Hartog John Marion

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Biografie:
John Marion Hartog 1922-1986
John Hartog died suddenly of a heart attack last July in his 64th year. He will be remembered chiefly as the conceiver, organizer and leader of the British expedition which made the first ascent of the Muztagh Tower in 1956, but he also led several polar expeditions. His complex character meant that he was not an easy person to know. He could at times be engagingly good company and could show great thoughtfulness and generosity. But equally at other times he could be unnecessarily stubborn with irritatingly strong opinions. His was not an easy personality and I don't think he made any close friends.
He was born in February 1922, the younger son of Sir Philip Hartog, the educationist and first Vice-Chancellor of Dacca University. He was educated at Westminster School and Christ Church, Oxford, where he read Natural Sciences. His university studies were interrupted by the war in which he served in the Indian sub-continent, reached the rank of major and was mentioned in despatches. From 1951 he worked as a senior chemist with the National Research and Development Corporation, and from 1957 until his retirement with the Atomic Energy Authority (later British Nuclear Fuels) at Warrington.
Hartog was elected to the Club in 1951, having been proposed by John Hunt with whom he had climbed in the Dauphine and at Chamonix, and seconded by Bryan Donkin. His application form for membership of the Club is a typical record of the time: rock-climbing in England and Wales, winter climbing in Scotland, a season in Norway in 1948, climbs around Arolla, and a successful season in 1950 with the Hunts. In 1949 he led an Oxford expedition to the North-Eastland, Spitsbergen, whose chief purpose was to investigate a large new glacier which had formed on the south coast. The expedition was a joint one with Cambridge (led by Dr Brian Harland), although the two groups worked independently after they had been landed from HMS Cook. This expedition was followed by a larger joint Oxford and Cambridge expedition in 1951.
In 1959 came the expedition to the Muztagh Tower. For most of us at that time, because of the famous photograph by Sella, it epitomized, in the words of R L G Irving, 'Nature's last stronghold'. So far as I know Hartog was the first person to challenge this. He had noted that Conway, who discovered it in 1892, had thought that the SW arete appeared quite accessible, and close inspection of available photographs tended to confirm this in his mind. At any rate,
Hartog put together a small and extremely strong party, consisting of lan McNaught-Davis, Joe Brown, Tom Patey and himself. It is no criticism of Hartog to say that in climbing ability he was not in the same class as the others: having conceived the idea, he had equally appreciated that it required a party of great competence; the planning and choice of route was his. Hartog and Patey reached the true summit the day after Brown and McNaught-Davis had reached the three-metre-Iower W summit. It had been a great effort, and both parties had had to bivouac on the descent. Unfortunately for John his toes were severely frost-bitten. The subsequent descent must have been a nightmare, and he received great help from a French party which had coincidentally climbed the mountain by the SE ridge a few days later. John records how “the kindness, gentleness and care of the whole French expedition were beyond words”.
The first ascent of the Tower was one of the most notable mountaineering achievements of the 1950s, and an outstanding example of a lightweight expedition. For John it marked the. end of serious mountaineering; on his return to England he was hospitalized and in due course lost most of his toes. He nevertheless remained devoted to the mountains, and to Scotland in particular, being a frequent attender of Scottish Mountaineering Club meets. He remained a bachelor throughout his life, not I think through choice. That was a pity, because a successful marriage would, I am sure, have made for a more rounded and approachable person.
Roger Chorley
Quelle: Alpine Journal Volume 92, 1987, Seite 301-302



Geboren am:
02.1922
Gestorben am:
1986