Pritchard Hugh John Mostyn

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Biografie:
HUGH JOHN MOSTYN PRITCHARD
1877- 1959
H. Mostyn Pritchard, who died on September 4. 1959, was one of the small band of members who had been a member of the Alpine Club for over so years. He was elected on December 16, 1901, his proposer being A. D. Tupper-Carey and his seconder J. Oakley Maund. He was educated at Eton and Christ Church, Oxford, taking his B.A. in 1899, the same year as his first visit to the Alps.
Soon after his election to the A. C. had taken place, he joined the Stock Exchange and he remained a member until 1951. Although colour-blind, he was very fond of drawing and painting; a water-colour of Mont Blanc was exhibited at the Royal Academy in 1904 and he for a number of years produced the colour sketch for the Christmas Cards of one or more of his clubs. In 1957 his sketch of Mont Blanc from the Col du Geant was used for the A.C.'s Centenary Christmas Card, he providing the blocks free of charge.
He was a very keen fisherman and a first-rate shot; and he hunted in Leicestershire regularly up to the last War, with the Fernie and Cottesmore Hounds. His mountaineering record is a short one, as his marriage in 1904 put a stop to active climbing, though he continued to visit the Alps in later years. In 1899 he climbed Mont Blanc, Rimpfischhorn and the Matterhorn; in 1900 he was in the Aiguilles Rouges (Chamonix) and also on the Aiguilles des Charmoz and d'Argentiere, before going on via Courmayeur and the Val Tournanche to Zermatt and the Oberland. Joseph Lochmatter was his guide on one occasion. In 1901 he was again climbing round Zermatt, but after that date we have no exact records.
He does seem, from his diaries, to have been a man who could not devote himself to one sport only; he had never really intended to go in for climbing, but chance started him off and he found that, physically and aesthetically, it suited him. But he evidently liked just to enjoy Alpine scenery and the milder excitements of mountain walking; it formed part of his general sporting activities, but was not an exclusive preoccupation.
But he never lost his interest in climbing; that was evident from his participation in the Club's celebrations over the climbing of Everest, when he was particularly pleased to meet Hillary, with whom he corresponded occasionally afterwards; and he delighted to find himself one of the small group at the Centenary Dinner in 1957 who had also attended the Jubilee Dinner fifty years before. It was no unusual thing for him to drop in during the morning at the A. C. for a talk, and though knocked over by a taxi a year or two ago and considerably crippled, he refused to become an invalid until the last few months of his life, when he became seriously ill with heart trouble.
To his two daughters, who have helped with particulars about his life, we tender our sympathy in their loss.
T. S. BLAKENEY
Quelle: Alpine Journal Volume 65, 1960, Seite 268-269


Geboren am:
1877
Gestorben am:
04.09.1959