Looking back at the life of a gentleman climber

The name of Arthur Dolphin is less widely-remembered, though to generation after generation of British climbers he remains a hero.

Everest was conquered on May 29, 1953. Less than two months later, on July 25, Arthur Dolphin, from Baildon in West Yorkshire, was killed in a fall as he returned from an ascent of Mont Blanc in the Alps. He was 28. Such was his skill and reputation as a climber that Dolphin, a former metallurgy student at Leeds University, could have been a member of the successful Everest expedition.

He was nominated along with Jack Bloor, from Old Farnley in Leeds, and Ian McNaught-Davis, who later partnered Joe Brown in a 1960s BBC TV serialisation on climbing.

The rejection letters stated that selection was based on age and experience, particularly in relation to the Himalayas. Arthur Dolphin also suffered violent altitude sickness when he passed 10,000 feet – an ailment he was slowly overcoming.

Though he missed out on the expedition, Dolphin left another legacy – dozens of first-time climbs made across Britain in the 1940s and 1950s, climbs which are today still a challenge to adherents of the pursuit.

For the first time Dolphin's life has been recorded.

Tom Greenwood, who lives in the Pennine town of Hebden Bridge, and who is an enthusiastic walker and climber himself, has produced Memories of Dolphin – the life of a climber remembered. Painstakingly pieced together and including contributions from several of Dolphin's contemporaries, Memories of Dolphin paints a picture of a most remarkable man, who in the years after the Second World War represented a new generation of climbers.

As Bill Birkett, author of Lakeland's Greatest Pioneers, says in his foreword to Greenwood's book: "In the post-war years Arthur was one of the most important and influential figures in the history of British rock climbing, spanning the social gap between the old guard and the emergence of a hungry new breed of working class climbers."

Dolphin began climbing in 1940 when as a teenager he tackled routes at Almscliffe Crag, outside Harrogate.

In the following 13 years Dophin blazed a trail of climbs across Britain, including the Lake District and the Welsh mountains.

The climbs he established are still recognised today as being among the most difficult in the country.

Dolphin also took part in several expeditions to the Alps. Tom Greenwood, a member of the climbers' legendary Gritstone Club to which Dolphin also belonged, reproduces some of Dolphin's diaries, including his record of an expedition to the Swiss Alps in 1951. He obtained detailed records of Dolphin's climbs, and spoke to the woman who was Dolphin's fiancee – he had been due to marry in the year of his death. He also obtained photographs of Dolphin in action.

Dolphin was also a fell runner, pot-holer, and a member of Leeds Harehills Harriers. In his working life he was a metallurgist, working for the Leeds engineering firm John Fowler and Co Ltd. A picture emerges of a quiet, modest, gentle, helpful, highly intelligent and widely-respected young man. Tom Greenwood's fascinating book deserves a far wider audience than only the climbing fraternity.

Memories of Dolphin, 11.99, is published by Green Woods.