Between 1902 and 1939, four expeditions had attempted the summit of K2 which at 8,611 meters is the second highest mountain in the world. In the years preceding the Second World War, while the Germans focused on Nanga Parbat and the British on Everest, K2 was an American peak. The expedition that tried in 1938 was led by Charlie Houston, an American doctor who a year earlier had been a member of the British–American Himalayan Expedition that had scaled Nanda Devi (7,816 meters). During the Second World War, Charlie was a naval flight surgeon and studied the effects of high altitude on the humane body. In later years he would be among the first to study High Altitude Pulmonary Edema and High Altitude Retinal Hemorrhage.
In 1953, Houston was back to attempt K2 with a mainly American team, the outsider being Colonel Tony Streather who had served in the British India Army and after Independence spent time with the Chitral Scouts in Pakistan. In 1950, he was the liaison officer and interpreter with a Norwegian expedition that scaled Tirich Mir (7,708 meters) in the Hindu Kush. He was short-listed for trials for the British Everest expedition but despite being by far the best acclimatized and fluent in Urdu, he was rejected. At the same time as Streather received one letter with bad news, another arrived inviting him to join Houston’s K2 Expedition. Streather’s greatest quality was to integrate well in a team which was one of the overriding considerations by Houston in selecting the other members.
The Belay. Sketch shows the location of the climbers before and after the fall during the 1953 American Karakorum Expedition
The expedition assembled in Rawalpindi at the end of May 1953 and stayed with Colonel Ata Ullah of the Pakistan Army Medical Corps. Houston describes him as “A dynamic individual with great power, great ability, [and] a sensitive intelligence”. Ata Ullah would manage the base camp and proved to be a great comfort by his consistent support and in spite of being nearly fifty, he climbed till Camp III. The expedition landed on “the rather frightening air strip” at Skardu, where they were given a great reception and after the long trek through Askole and up the Baltoro Glacier, they arrived at the base camp on 20 June 1953. “On the way, the older men wanted to know if we knew the ‘Duke Sahib’ [Prince Lugi Amendo, Duke of Abruzzi], and the slightly less old ones, if we knew ‘Shipton Sahib’!” Both were pioneers of mountaineering in the Karakoram and Himalaya before the Second World War.
Pete’s borrowed ice axe is now something of a holy grail of mountaineering artifacts, on display at the American Alpine Club Museum in Colorado
On the seventh day of the ascent of Lamba Pahar (the name the locals had given to K-2), and climbing without oxygen, they were trapped by a storm for over a week, 860 meters below the summit. Art Gilkey, a team member, was diagnosed with thrombophlebitis (blood clots in his leg), a life-threatening condition at altitude. Without hesitation, the team elected to abandon the attempt on the summit and devote all their energy to getting him off the mountain. The expedition retreated through a 130 kph blizzard with Gilkey, wrapped in a tent and sleeping bag, being belayed by Pete Schoening and guided by the others down treacherous rock and ice. They had descended more than 300 meters and were within 180 meters of Camp VII, when disaster struck. George Bell slipped and fell on a patch of hard ice, pulling off his rope-mate Tony Streather. As they slid down, their rope became tangled with those connecting Houston, Bates and Molenaar pulling all of them off as well.
Gen Ayub Khan examines the equipment of the 1953 American Karakorum Expedition. The author is the little boy standing behind him
As all five along with Gilkey fell a hundred meters to the end of their ropes, their combined weight hit Pete Schoening, who was anchoring the belay with his ice axe wedged against a boulder. The nylon ropes which had only recently replaced silk cords shrank to half their diameter but did not snap. The ice axe was a gift of life from a friend and fellow climber Tom Miller. Before Schoening left for Pakistan, Tom was going over his gear and looking at his ice axe, said, “You’re not using that thing, you’re taking mine.” Schoening’s axe like most at that time was of European ash and it wasn’t uncommon for it to break under stress. However, Tom had replaced the shaft of his axe with a much stronger length of hickory, and insisted that Pete take it to K2.
