Havelock Attractions

At the northeast corner of the South Island, 40km northwest of Blenheim, is the little township of Havelock (pop. 500), in a beautiful setting in the Marlborough Sounds. The settlement, named after General Sir Henry Havelock, who distinguished himself in the Indian Mutiny, was established on the site of an old Maori village to supply the needs of gold miners working at Wakamarina, 10km west. The inhabitants now live mainly by fish farming (mostly shellfish) in the inlets of the Marlborough Sounds.

Havelock's main claim to fame is that the atomic physicist Ernest Rutherford and the missile scientist William Pickering went to school here. The old schoolhouse is now a youth hostel. In the former Methodist church is a memorial room commemorating Rutherford and Pickering.