In all walks of life during wartime there was a certain degree of disorganisation, or rather improvisation, which lent to things an element of fantasy which we quite miss in these productive days. The J.M. was still in the early stages of its formation, and a general chaos reigned quite happily side by side with rigid military discipline. For some days after my arrival I spent my time, in company with some thirty other recruits, in planting potatoes. Then, by one of those mysterious dispensations which always seem to occur in organisations of this sort, despite the fact that a good third of the new personnel were farmers’ boys, I was designated to be a muleteer!
I had been quite used to cows from childhood, but had never come close to a mule in my life. Worse still, I entertained a wholesome terror for them, having heard that they were vicious, stubborn, and endowed with a most redoubtable capacity for kicking. When our group leader announced my new profession I asked him, my features tense with fear, just what I would be expected to do. He replied with the succinctness which characterises all great leaders of men:
‘Nothing to it. You go to the stable, you take the mules to drink at the trough, you give them one truss of hay per four mules, and you clean out the stable. That’s all for the moment.’
The only thing he forgot to tell me was that, owing to a short admin course, no one had appointed a new muleteer, and consequently the animals hadn’t eaten for two days. I went into the stable with all the innocence of the newly-converted going to his baptism, and if the animals seemed a trifle agitated I hardly noticed it.
‘It’s because they don’t know me yet’, I said to myself.
Dodging a kick vigorous enough to propel me into the next world, I squeezed in between two of the beasts in order to set them loose, then did the same for four others. Only then did it begin to dawn on me that I had done something rasher than climbing the Whymper couloir at four o’clock in the afternoon.[1] Wild with hunger and thirst, the mules stampeded in all directions, and one of them, baring his long yellow teeth, tried to bite me in the most uncivilised fashion. Only the agility which enabled me to climb like a flash into the hayrack saved me from being trampled to death. I would probably have been stuck there for hours if, finding the door open, the mules had not burst out into the village in an unbridled cavalcade. Fortunately I was speedily relieved of my duties as a muleteer, and sent off to be part of a team building new military quarters about five thousand feet up in the high pastures of Roseland.
The chalet in which we had to install ourselves was primitive in the extreme. Everything normally considered necessary to the maintenance of a group of men, even in the hardest sort of conditions, was lacking – camp-beds, mattresses, blankets, even a stove. All these things needed to be got up as quickly as possible, but, the season being very late that year, Roseland was still half buried in snow, and the last two or three miles of the road were unusable. The only method of transport was our own backs. The work of my own team consisted mainly of doing all this carrying. We had to do just one trip a day which, with a load of about a hundred pounds, took around three hours for the return journey. The hours were thus short, but the work required more than average energy, particularly inasmuch as, sleeping on the bare ground and eating inadequate food, simply to survive demanded a constant output. For this reason the team was made up of the stronger men. Used to working with mules, I was perfectly designed to replace them when the need arose!
The rough life we led at Roseland suited me ideally, except that three hours of work, however laborious, were not enough to appease my energies, so that I had to look around for other methods. With a few friends of similar tastes, I used to get up before dawn every day and climb the two thousand feet to the Grande Berge, a peak overlooking Roseland, on skis. After a swift downhill run came breakfast, then I would do a first carry, and in the afternoon another. Then the loads began to seem too light, so I started taking a little more each day. Some of the other porters joined in the game, which became a daily competition, until we were carrying up to a hundred and thirty odd pounds at a time.
It should be added that in those early days of the J.M. there reigned a wonderful team spirit and good humour. Our ideal may have been rather too simple, but most of us really did have an ideal for which we were willing to give our utmost strength. It was all very inspiring. In this atmosphere of shared high spirits and exhausting labour I passed days of intense and utter happiness. In the words of Schiller, ‘In giving of itself without reserve, unfettered power knows its own joy’.
Once the snow had melted, the life of our troop changed completely. Our time was divided between forestry, ski-mountaineering, physical culture and, in a milder sort of way, climbing. The professional guides and instructors played a purely technical role, and the disciplinary side was looked after by the various grades of ‘leaders’. These were mostly officers or non-commissioned officers from the disbanded air force. Most of them knew little about mountains and their lore, and some of them loathed the whole business. For this reason mountain activity was not always taken as far as it should have been, despite the enthusiasm of both the instructors and the volunteers.
The activity of each group depended a lot on the tastes of its leader, who might give priority according to his preferences to skiing, climbing, hill-walking, manual labour or cultural activities. By a stroke of luck our leader was an ex-N.C.O. of alpine troops, an experienced mountaineer, and a one-time ‘Bleausard’.[2] Thanks to him our time was mainly spent on long ski excursions along the high ridges of Beaufortin, or else in rock climbing. We worked out a number of practice grounds along the foot of the limestone pinnacles and crags above Roseland. At least twice a week we had to undergo half a day’s climbing. I had no trouble in outclassing most of the others on these occasions, but one, named Charles, sometimes outdid me. Tremendous competitions resulted when, our safety ensured by a rope from above, we would strive to surpass each other by means of the most spectacular rock-gymnastics.