Incredibly, Pete held on and the nylon rope and the hickory shaft of Miller’s axe withstood the strain. Otherwise all six climbers would have plunged to their death 2,000 meters below. It’s considered one of the greatest saves in mountaineering history, and simply called ‘The Belay.’ Pete’s borrowed ice axe is now something of a holy grail of mountaineering artifacts, on display at the American Alpine Club Museum in Colorado. However, the end was not without tragedy. During the team’s scramble to recover from the fall and establish a forced bivouac, they discovered that Gilkey, who had been in voice contact with them, and still suspended in the protective sleeping bag from a line secured on either side of the ice axe, had vanished along with the supporting anchors.
Members of the 1953 American Karakorum Expedition paying their respects to their fallen comrade, Art Gilkey
The expedition was widely praised for the courage shown by the climbers in their attempt to save Gilkey and for their team spirit. There is speculation that Gilkey cut himself loose to save the lives of his five colleagues. Back at Base Camp, a cairn was erected in his memory inside which was his aluminum box containing a favorite poem, mountain flowers and the flags that the expedition would have erected at the summit. The Gilkey Memorial as it is now known has become the burial site of climbers who have perished on K2, as well as a memorial to those whose bodies have not been found. In 1993, Gilkey’s clothing and remains were discovered close to the Base Camp.
L-R - Maj Gen Shahid Hamid, Gen Ayub Khan, Col Tony Streather, unknown, Charlie Houston
My parents kept an open house in Rawalpindi and had befriended Charlie Houston through Colonel Ata Ullah who was related to my mother. Charlie’s wife Dorcas had flown halfway round the world to meet him on his expected return, and stayed at our residence. The news of the ascent being abandoned and the accident filtered down to Rawalpindi but with no information of any casualties. The expedition did not have a long-range communication set and till there was no confirmation of who all had survived, my parents were in a dilemma if and how to inform Dorcas. It came as a big relief to know that Charlie was safe.
When the battered expedition finally arrived back, the Shahid Hamid’s hosted a dinner for them during which Charlie Houston delivered a talk on the expedition along with a movie that had been quickly developed by the ISPR. The army chief, General Ayub Khan was also invited.
Post Script
While the author was attending the Staff Course at Camberley in 1980, Colonel Tony Streather paid him a visit and talked with great enthusiasm about the Hunza porters. After Independence, the Government of Pakistan did not permit Sheraps from Nepal to be employed as High Altitudes Porters (HAPs). As their replacement, the Jamal Khan, the Mir of Hunza sent six men to join the expedition of whom only two had any experience of climbing at high altitudes. With some basic training on the trek to the base camp and with the right equipment, the climbers from Hunza carried loads all the way to Camp III. When the team the climbers returned after six grueling weeks on the mountain, the joy of the Hunzakuts is best left to Streather to describe.
Sketch of Pete Schoening's miracle of 'The Belay' - in which he saved the lives of his team of climbers during the 1952 American Karakorum Expedition
In an article published in The Himalayan Journal that same year, he recollects: “I shall never forget our arrival at Camp II. The Hunzas were there to meet us and, as they heard us climbing down through the darkness of the evening they came clambering up to meet us. We were literally carried the last few feet into camp and there a wonderful treat was awaiting us. The evening was calm and down here it was even warm enough to sit outside. We lay back on our sleeping-bags among the rocks, our boots off and our weary legs being massaged, while milk and rice and tea and then more tea was brought to us. The Hunzas did not attempt to hide their joy at seeing us safe again and many sincere tears were shed that evening. [...] I told the Hunzas about Art, and they offered a most touching prayer in his memory and asked me to translate their feelings to the others. Although I’m no sentimentalist, I found it hard to prevent my voice from breaking as I translated their thoughtful wishes of condolence to the Americans. No people from our so-called civilized countries could express them.”
Mir Jamal was a great visionary and his offer of HAPs from his State of Hunza and Houston’s acceptance were a landmark event. It not only established precedence for their regular employment with the many expeditions that followed, it also gave birth to a generation of mountaineers from Hunza who have made a name for themselves and for Pakistan.
