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Chapter Four

The Mount Bogong Tragedy

[Northern Victoria, Australia, October 1984]

On August 5, 1936, three men set off from Hotham Heights on a skiing expedition to Mount Bogong. All were experienced skiers. Cleve Cole, thirty-seven years old, was a leader of the Lone Scout organization in Melbourne and co-author of a book on scouting; Howard Michell, twenty-three, was the scion of a wealthy textile family in South Australia; Percy E. “Mick” Hull from Hawthorn, Victoria, also twenty-three, was well familiar with the highlands. They were in good spirits when they departed. They would be the first men to cross the high plains in winter. Their plan was to ski up the summit of Mount Bogong, then on to the Staircase Hut, where they’d left a cache of provisions for their return trip. They never made it to the hut.

I learned of the famous disaster on my first trip into the Bogong High Plains. It was 1984. I was new to Australia, and Gray was so excited to show me the region. We stopped in Glen Valley, a jumping-off point to the numerous bushwalking trails and campsites. I was still adjusting to Aussie terms: While he pumped the petrol (gasoline), I went inside the milk bar (convenience shop) to use the loo (toilet) and buy some biscuits (cookies) for our tea (dinner). In there, I found a wall display filled with flashy, touristy brochures of the Victorian Alps: Mount Hotham, Mount Beauty, Mount Bogong, and the high plains that lie amid them. To a person from the Pacific Northwest, calling them “mountains” and “alps” seemed a misrepresentation. These terms must be understood in the context of the largely horizontal topography of Australia, the flattest of the seven continents. Mount Bogong, the highest “peak” in Victoria, rises to only about 6,500 feet and appears more like a rounded hilltop. Among the brochures, I also found an older sun-bleached, flyspecked pamphlet, mimeographed on cheap paper. The title in faded ink read, THE MT. BOGONG TRAGEDY. I took one, along with the chocolate biscuits, and read it as we got back on the road.

On August 6, the three skiers had been overtaken by a sudden blizzard. They dug a snow cave where they waited three days for the storm to end. But on August 9, running low on food, they decided to make a break for the Staircase Hut. They soon became lost in the whiteout conditions and for the next five days wandered with little food, exposed to sub-freezing temperatures and severe winds. On Friday, August 14, they finally descended Mount Bogong into the rugged and largely un-surveyed Big River Valley country. By then, suffering from exhaustion, hunger and hypothermia, too weak even to continue carrying their sleeping bags and gear, they dumped them and tried to find their way through the thickly timbered wilderness with its steep ravines. They had matches to start a fire, and now wood, but their fingers were too badly frostbitten to use them. Cole’s feet were blistered, making it impossible for him to walk any farther, so they decided Michell would go for help. The remaining two men took shelter in a hollow log. According to Hull’s later account, after three days Cleve Cole lost hope that Michell had made it through, and at that point he seemed to lose his will to live. Hull woke later that night to find his companion missing and went out looking for him. Discovering him unconscious and partially covered in snow, Hull managed to drag him back to their log. By that time, he, too, doubted they would be found alive.

But the night before, on Sunday, August 16, Michell had reached Glen Valley, stumbling into the township so debilitated that he could give only the sketchiest details of where he’d left his companions. He was driven to the Omeo District Hospital where he would eventually recover, though needing two toes amputated. The alarm was sounded, and search parties set out early the next morning. Every able-bodied man in the vicinity joined in the effort. Skiers came up from Melbourne. Both the Maude and Yellow Girl mines suspended operations so their workers could join the search. More than 120 men set out into the rugged country with no clear idea where to find the missing skiers. They started on horses, but soon had to leave the animals behind as they climbed into the difficult terrain. Meanwhile, back in Glen Valley, the women prepared food to send out by packhorse to the parties over the coming days.

On Tuesday, August 18, at around eight-thirty in the morning, one of the search parties climbed a high ridge overlooking a valley. A member shouted across the expanse, “HALLOOOOO!” and was surprised to hear a faint whistle. Below them, they saw Hull emerge from thick brush. The seven men made their way down the slope to find him in a gravely weakened state. Cole was in even worse shape, lying unconscious inside the log. For the next two hours, they administered first aid to the badly frostbitten men and fed them hot liquids. Too weak to walk, the skiers were carried on stretchers improvised from saplings and oilskin coats. In rain and hail, against a strong north wind, it was slow going out of the steep gullies and ravines. The team took turns carrying Cole and Hull on the makeshift frames. Holding them shoulder high, they crossed the rushing Mitta Mitta River, wading waist deep into its freezing waters. In six hours, the party had covered only three miles. Exhausted, they made camp at four in the afternoon, continuing to care for the two men as best they could.

Early on the morning of Wednesday, August 19, they set out again. A member of the party was sent ahead to get help. Incredibly, by early afternoon the young man had covered fifteen miles and was close to Glen Valley when he came upon another rescue party led by Harold Hull, Mick’s older brother. Word was sent to the township the two men had been found, and the second search party went out to help bring them in. A Sister Watson of the Bush Nursing Association drove a motor car up the river as far as the road would go to meet them, returning to Glen Valley with Cole late in the afternoon. Suffering severe hypothermia, he was too fragile, his condition too critical, to move him to the district hospital. A doctor from Omeo attended to the unconscious man. Cleve Cole died shortly after nine that night, having never regained consciousness.

By all accounts, it was a disaster with a tragic ending. But it also became a stirring piece of Australian lore and a source of national pride, how the townships had rallied to save two of their own. The Sydney Morning Herald hailed the effort as “a magnificent example of the working of the bush code.” The Western Mail in Perth called it “one of the most thrilling alpine dramas enacted in Australia.” The following years saw the construction of a series of huts on the Bogong High Plains to provide shelter to future skiers. The first to be constructed was the Cleve Cole Hut.

Certainly, it was a moving and inspiring tale, but as I would later learn, there was more to the story that never made it into the news-papers or the Glen Valley pamphlet.