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Thomas Duncan Bourdillon ( ;G. M. Miller, BBC Pronouncing Dictionary of British Names (Oxford UP, 1971), p. 18 16 March 1924 – 29 July 1956) was an England mountaineer and member of the 1953 British Mount Everest Expedition which made the first ascent of Mount Everest. He died in Valais, Switzerland, on 29 July 1956 aged 32.
Bourdillon was educated at Gresham's School, Holt, and Balliol College, Oxford, where he read Physics and was president of the Oxford University Mountaineering Club.
Bourdillon had been with Eric Shipton on the 1951 reconnaissance of Everest and on Cho Oyu in 1952. He was in charge of the oxygen equipment on the 1952 and 1953 expeditions, and recommended closed-circuit equipment.John Hunt, The Ascent of Everest (London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1953), pp. 257-262,276-278
With his father, Robert Bourdillon, he developed the closed-circuit bottled oxygen apparatus used by Charles Evans and himself on their climb to the South Summit of Everest on 26 May 1953. Bourdillon could have been either the first or second man to officially reach the summit of Everest, but he was forced back when Evans's oxygen system failed. The pair came within of the Main Summit; both turning back after reaching the South Summit. Three days later, Hunt directed Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay to go for the Main Summit, using open-circuit equipment; which they reached on 29 May 1953. Bourdillon never attempted an Everest expedition again.
Bourdillon died with another climber, Richard Viney, in a climbing accident on 29 July 1956, while ascending the east buttress of the Jägihorn in the Bernese Oberland.
In July 2018, Bourdillon's widow opened a new outdoor activity centre at Gresham's School, with an assault course, a zip wire, abseiling, and a climbing tower.David Bale, "International rugby stars Tom and Ben Youngs return to their old school as special guests" in Eastern Daily Press, 5 July 2018, accessed 22 July 2021
Career
Bourdillon made a career as a physicist in rocket research.
Mountaineer
Active as a climber while still a schoolboy, Bourdillon developed his climbing during his years at the University of Oxford. By his mid-twenties he was an inspiring figure in the renaissance of British climbing in the Alps, and he then moved on to the challenge of the Greater Ranges and Mount Everest.
Family
On 15 March 1951, Bourdillon married Jennifer Elizabeth Clapham Thomas (born 1929), a daughter of Ronald Clapham Thomas, at Hendon."BOURDILLON, Thomas D, and THOMAS, Jennifer E C" in Register of Marriages for Hendon Registration District", vol. 5e (1951), p. 1289 They lived near Aylesbury and had one daughter, Nicola, born in 1954, and one son, Simon, who was only ten weeks old when his father died.Register of Births for Aylesbury Registration District, volume 6a, Pages 403 (BOURDILLON, Nicola M) and 510 (BOURDILLON, Simon B)
Films
Bourdillon appears as himself in the film The Conquest of Everest (1953)Stuart Ward, British culture and the end of empire (Manchester University Press, 2017), p. 62 and in archive footage in The Race for Everest (2003).
Sources
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