The Maverick Mountaineer: The Remarkable Life of George Ingle Finch by Robert Wainwright, review: 'heroic follies'

Having conquered the Eiger, Jungfrau, Matterhorn and Mont Blanc, Finch joined the wunderkind George Mallory on the 1922 expedition to Everest. The Australian was the architect of its landmark use of oxygen cylinders to tackle the high altitude, which some traditionalists considered cheating. Using his bottled air, however, Finch climbed to the then-record height of 27,300ft, within reach of the summit. Yet he turned back to rescue his partner Geoffrey Bruce. Two years later Mallory would perish on those treacherous ridges.

Finch’s scientific ventures, most notably on the staff at Imperial College London, are well handled by Wainwright. There are breakthroughs, eccentric professors and industry spats – even a fist fight. Finch also distinguished himself in both world wars: during the first he blew a German fighter ace out of the sky with a booby-trapped observation balloon; in the second he created an incendiary bomb and developed London’s fire defences.