It was now that I first met Gaston Rébuffat. He was attached to a troop quartered in the picturesque Arèche valley, with its dense pine forests and lush pastures dotted with old rustic chalets. There being no rocks to climb in that pastoral area, this troop was forced to come up to Roseland for the purpose. Caught by the rain one day, they took shelter in our chalet, and somebody told me that among them was a young fellow from Marseilles who claimed to have done some big climbs. I had often heard about the wonderful training ground formed by the ‘calanques’, the rocky coast near Marseilles, and I excitedly got myself introduced to the new phenomenon.
In those days Rébuffat was of rather startling appearance at first sight, tall, thin and stiff as the letter I. His narrow features were animated by two small, black, piercing eyes and his somewhat formal manners and learned turn of phrase contrasted comically with a noticeable Marseilles accent. All this took me a bit by surprise, but after a slightly strained beginning a mutual sympathy grew up quickly, and we spent the whole afternoon walking around in the rain talking climbing. As you would expect, each asked the other what he had done. I was astonished to learn that, without any other experience than the rock gymnastic technique learnt in the Calanques, Rébuffat had done high mountain routes equivalent to my ultimate ambitions. The conversation came round to our future projects next, and again, his seemed completely extravagant to me. His whole conception of mountaineering, normal enough today, was far in advance of its time and entirely novel as far as I was concerned.
Among all the climbers I had met up to that time mountaineering was a sort of religious art, with its own traditions, hierarchies and taboos, in which cold reason played quite a small part. Having grown up among the priesthood, I had blindly observed all the rites and accepted the articles of the creed. To Rébuffat this was all a lot of outdated rubbish. His sceptical mind was free of all prejudices: in his view what mattered was to be a really good rock climber, and will-power and courage would look after the rest. In support of his theo
ry he cited examples of well-known German and Italian climbers who, with no other experience than what they had gained in the Dolomites and other lower limestone ranges of the eastern Alps, had put up some of the hardest high mountain routes. With implacable logic he drew the conclusion that what was possible for Germans and Italians was possible for Frenchmen too. Pushing his argument to its end, he reasoned that since he considered (rightly) that he was a really good rock climber, and had plenty of will-power and courage, he would shortly climb the fiercest faces in the Alps, even including the north faces of the Eiger and the Grandes Jorasses, then ranked as the ‘top two’.
For one who, like myself, climbed instinctively because, when the glaciers were shining in the sun and the rock-needles picked out against the blue of the sky, he felt an impetuous need of action surge through his muscles, this methodical will, these carefully worked-out theories, this self-confidence and cold ambition were quite bewildering. As I listened to him I was plunged into an indefinable mixture of amused scepticism, respectful admiration and vague desire.
Some time after this encounter I was chosen to go on a leader’s course at the J.M. Central School at La Chapelle-en-Valgaudemar, in the south of the Oisans range. My rival Charles and Rébuffat were both going along too. At Roseland our leader had been changed, and all the pleasantness of our life went with him. Commanded by a narrow-minded brute, set to work on boring and ill-organised projects, we led a pointless existence which began to weigh heavily on me. The news of my departure for the mountains made me happy again, and some of my comrades told me that when the order was read out by the leader my face was so lit up with joy that nobody could help noticing it despite the fact that we were standing rigidly to attention.
I had now lived for some years in the over-civilised Chamonix valley where cable-cars, rack railways and comfortable refuges combine to make climbing a less rugged pastime. I was used to the elegant majesty of rock spires, to the splendour of Mont Blanc’s masses of hanging ice, and to the charms of the green pastures of Savoy. When I got to La Chapelle-en-Valgaudemar, I felt as much out of my own world as if I had suddenly been transported to Tibet. Everything in this valley was new to me, both man and nature. There were no elegant rock spires soaring into the sky like flames, no imposing glaciers to gladden the heart with the contrast of their whiteness against the blue of the sky and the green of the meadows. There were no fat pastures speckled with flowers; no prosperous-looking herds with bells tinkling among the peace of nature; no big chalets with wide, pine-shingled roofs looking as though built to last forever; no noisy bands of tourists; no mechanical contrivances disturbing the solitude of the summits.
Here nature was in a harsher mood, but remained almost unspoiled. The inhabitants seemed to be living in another century. The mountains with their rounded crests resembled ruined castles, their dark walls mouldering into vast screes and arid patches of scraggy grass. Only a few dirty snow-gullies and moraine-covered glaciers relieved the sternness of the scene. At the foot of these somewhat unattractive summits was squeezed the valley, where men, apparently hardly out of the Middle Ages, lived wretchedly in moss-thatched hovels, fighting with a hostile nature for every inch of cultivable earth. Right up to the very edge of the mountain little fields of low grass and thinly sown com showed among the wastes of boulders like a green and yellow patchwork quilt.
In the village of La Chapelle the tarmacked road and a few small hotels formed the outpost of the modern world, but as one went farther up the valley the signs of civilisation gradually faded out. At the very end was the hamlet of Rif-du-Sap, perched between two avalanche gullies, where life was as primitive as in many parts of the Himalaya. Nevertheless the bareness and rusticity of Valgaudemar did have a certain austere poetry about them. They gave just the same kind of feeling of being at the ends of the earth that I recognised again with delight when, years later, I visited the remote mountains of Asia and America.
