After the beginning of World War Two there was a radio announcement that all enemy aliens were to report to their local police stations so that they could be put on a register. Though Harry Krauss heard the call, he didn’t believe he fitted the description of either ‘enemy’ or ‘alien’. He had become a British citizen many years earlier, and was married to a New Zealander.

Harry was well known in the town and proud of his reputation, not only as an excellent baker but as a staunch supporter of the local rugby club, where his sons Hermie and Kurt had been chosen for provincial and regional representative sides every year since they left school. Why should he register? He was against Hitler, who was a maniac. He told anyone who cared to listen that if he were living in Germany right then, his sons would have been taken off to the youth camps to be trained for Hitler’s army.

But attitudes towards him were changing in the town. People he’d known for years were avoiding him, some long-standing baking orders were cancelled, daily custom declined and he awoke one morning to find a swastika painted on the garage wall. A day later Gary Couper paid him a visit and advised him to register. ‘We all know you,’ Gary said. ‘Don’t worry, they’re not going to lock you up.’

So Harry took the train to Wellington, upset at having to come under enemy alien regulations. ‘This is my country,’ he kept trying to explain when interviewed. ‘Today’s Germany is not my Germany. The flag of Germany is not my flag. I would fight for my adopted country if I could.’

In the following days he had to give up his .202 rifle which his sons used for rabbiting. His radio was sealed so that it could not be used to transmit messages, and the telephone was disconnected. His taxi licence was taken from him, and he was not permitted to move out of town.

After several trips to Wellington to present himself to the Aliens Authority, Harry was given permission to report to the local policeman instead. Although this made life easier for him in one way, he sensed growing hostility towards him, and was becoming more reclusive as time went by. He spent most of his day away from the shop-front and more time with his drawings and making cake decorations, which he would wrap in tissue paper and store in tins. He was worried about family in Germany and wrote regularly to his mother in Berlin.