John Morris papers, 1922-1967

Charles John Morris (1895-1980) was an English army officer and ethnologist. After service in World War I, he joined the British Army in India. Most of his military career was spent as a captain with the 3rd Gurkha Rifles. Because of his knowledge of the Nepali language, Morris was invited to join the first expedition to attempt to climb Mount Everest. This expedition, under the command of General Charles Granville Bruce, attempted but failed to reach the summit in 1922. On the journey back to India, Morris and the expedition photographer, John Noel, separated from the others to explore the gorge of the Arun River. In 1927 Morris and American mountaineer Henry F. Montagnier undertook an exploration in the state of Hunza in the Himalayas. Morris was promoted to the rank of major after his return to India. He resigned from the army in the mid-1930s and took a degree in anthropology from Cambridge University in 1935. Morris traveled in Bhutan in 1932, in East Africa in 1933, and in Agra and Razmak in 1934. He taught in Japan until World War II, then headed the Far East service for the BBC (1943-1952). From 1952-1958 he was controller for the BBC Third Programme.