The J.M. Central School occupied a few old buildings in the middle of La Chapelle. Since we were going simultaneously through the courses for team leaders and rope leaders, we led a life so hard and active that, if I did not still possess notes made at the time, I would be tempted to think my memory guilty of exaggerating.
The ascents that we did every week were in a different style from what I was used to in the Mont Blanc range. There was comparatively little rock climbing about them, and what there was was seldom very difficult. These great rubbish heaps of mountains were more a question of unending trudges among steep, slippery grass, rabbit warrens, and moraines of loose boulders. The habit of the school was to send us up to remote huts loaded like mules and at competition speed. In the same way, climbs were carried out at such speed that the majority of students ended up in a state of complete exhaustion. Given the fact that in those days there was very little food around, these mountain trips were profoundly tiring even for the toughest, and when we got back to the Centre after three or four days we were all more or less done in.
But we were far from being allowed to rest for the remainder of the week. An iron discipline imposed ten to fourteen hours of work every day. We were up at six, and it was usual for us to get back to our beds at midnight without having had any other time off than what was necessary for meals – if one could so term the absorption of a few ill-cooked vegetables, whose main nutritive value came from the in-numerable flies stuck to the plate.
The day would begin with perhaps three-quarters of an hour of high-speed physical training. The rest of the morning would be spent at some kind of manual labour, wood fatigue or improving mountain tracks. The afternoons began with a rock climbing session on a small local crag, followed by lectures or study. After the evening meal we still had to attend cultural classes or rehearsals for a sort of music hall act called ‘passing out’ with which each course ended. Naturally all the activities were carried on at top speed, and the least little movement from one place to another was carried out at the double, and singing.
The method of character training at the J.M. Central School was, it appeared, modelled on that of the military colleges, and every day we had the opportunity of measuring its full excellence. However unexpected the ideas may be which germinate in the brain of the brass-hatted pedagogue, anyone would at least agree that they were formulated at a time when there was enough to eat to support such a painful existence. But in those days, when the whole of France was starving, this was decidedly not the case. After three weeks about half the course were at the end of their strength, and the rest were more or less run down. Probably due to the inadequate nourishment we were nearly all suffering from a painful illness. The smallest scratches would turn into festering wounds which grew larger every day and resisted all attempts at medication. In varying degrees, we all had our hands, forearms, calves and feet covered in these agonising sores.
The course, which had begun in enthusiasm, turned into a sort of hell as the days went on. Without the impulsion of the ideals which remained in us like the voice of conscience and gave an unguessed-of endurance, such trials would have been insupportable. We told ourselves that anyone who could not take it was unworthy to be called a man. Had it been otherwise there would have been no motive to resist the temptation of the sick-bay, or even of the liberty of desertion. One might suppose that the leaders who imposed such an inhuman regime were mere bloodthirsty brutes, Nazis worthy of service in the S.S. Nothing could be farther from the truth, because in reality the great majority of them were likeable and intelligent men, frequently quiet and even sensitive. By what collective aberration these sensible beings could have been led to apply such stupid methods of education will always remain a mystery to me. Fortunately, after the first year, the excesses began to be understood, and the courses were subsequently humanised even to the point where enthusiasm gave way to a certain slackness. But this cannot change the fact that as a result of those first courses a number of young men contracted grave heart and lung ailments which will handicap t
hem for the rest of their lives.
As for me, although I was one of the few to finish in reasonable physical condition, those five weeks have left a memory of exhaustion greater than any I have known since. I have no doubt that the ordeal had a permanent effect on me, and if later, on big expeditions, I have sometimes surprised my comrades by the ease with which I could undergo what seemed unusually exhausting and painful experiences, it has been because they seemed nothing to what I endured at La Chapelle.
At last the course came to an end. I had done little climbing, and learnt nothing new about it. But despite it all, I did not regret my time in Valgaudemar. I had widened my horizons, met new men and new mountains, and had been enriched by an extraordinary experience which I was happy to have stuck out to the end. ‘Ah, do not beg the favour of an easy life – pray to become one of the truly strong. Do not pray for tasks proportionate to your strength, but for strength proportionate to the task.’[3] I also had the lesser satisfaction of graduating first in the technical tests and second in the overall classification, the more studious Rébuffat having beaten me by a few points.
In the course of these five tough weeks which we had gone through shoulder to shoulder, Gaston and I had got to know each other and despite profound differences of temperament had become great friends. The trials of the course had not abated our love of the mountains or our desire for the great climbs. No sooner were the results published than Gaston wanted to drag me off to the famous north-west face of the Olan. It would make us A.W.O.L., but provided we accepted this and the punishment which would ensue on our return to our centres, we had the chance of doing the climb. Rébuffat’s proposition was extremely tempting, and I wasn’t very worried about the J.M. brand of punishment, which consisted of making us carry an eighty-pound sack of stones for twenty or thirty kilometres. But I was not yet ripe for climbs of this class, and had been over-impressed by the tale of the first ascent. Discretion won the day and I declined the offer.
Conquistadors of the Useless Page 5