Equipment notes (9) "ready for immediate erection"

 Alpine outfitting advice from the mid-1930s.

Tents —In the early days of Alpine climbing tents were a necessity. Later on, when huts became numerous, tents were no longer needed; now again, as the vogue of mountaineering increases beyond all previous measure, they become useful once more. Most of those who have tried to sleep at crowded huts in July or August have longed for a tent, but the possibilities of tents have hardly yet been realized. They can serve alternatively either as substitutes for hotels or for club-huts, and for both these purposes the Whymper tent forms an ideal compromise; it is neither too big nor too small.

A Mummery tent
Illustration from the Badminton Library: Mountaineering

Fortunately, Switzerland is a country well served by railway and postal communications, with reasonable rates for goods and baggage. Between Zermatt and Saas, for instance, tents in bundles can be transported for three francs per twenty-five kilos, and the same rate applies to other distances in Switzerland not exceeding a hundred kilometres.

It may be useful to know that the step of a twelve horse-power motor-car will carry two Whymper tents with the poles already in position, so that the tents are ready for immediate erection; that is to say, each tent (which will only require two pegs) can be put up ready for habitation in about two minutes. The fly-sheet, if used, will take about ten minutes more. Each tent with its fly-sheet and pegs weighs about 52 Ib. The same step of the car will also take two army folding stretchers, which make excellent camp bedsteads, although, as they do not fold across their length, they are not convenient to carry to a camp at any considerable distance from the car. The tents have the floor-cloth sewn into them and afford more than six feet of head-room: various sizes may be ordered from the makers (Benjamin Edgington, of 313 Regent Street). These tents will be most useful where the approach to the camp site consists of nothing more difficult than a mule-path.

The fly-sheet is chiefly of importance as protection against midday heat; it should have holes in it to receive the tips of each pair of poles, and the tips should have shoulders on which the fly-sheet rests. Stout durable strings should be substituted for the rings which are intended to receive the spikes of the poles. A gutter must not be forgotten and should be dug with an ice-axe all round the tent to drain away rain-water; it should run underneath the edge of the fly to receive the water pouring off it.

In very cold climates arctic tents are necessary. They are dome-shaped, supported on numerous ribs from which is suspended an inner tent. A flap extending all round on the ground enables the tent to be held down by weights. Such tents offer a minimum resistance to the wind and are warm, but for daily travel they are too elaborate and troublesome to erect. Camp and Sports Co-operators, Ltd., of 2 & 3 Greville Street, Holborne, are the makers.

On Kangchenjunga the gallant Bavarian expedition, toiling along the knife-edged ridges of this most formidable of mountains for weeks together, exposed to wind and cold, slept in caves which they hacked out of the ice. This method of camping has also been successfully adopted on the Dent d’Hérens and on the summit of the Moench. On Nanga Parbat, on the other hand, where the ascent consisted mostly of face-climbing under the full force of the Indian sun, it seems that the contrast between the grilling heat outside the cave and the icy cold of the interior was impossible to endure.

If a tent is only required as the substitute for a hut, a smaller one than a Whymper will suffice, and a Mummery tent will serve the purpose ; this type is supported by two ice-axes. In a larger-sized Mummery, extensions have been designed for lengthening the supporting ice-axes so as to give more head-room than in the standard pattern. Packed in a bag, a Mummery tent, 6 ft. 6 in. by 4 ft. by 4 ft. high in the centre, and made of green rot-proof canvas, will weigh 10 lb. Made of aero fabric, it will only weigh 6 Ib. Even this weight, however, is a considerable addition to a rucksack, and if ice-axes are used as tent-poles, the tent will have to be taken down every time that the occupants set out on a climb. This disadvantage may be avoided by employing ordinary tentpoles, which should then be jointed in sections for convenience in carrying. 

References

Chapter Three “Equipment” by C F Meade in The Lonsdale Library of Sports, Games and Pastimes, Volume XVIII, Mountaineering, London: Seeley Service & Co, 1934.