Infection sees Scots mountaineer lose his memory and need psychiatric treatment

No avalanche was strong enough and no mountain range dangerous enough to stop Hamish Macinnes.

But when the pioneering climber and heroic ­rescuer was sectioned and found himself being treated for dementia symptoms, he faced losing a lifetime’s worth of thrilling adventure memories.

Hamish collapsed alone in his Glencoe home five years ago and lost his memory due to a severe urinary tract infection (UTI) that caused mental illness.

He was hospitalised before getting referred to a secure psychiatric unit in Inverness.

Friends, including Monty Python star Michael Palin, were warned Hamish was close to death. They rushed to his bedside to say their goodbyes.

Drawing on all the mental strength that saw him climb Everest, Hamish managed to recover and then started to piece his memory together by ­reading the dozens of books he had written about his adventures.

Now 88, the Scot is telling the story of his comeback in the film Final Ascent, and admits that his ­hospital ordeal and memory loss were more ­terrifying than anything he encountered while climbing.

He said: “A friend found me unconscious at my front door, and I don’t remember all my time inside because I was sedated and in a straitjacket. It’s a bit of a horror story.

“I was five years ill, and two years with loss of memory. I’ve got vivid recollections of screaming and everything. I had a pretty rough time, the film reminds me of it.

“I went down to 8st, people were coming from a long way because they thought I was dying. If I had been given antibiotics initially, all of this wouldn’t have happened.”

While hospitalised, Hamish staged several escape attempts, at one point making it to the roof of the Belford hospital in Fort William via a fire escape ascent. After weeks of treatment in different facilities, the UTI was diagnosed and he was treated and then sent to the Priory clinic for rehab.

But that was just the start of the hard work for a man whose life was dedicated to scaling peaks literally and figuratively.

Born in Gatehouse of Fleet in ­Kirkcudbrightshire, Hamish got into climbing when he was a teenager and scaled the Matterhorn in the Alps at 16. He went on to become one of the best-known mountain men of the last century.

He climbed Everest twice, explored Patagonia and the Amazon, and was a mountaineering expert on films such as The Mission, The Eiger Sanction and Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

It was working on the Holy Grail, ­building the Bridge of Doom, that led him to meet Palin, who helped launch Final Ascent at its Glasgow Film Festival premiere this year.

The Python legend said in the film, which is out in cinemas: “I heard he was ill. Then I heard he’d been taken to a mental hospital against his will. And no one could find out why he was taken there. I found this much-reduced figure sleeping in one small room and I noticed the bed was very narrow.

“It looked like he had been on some kind of expedition. I said, ‘This man has been up most of the ­Himalayan mountains and here he is in this place.’

“It seemed an extraordinary place for Hamish to be.”

Hamish was home, but bereft of his memories, until he realised he could reboot his brain with the contents of his bookshelves.

He said: “I realised I was lucky because I have made a lot of films and written more than 40 books, so going through them brought it all back.

“If it wasn’t for the books, I wouldn’t be here today. It was like looking through a glass darkly, seeing things through a filter, a neutral density.”

And what memories. As well as his global ­expeditions, he was the leader of Glencoe ­Mountain Rescue and the inventor of the world’s first metal ice axe, as well as folding stretchers and a box tent.

He said: “Over the years, I have lost more than 30 friends. I’ve been declared dead six times, I think. And I’m still here. I have always been physically strong but mentally as well, which is why I am still alive.”

Having battled back to health, Hamish still lives alone in the house he hand-built in Glencoe, goes walking every day and is putting the finishing touches to a book.

He is delighted with the chance to tell his story in Final Ascent, and hopes it raises awareness of mental health issues.

It has been part of Scottish Mental Health Arts and Film Festival and the Luminate festival focusing on senior issues.

Director Robbie Fraser said he was ­honoured to bring Hamish’s adventures to the screen.

He added: “I hope the film helps him get his head round what happened.

“He is like a superhero and his house is like the Batcave. He is an ­inventor, an engineer, a safety innovator, directly he has saved God knows how many people through his work with Glencoe rescue, but with his metal ice axes and folding stretcher, has saved thousands of lives.

“He is a Scottish hero and I think his willpower and the inner strength that he has developed over 60 years of climbing, up to and including Everest, gave him the strength to cope with this thing which was perhaps his biggest challenge.”

Hamish added: “I’m cured, and I’ve got those memories.

“It’s phenomenal to have them back.”