Hugh Ruttledge 20 May – was, as a result of disagreements between team members, never established. It was during this expedition that Wyn-Harris found the ice axe which belonged to Andrew Irvine, who had disappeared on the peak on the with George Mallory. One of the men rejected for this expedition was Tenzing Norgay, who made the first ascent of Everest in 1953 with Sir Edmund Hillary. Fortunately, Ruttledge had the foresight to hire Tenzing to come with him to Everest in 1936. In 1934 Ruttledge was awarded a Royal Geographical Society Founder's Gold Medal; his citation read 'For his journeys in
1953 British Mount Everest expedition Nepal, with a total weight of ten thousand pounds of baggage. 1953 British Mount Everest expedition The 1953 British Mount Everest expedition was the ninth mountaineering expedition to attempt the first ascent of Mount Everest, and the first confirmed to have succeeded when Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay reached the summit on Friday, 1953. Led by Colonel John Hunt, it was organised and financed by the Joint Himalayan Committee. News of the expedition's success reached London in time to be released on the morning of Queen Elizabeth II's coronation, Identified as the highest mountain in the world during the 1850s,