Cambridge University Mountaineering Club
In 1929 Mrs Oldfield, only daughter of George Wherry donated his collection of mountaineering books to the CUMC. This collection forms the basis of the club's library. Over the years the library has grown in size and moved location several times. It consists of periodicals, mountain guides, maps, books on technique and mountaineering literature. The library also houses the club archives, which include minute books, logbooks, correspondence, photographs and printing plates. It is an important source for the history of Cambridge and British mountaineering as well as being a useful resource for current climbers and mountaineers seeking inspiration for expeditions or technical information.
George Wherry, the founder of the club's library, was closely connected with the university and CUMC for a large part of his life. Born in Lincolnshire in 1852, Wherry made his career in surgery. He trained as a doctor at St. Thomas' Hospital. Having qualified at the age of 21 he was told that he was too young to practise and would be better advised to continue his medical studies in Cambridge. In 1874 Wherry was appointed house surgeon to Addenbrooke's Hospital, and while there he worked for a university degree. He entered Downing College and gained his Bachelor of Medicine in 1878 and Master of Surgery a year later. He was also elected Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons. In the same year he was appointed one of the honorary surgeons to Addenbrooke's Hospital a post which he held until 1916. He was University Lecturer in Surgery from 1883 to 1911. At the outbreak of the First World War he was appointed, with the rank of lieutenant-colonel, to the staff of the military hospital at Cambridge.
Wherry was an ardent climber. Like all mountaineers trapped in the bog lands of East Anglia, he made some 'interesting' ascents including routes on Stonehenge. But it is as a dedicated alpinist that he is remembered by the club. He first visited the Alps in 1890 and was a regular visitor thereafter, publishing an account of his climbing experiences of 1890-95 in Alpine Notes and the Climbing Foot. Wherry walked and climbed extensively in the Western Alps. Several of the routes he did continue to challenge today's would-be alpinists despite the advent of modern equipment and techniques. He became a member of the Alpine Club in 1893, serving on its committee in 1910 and regularly contributing to the club journal. For many seasons he climbed with F. Aston-Binns who was killed in 1898 and with A. D. Godley. In 1909 he published his second mountaineering book Notes from a Knapsack. Amongst his many mountaineering friends were Geoffrey Winthrop Young. Of Wherry's partnership with Godley, Young wrote:
Those who may have seen him climbing with Godley during their later years of close companionship will never forget the impression: both tall, reserved, gentle and yet alert, alike and yet unlike; exchanging at slow intervals the mere hint or savour of some quip or recondite allusion; accepting each other's hits and apt quotations with scarcely a twinkle of the eye to disturb their seeming gravity. [Alpine Journal 41 (1929)]
It is fitting that he died in August 1928 at the Monte Rosa Hotel in Zermatt amongst the mountains he loved.
