Florence Crauford Grove
Encyclopedia
Florence Crauford Grove was an English
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

 mountaineer
Mountaineer
-Sports:*Mountaineering, the sport, hobby or profession of walking, hiking, trekking and climbing up mountains, also known as alpinism-University athletic teams and mascots:*Appalachian State Mountaineers, the athletic teams of Appalachian State University...

 and author
Author
An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...

, sometimes known as F. Crauford Grove.

Mountaineer

Grove became an experienced alpinist in the late 1850s and joined the Alpine Club of London
Alpine Club (UK)
The Alpine Club was founded in London in 1857 and was probably the world's first mountaineering club. It is UK mountaineering's acknowledged 'senior club'.-History:...

 soon after it was formed in 1857, later serving as its President from 1884 to 1886. He was one of the best British climbers of his day and is remembered for opposing guideless climbing during the 1870s. An article on the founders of the Alpine Club in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography calls him a "gentleman traveller of independent means".

Because of his first name, Grove is sometimes mistakenly thought of as a woman. His second name is Crawford.

First ascents

  • 12 August 1863: Dent d'Hérens
    Dent d'Hérens
    The Dent d'Hérens is a mountain in the Pennine Alps, lying on the border between Italy and Switzerland. The mountain lies a few kilometres west of the Matterhorn.The Aosta hut is used for the normal route.-Naming:...

     (4,171 m) with Reginald S. Macdonald, Montagu Woodmass and William Edward Hall and guides Melchior Anderegg
    Melchior Anderegg
    Melchior Anderegg , from Zaun, Meiringen, was a Swiss mountain guide and the first ascensionist of many prominent mountains in the western Alps during the golden and silver ages of alpinism...

     and Peter Perren
  • 16 August 1863: Parrotspitze
    Parrotspitze
    The Parrotspitze is a peak in the Pennine Alps of Italy and Switzerland. It is located south of Dufourspitze in the Monte Rosa Massif. The mountain is named after Johann Jakob Friedrich Wilhelm Parrot, a German doctor, who made an attempt on the Piramide Vincent with Joseph Zumstein in 1816.The...

     (4,432 m) with the same party (Reginald S. Macdonald, Montagu Woodmass, William Edward Hall, guides Melchior Anderegg and Peter Perren)
  • 22 August 1864: Zinalrothorn
    Zinalrothorn
    The Zinalrothorn is a mountain in the Pennine Alps in Switzerland. Its name comes from the village of Zinal lying on the north side and from the German word Rothorn which means Red Peak...

     (4,221 m), with Leslie Stephen
    Leslie Stephen
    Sir Leslie Stephen, KCB was an English author, critic and mountaineer, and the father of Virginia Woolf and Vanessa Bell.-Life:...

     and guides Jakob Anderegg and Melchior Anderegg
  • 1874: West summit of Mount Elbrus
    Mount Elbrus
    Mount Elbrus is an inactive volcano located in the western Caucasus mountain range, in Kabardino-Balkaria and Karachay-Cherkessia, Russia, near the border of Georgia. Mt. Elbrus's peak is the highest in the Caucasus, in Russia...

     (5,642 m), first ascent led by Grove, with Frederick Gardner, Horace Walker
    Horace Walker
    Horace Walker was an English mountaineer who made many notable first ascents, including Mount Elbrus and the Grandes Jorasses.-Alpinism:...

    , Peter Knubel and their guide Ahiya Sottaiev. The west summit is forty metres higher than the east summit.

Publications

  • The Frosty Caucasus: an account of a walk through part of the Range and of an ascent of Elbruz in the summer of 1874 (London, Longmans, Green & Co, 1875, 341 pp.)

Grove's book is illustrated with six plates by Edward Whymper
Edward Whymper
Edward Whymper , was an English illustrator, climber and explorer best known for the first ascent of the Matterhorn in 1865. On the descent four members of the party were killed.-Early life:...

, from photographs by Horace Walker, and a folding map. Chapters cover the Upper Rion, the valley of the Upper Tcherek river, the Bezingi glacier and the Kotchan Tau Group
Koshtan-Tau
Koshtan-Tau , is the highest peak of the Koshtan massif of the central Caucasus Mountains in the Kabardino-Balkaria Republic of Russia, near the border with Georgia.-References:...

 (both in Kabardino-Balkaria
Kabardino-Balkaria
The Kabardino-Balkar Republic , or Kabardino-Balkaria , is a federal subject of Russia located in the North Caucasus. Population: -Geography:The republic is situated in the North Caucasus mountains, with plains in the northern part....

, Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...

), Tchegem and the Gorge of the Djilki-Su, Urusbieh, the first ascent of Mount Elbruz (in Kabardino-Balkaria and Karachay-Cherkessia
Karachay-Cherkessia
The Karachay-Cherkess Republic , or Karachay-Cherkessia is a federal subject of Russia . Population: -Geography:*Area: *Borders:**internal: Krasnodar Krai , Kabardino-Balkar Republic , Stavropol Krai ....

), and the Nakhar Pass (in Georgia
Georgia (country)
Georgia is a sovereign state in the Caucasus region of Eurasia. Located at the crossroads of Western Asia and Eastern Europe, it is bounded to the west by the Black Sea, to the north by Russia, to the southwest by Turkey, to the south by Armenia, and to the southeast by Azerbaijan. The capital of...

).

The Frosty Caucasus was republished in a facsimile edition by Adamant Media Corporation in February 2002 (ISBN 978-1402184468).

The title of the book is taken from William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...

's play Richard II
Richard II (play)
King Richard the Second is a history play by William Shakespeare believed to be written in approximately 1595. It is based on the life of King Richard II of England and is the first part of a tetralogy, referred to by some scholars as the Henriad, followed by three plays concerning Richard's...

-

O, who can hold a fire in his hand

By thinking on the frosty Caucasus?

Footnotes

The source of this article is wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.  The text of this article is licensed under the GFDL.
 
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