1933 on Everest.
He was the author of a number of technical papers on forestry and natural history matters, as well as a book, Soondar Mooni ( 1958), being the life of an elephant.
T. S. B.
Professor N. E. Odell writes:
I first met Shebbeare in Darjeeling early in 1924, when we were preparing to set forth on the third expedition to Mt. Everest. As our efficient Transport Officer during the long trek through Tibet, one has vivid recollections of his busying himself with the masses of stores and equipment, supervising the yak train, and checking them at each halt or camp, of which proceeding I am glad to possess a characteristic actionphotograph. His experience and his chapter on 'Transport' in Norton' s The Fight for Everest provided sound advice for the next enterprise, nine years later, when he accompanied Ruttledge's expedition in 1933, again as Transport Officer, resulting in another, and rather more discursive, report in Everest 1933· It was on this last expedition that he was able, though professedly no mountaineer, to fulfil a secret ambition, against his leader's orders, of reaching the North Col. This, however, was typical of his 'guts' and endurance in his fiftieth year!
His achievements as an Indian Forest Officer have been well emphasized in The Times obituary, and particularly in the letter in that journal dated August 19, 1964, by Sir Harry Champion. I recollect, moreover, how fascinated he was in 1924 by many of the trees and shrubs, new to him, that he found in the Rongshar valley, west of Everest, which we visited after our main operations. He was, I remember, particularly interested in a tree from which the local natives were obtaining pulp for paper-making and export to Tibet: a species and a resulting industry of which he had been entirely ignorant.
It was always a delight to travel with him and hear his observations on trees, plants and animals; and I was privileged, on our return from Tibet, to break away from the main party and accompany him over the Sebu La into the Lachen valley of Sikkim. There we eventually ran very low in our own rations and took to the native food, with a high proportion of maize. This seemed subsequently to result in our both acquiring bad attacks of the dreaded 'hill fever', a truly surprising experience for the proverbially tough' She Bear',' Shebbie ',or' She', by which nicknames he was variously known to his many friends.
Quelle: Alpine Journal Volume 69, 1964, Seite 327-328


Geboren am:
03.03.1884
Gestorben am:
11.08.1964