To attempt to write a biography of a man like Harry is an act of faith. Faith that somehow out of the recollections of those few who still recalled his passage and, more prosaically, out of some active archival research, would emerge an accurate picture of a man whose life was far from mundane.
In relating the exploits of "Freddy" Fredkens, David Ben Gurion, in his Diary of the War of Independence, quietly revealed the existence of a Haganah agent, whose true name turned out to be Henryk Harry] Grzegorz Tursz-Fredkens, an ex-RAF pilot.
Harry, as he was generally known, was a Polish Jew whose appetite for life was unbounded, sometimes reckless and even amoral, but always fascinating.
He was a man driven by the lure of new adventures and the opportunity of financial success. These aspirations were not always fulfilled and Harry had to cope with many disappointments over the course of his remarkable life.