Mountaineer’s Funeral

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31098, 29 June 1966, Page 9

Mountaineer’s Funeral

“Thank God for the way he went. It is a cliche, but true, that ‘Greater love hath no man than this, that he lay down his life for his friends,’” said the Bishop-elect of Christchurch, the Very Rev. W. A. Pyatt, in an address at the funeral service yesterday morning for Mr John Harrison, killed by an avalanche during the Mount Rolleston rescue attempt last week.

Mountaineering friends and associates from all parts of New Zealand were among more than 500 people who attended the funeral service at St. Mary’s Church, Merivale, and the committail at the Memorial Garden Crematorium.

The Mayor of Christchurch (Mr G. Manning) attended to show civic sympathy, and among the mourners were the Minister of Transport (Mr McAlpine), the chairman of the Arthur’s Pass National Park Board (Mr N. S. Coad), the board’s secretary (Mr W. M. Ollivier), and park rangers.

Police formed a guard of honour at the crematorium. They were Chief Superintendent G. W. Alty, Chief Inspector L. D. Bridge, SeniorSergeant R. D. Wales. Sergeant G. Davidson, Sergeant E. J. Niven, and Constable B. W. Thomas, secretary of the search and rescue co-ordin-ating committee. The pall-bearers were Sir Edmund Hillary, Messrs A. McKenzie, W. Romanes, N. D. Hardie, and B. Hearfieid (all mountaineering friends), and the dead man’s brother, Mr R. Harrison. Another noted mountaineer who was present was Mr Peter Mulgrew. Mr Harrison organised

his rescue when he was injured in the Himalayas in 1961.

As the cortege, more than a mile long, travelled to the crematorium, traffic stopped and Main North road reconstruction work ceased. Silent groups of people watched the funeral go by. The Bishop-elect began his address by reading the inscription in a prayer-book owned by Mr Harrison—- “ Thursday, 7 November, 1946. To my friend J.H. from E.W.L. Endure hardness as a good soldier of Jesus Christ. II Timothy ii, 3. God had given man choice as to the way he lived, said the Bishop-elect. Some chose not to be concerned with affairs at large. Others chose to live excitingly, beyond the humdrum, with their eyes turned to the mountains and the sea.

Mr Harrison, he said, had chosen to live boldly and courageously, and had very gently lived life to the full.

John Harrison, in going to the mountains, had deliberately accepted that this choice held life or death. The kind of life he had chosen lay not only in mountaineering, but in human life And personal relationships. God could be thanked that he had given his life serving others. The Bishop-elect asked for generous support for the national fund which has been set up to provide for the education of Mr Harrison’s two young daughters. The photograph shows the pall-bearers carrying the coffin from the church. Sir Edmund Hillary, president of the New Zealand Alpine Club, Is on the left, and Mr Hardie, leader of the rescue party, on the right.