Strictly business

Harry was born in Eltham, Taranaki, in 1881, the third son of a pioneer farming family. His first experience of the sea in small boats was on a trip to Kapiti Island from Waikanae around 1893 with his uncle Frank in a dinghy borrowed from a local fisherman. Frank rowed the six miles while Harry bailed with a rusty fruit tin. It was calm at first, but the wind picked up and Harry was busy with the bailer.

They stayed on the north end of the island with his uncle’s friend, Mr Lowe and helped him build a 30ft boat to be used as a lighter to carry Lowe’s sheep out to steamers. In his memoirs, Harry wrote, “Adze, axe and hand-saw were the principal tools. Much of the timber was driftwood from shipwrecks, mainland sawmills,