Binnie Alfred Maurice

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Biografie:
Alfred Maurice Binnie 1901-1986
Maurice Binnie, who died on 31 December 1986, was born on 6 February 1901.
He was educated at Weymouth College and Queens College Cambridge. He worked for two years for the Bridge Stress Committee, before being appointed to a University Demonstratorship at Oxford in 1925. He joined Balliol and moved to New College as a lecturer in 1933. In 1944 he returned to Cambridge as a university lecturer in engineering, in charge of the hydraulic laboratory, and was appointed to a fellowship at Trinity where he lived until his death.
As an undergraduate, visits with relations in the Lake District aroused his interest in climbing, and the first climb he recorded was in Wales in 1923. His first visit to the Alps was in 1924, and for the next 60 years he seldom missed an opportunity, and for a don there were many, to visit the hills or the mountains. He was elected to the Club in 1929 and served on the Committee in 1936. There are few valleys or mountains in the Alps which he did not visit, and he was just as happy in the little mountains as on the 4000m peaks. One of his best years was 1927, when he was qualifying for the Club and climbed, among others, the Bernina, Roseg, Disgrazia and traversed the Matterhorn, up the Zmutt and down the Hornli ridges. On this last, he was accompanied by Eric Shipton and Bill Younger.
He took a keen interest in the OUMC and the CUMC; he was Senior Treasurer of the latter, and many meetings took place in his rooms. At Oxford he met Harold Herbert, then an undergraduate at St John's, who became his most regular climbing companion until Herbert died in 1981. He spent many Easter holidays at Wasdale in parties made up mainly of the Herbert family (four brothers) and their friends.
In 1932 he was awarded a Rhodes Travelling Fellowship, and from November 1932 until September 1933 he was abroad, visiting Australia, New Zealand and Canada, where he was able to combine climbing with his scientific duties. In New Zealand he did several mountain walks and climbs and was involved in one event which should be recorded here as he was always extremely reticent about it himself.
He and Miss Katie Gardiner (later President of the Ladies Alpine Club (LAC), 1941-45) and the guides Vic Williams and Jack Pope set out on 8 February to climb Mt Tasman. The following account of what happened appeared in an obituary notice of Miss Gardiner, who died in 1974.
The party consisted of Katie, her friend Mr A M Binnie, Vic Williams and Jack Pope. The weather seemed perfect. An advance camp was set up on a ledge at the head of the Fox glacier in preparation for the climb, but in the middle of the night the weather suddenly changed and a violent storm burst. With his usual foresight, Vic Williams had noted a nearby crevasse as a likely refuge in such an emergency and while the others clung onto a tent fly, Jack Pope got down into the crevasse and cut out a platform. With a meagre supply of salvaged supplies and their sleeping bags, the four huddled in the crevasse for the rest of the night, hoping for the storm to pass. But dawn brought no respite. Thunder and lightning continued and there was little daylight. The blizzard continued for over a week, during which the party existed on a food supply that had been intended to last for only a couple of days and which was almost exhausted after six. On the sixth day Katie wrote a wilf to the effect that, should they not survive, Jack's and Vic's wives were to be cared for. Conditions outside the crevasse were so bad that Vic Williams doubted that anyone in the open could have survived for more than half an hour. Jack Pope made a vow never to climb again. Finally, on the ninth day, the storm abated. The party was weak from lack of food, but four eggs had been held in reserve and, after eating these, they decided to get down the glacier. As they started to descend they were met by a rescue party led by the Maori guide Joe Fluerty who, while surrounded by sceptics, had remained convinced that they were alive. A few hours after the descent to the Chancellor Hut the weather once again closed in, but by then they were safe.'
Others occasionally referred to the time 'he spent a week in a crevasse with a woman', but this would be received with only a grunt.
In July he was in Canada and spent some time in the mountains, which he described in 'Western Canada in 1933' (AJ46, 81-88, 1934)' Here he again met and climbed with Miss Gardiner, also with Mr and Mrs I A Richards. One comment he made in that article is worth quoting. They were on the summit of Pinnacle. 'From the summit we were able to discuss the North Tower of Eiffel. It appears inaccessible except by those detestable engineering methods with which we are now so familiar.' This would have meant using a few pitons, and was a typically forthright opinion which was shared by many members of the club 50 years ago.
He was in Corsica in 1928 and returned to Canada in 1935.
Other expeditions included one to Norway in 1932, where he climbed in the Horungtinder, crossed the Jostedalsbrae and went up to Romsdal. In 1938 he went to the Lofoten Islands which he described in his humorous way in “A Month in Lofoten” (A15I, 43-53,1939).
After the war he went several times to the Pyrenees with H W R Wade, who also accompanied him to the Dolomites and in Scotland.
When not elsewhere, he visited the Alps almost every summer and was sometimes able to spend two months there. In addition he spent very many short holidays in the hills and mountains of Britain.
His scientific achievements have been recorded elsewhere. He was very distinguished in the study of hydraulics and was elected to the Royal Society in 1960. His inquisitiveness must have led him to many new ideas and discoveries, and nothing in the least unusual missed his attention.
He was a splendid companion and as Wade has written: 'He was always excellent company, with his keen sense of humour and sly comments on people and things. He had a marvellous repertoire of stories with which he used to regale me on summits and elsewhere.' And to quote from his notice in The Times: 'He was above all generous and entirely devoid of malice. He loved climbing and nearly all his holidays were spent in the Alps or the British hills. Those fortunate enough to have his company on these expeditions could appreciate him at his best.'
Alec Malcolm
Quelle: Alpine Journal Volume 93, 1988-89, Seite 305-307


Geboren am:
06.02.1901
Gestorben am:
31.12.1986