1858 Almer & Barrington Eiger West Flank First Ascent

Official Expedition Narrative & Archival Record

The first ascent of the Eiger on August 11, 1858, was a product of Irish sporting ambition meeting Bernese guiding mastery. Charles Barrington, a twenty-five-year-old landowner and amateur athlete from County Meath who had never climbed in the Alps before that summer, arrived in Grindelwald in early August determined to attempt one of the great unclimbed summits of the Bernese Oberland. He engaged Christian Almer — already recognized as the finest and most technically gifted guide in Grindelwald — and Peter Bohren, a powerful and experienced local Bär guide. The three-man team departed the Kleine Scheidegg before dawn on August 11, picking their way across the moraine and upper glacier slopes below the Eiger's western face. Unlike the terrifying vertical limestone amphitheater of the North Face, the Eiger's west and south flanks are comparatively moderate: mixed snow slopes, loose rock gullies, and broad couloirs that demand stamina and careful route-finding rather than the technical virtuosity required on the north. Almer led the party upward through broken terrain, navigating patches of ice and scree with the methodical sureness that had already made him the most trusted man on a rope in the Bernese Alps. By mid-morning, the three men had passed the difficulties of the lower ridge and were moving steadily upward on the final steep snow slopes toward the summit. At approximately eleven in the morning, they stepped onto the highest point of the Eiger, 3,967 metres above the Grindelwald valley. The view opened in every direction: the Jungfrau and Mönch rose to the south, the green Bernese lowlands stretched north, and across the glaciers the great summit of the Wetterhorn shone in the August sun. The descent was made safely and the party returned to Grindelwald by afternoon. Barrington reportedly celebrated his ascent by purchasing the entire bar supply of the Kleine Scheidegg hotel. The climb was widely reported in the British press and helped crystallize public attention on the unclimbed summits that would fall in rapid succession during the Golden Age decade that followed.