Toddler finds Charlie Smellie's lost medals in Arnold Rae Park

Two year-old Trystan Latimer, with his big sister Maraea and mum Gaylene West, and some of the medals he found at Arnold Rae Park.

Two-year-old Trystan Latimer couldn't wait to show his mum, Gaylene West, what he had found when she took him and his 11-year-old sister Maraea to Arnold Rae Park in Kaitaia on Monday to burn off some energy.

Trystan's sharp eyes had spotted a black plastic bag — exactly where he was not able to say, being just 2 — but the contents very quickly found their way to the police station.

The collection included a watch, a New Zealand Defence Force medal, a royal visit of 1953 commemorative medal, and NZ Fire Service honours including a gold star (awarded in 1986), a long service medal with seven bars, and a medal conferring life membership of the Kerikeri Fire Brigade, also awarded in 1986.

And it did not take the CIB to identify the owner. Many of the items were engraved with the name CA Smellie, better known throughout the Far North as Charlie.

Mr Smellie, who died in Kaikohe in February last year, aged 79, arrived in Kerikeri with his family as a toddler, from Whakatane. He spent almost his entire life there, opening the town's first supermarket, although he also resided in Kaikohe, and for a short time very late in his life in Kaitaia.

He was a volunteer firefighter from 1955 to 1987, reaching the rank of station officer, a long-serving member of the Lions, a Justice of the Peace, and a two-term local politician.
Mr Smellie's younger brother Bill, who lives at Pahi, on the Kaipara Harbour, was surprised to hear the missing medals had been found in a Kaitaia park.

He didn't know when or how they had disappeared, but he had wondered why they weren't among the possessions the family received after the funeral.

He was pleased to hear that the medals had turned up, and commended the young boy who had found them. He would donate them to the Kerikeri Fire Brigade, if it was interested.

"He was one of the brigade's founder members. He was always very involved," he said.