Gränsfors Hatchets

all photographs by the author

The Small Hatchet is a great tool for splitting kindling. Using a stick to keep the workpiece upright keeps the fingers at a safe distance from the sharp blade.

Daniel Beard, in The American Boy’s Handy Book, wrote, “At least one or two good sharp hatchets should form a part of the equipment of every camp; it is astonishing, with their aid and very little practice, what a comfortable house may be built in a very short time.” It’s no longer acceptable, as it was in 1882, to chop down live trees to build the cottage, beds, tables, and chairs Beard describes in his chapter on camping in the woods, but a sharp hatchet is still a useful tool to have while camp-cruising.During my Inside Passage cruises (Sea Trial Part I and Sea Trial Part II) I used a hatchet to split firewood and kindling, to make and drive tent stakes, to make floats to keep a mooring line from snagging on rocks during a midnight low tide, and even to fashion a slender rudder to hold a steady course while rowing.