Photographic Contribution to the Berger Archive by David Byett

So who is David Byett?

He contacts the Pegasus Club on 3rd July 2019 via Facebook and asks to join the group. He is not a caver and has no interest in caving, was never a member, associate or friend of the club and knows no one in the club. 

This is a bit of a mystery until he explains that he had recently bought an old 35mm slide projector at a car boot sale in Derby which contained four boxes of slides. On viewing some of these slides and doing a bit of research online he determines that they are mostly of an expedition to the Gouffre Berger. Doing comparisons with photos that are available on the net; one source must have been the Pegasus Caving Club website, David comes to the conclusion that they are indeed of the Clubs expeditions to the Berger in 1964 & 1967. He also observes that not all of the slides in his possession appear anywhere on the site.

​

When contacted by Andrew Walchester he enquires if the Club would like to take possession of the slides at no cost, having himself spent £20 on the projector. The answer was of course a resounding Yes. The slides were collected from David on 28th July 2019 and to show our appreciation of his time and trouble in contacting the Club it was agreed to reimburse him the £20 he paid for the projector, which evidently was not in good working order. The slides were then digitised by Andrew Walchester's Son Joe and are now part of the Berger archive on this, The Clubs website.

​

If it was not for David Byett, a part of the Pegasus Club history would probably have ended up in the bin and lost forever. Many Many thanks to you David from all the members past, present and future of The Pegasus Club Nottingham, aka The Pegasus Caving Club.

​

The Slides

In the four boxes there were a total of 144 slides all relating to the Pegasus Caving Club in one form or another. Apart from one they all appear to be related to the 1964 and 1967 expeditions to the Gouffre Berger, some taken on expedition training meets show walking in Snowdonia and caving in Yorkshire. The odd one out is a photo of Dennis Worth of the Hyperion Club of Stockport posing in the winding cleft, taken on the 1962 expedition and appearing in James Lovelocks “Life and Death Underground.

​

I have added the photos into the relevant 1964 or 1967 expedition galleries and I have replaced some of the existing photos with the newly obtained ones where the quality of these was superior.

​

A total of 61 of the 144 photos are new to the Pegasus Clubs archive and can be seen by following the link below. 

 

Cheg Chester August 2019
 

​