Because it’s There. An Unexpected Discovery in the Archives

As I’ve spread the word that I’m writing a book about Winston Churchill and an event from early in World War II, an unsurprising number of people have let me know they share my fascination with history. Not only does history offer so many great stories to follow, those stories sometimes lead us in unexpected directions.
 
I recently followed a surprising and fascinating detour while researching a little-known Royal Navy Officer - Captain (later Vice Admiral) Cedric “Hooky” Holland. Captain Holland played a critical role in the book I’m writing, but he is not someone you typically read about in history books.
 
My search for as much information as I could possibly find about his life took me to his service records which are available on the website of the UK’s National Archives. One of the challenges – and charms – of the Royal Navy’s service records from that time is that they were written by hand, with each incremental entry typically written in a different hand. The image that illustrates this article is one page from Captain Holland’s records. That page and the snippet just below will give you a sense of the Royal Navy’s H.R. system in the first quarter of the 20th century.                 

Cedric Holland was born in October 1889 and he joined the Royal Navy in January 1905 at the age of 15. Although some of the official comments on Holland’s accomplishments and character through the years were difficult to decipher, 40 years worth of mostly legible observations paint a picture of a good sailor and a good man. Holland was fluent in French, and he would go on to play a critical liaison role between the French and British navies in the first year of World War II. He ended up literally in the middle of the clash between the British and French navies on July 3, 1940 as shells soared over his head in both directions while he headed back to his destroyer in a small boat after attempting to negotiate with a French admiral.
 
What caught my eye and what led me to write this note was a line in a personnel evaluation that was written 98 years ago. On May 15, 1922 a senior officer included this in his assessment of Cedric Holland: “Was much disappointed at not being included in final Mt Everest expedition.”

What?
 
I had vague awareness that the first successful ascent of Everest was accomplished around the time I was born. I checked and confirmed that Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzig Norgay summited Everest on May 29, 1953. (I was born in 1954).  I had not been aware of a British attempt 30 years prior to this. Even though this had absolutely nothing to do with the story I’m writing, and was a complete waste of time (aside from the psychic reward of filling in the details of an interesting tale), I felt compelled to quickly dig into this Everest story.
 
In brief … I learned that the 1922 British Mount Everest expedition was the first organized attempt to reach the summit of the earth’s highest mountain. Not only were the British not successful, but their attempt resulted in the first climbing deaths on Everest when 7 porters were killed in an avalanche. Another British expedition attempted to summit Everest in 1924. There is actually a possibility that 2 climbers reached Everest’s peak … but we will probably never know for sure. Those two climbers - George Mallory and Andrew Irvine - disappeared. Irvine’s body has never been found, but Mallory’s was discovered 75 years later, in 1999, at a height of 26,760 feet. Everest’s official elevation is 29,029 feet. There is some speculation that the climbers might have been on their way down from the summit when they died. To add to the mystery, Irvine is said to have carried a camera. There are some at Kodak who believe they would be able to develop the film if Irvine and his camera are ever recovered.
 
If the name George Mallory is at least vaguely familiar, it’s because he is the author of one of the most famous quotes in history, certainly the most famous quote in mountaineering history. Mallory toured the U.S. after the 1922 expedition. When a reporter asked why he wanted to climb Mount Everest, Mallory replied: “Because it’s there.”
 
I’m writing about Hooky Holland (who had a remarkable nose, and was remarkably good-natured about his nose), Winston Churchill, and the clash between the British and French fleets on July 3, 1940 in part because the story is there … and the more I’ve learned, the more it has become a story I just have to tell.