- Contributed by听
- H. A. Bergenheim
- People in story:听
- Jarl Bergenheim
- Location of story:听
- Yl盲-Sommee, the Karelian isthmus, Finnish-Russian front
- Article ID:听
- A1289171
- Contributed on:听
- 18 September 2003
It was a freezing cold day (-48C) in Yl盲-Sommee, on the Finnish-Russian Karelian isthmus-front. It was so cold, that every breath felt like a hundred needles in your lungs. My grandfathers brother, Jarl Bergenheim, captain in the Finnish army, had just arrived in the village with his regiment; the 10 infantry regiment. The regiment had a couple of days earlier withdrawn from a battered, naked hill called Marjapellonm盲ki, which they had successfully defended for several tough weeks, despite many fierce, massive russian attacks and artillery-concentrations. The hill had before the war been covered with trees, but when the regiment withdrew from it, there wasn麓t one tree left on the entire hill! All that was left of it was a grey mess consisting of snow, splinters from split trees, grenade-craters, gunpowder, blood and flesh. The entire hill was covered in thick black smoke. The regiment had suffered heavy casualties, mostly in the artillery-concentrations, but the Russians had lost a lot more men in their attacks, and when the regiment withdrew, it wasn麓t because of an attack, but because a new, better line was being established in Yl盲-Sommee. The Russians took the hill several days later, when they noticed that the defenders had left.
Let麓s now return to that freezing cold day, when Jarl and the regiment had arrived in Yl盲-Sommee village. The village was located on a low hill, with valleys surrounding it on two opposite sides, the two other sides being occupied by woods. It was sometime in the early morning when the Russians attacked. They came silently, and in large numbers through the woods south-east of the village. They caught the finns on guard by surprise, and immediately occupied a few houses and a barn with stone-walls. They defended themselves ferociously, with vast firepower. Jarl麓s company was ordered to take back the area, and they cleared all the houses in a short time, but were then pinned down outside the barn. Jarl then hurried to call for artillery support and ordered two machine-guns to the flanks. It was then it happened; a russian grenade exploded a few yards away from Jarl, and the entire calf on one of his legs was ripped off. He was immediately transported by horse-sleigh to the field hospital, which was several miles away. Luckily however, his orders had gone through before he was wounded, and the barn was cleared of enemies with the help of the machine-guns after the artillery concentration. Jarl later died in the field-hospital, and he was truly missed by his company. His last orders had saved many of their lives.
I told this story as a tribute to my grandfathers brother, his regiment, and the entire Finnish army during world war two. The Finnish army often fought against Russian forces that had up to ten times more men, artillery, tanks (the finns only had a few tanks during the winter war)and bomber- and fighterplanes. However the Russians were usually defeated, and suffered far larger casualties than the Finns. I owe my independence as a Finn to people like my grandfather麓s brother. Thanks for reading about his story.
Alexander Bergenheim, 16
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These messages were added to this story by site members between June 2003 and January 2006. It is no longer possible to leave messages here. Find out more about the site contributors.
Message 1 - Finland
Congratulations for this sensational story. I don鈥檛 know about Europe, but here in Brazil most of the people have no idea about the invasion of Finland by the Russians, and the heroic resistance of the Finnish army. As far as know, such resistance has even taken Hitler to erroneously think that the red army could be easily defeated. I have also written an article about my grandfather, who fought for Brazil in WW2. I believe Brazilian participation in the conflict is not very known in Europe, is it? Anyway, it was really not a very significant participation. We sent 25,000 men, after a German submarine sunk some Brazilian commercial ships, in 1942. As to the invasion of Finland, I only found out about it last year, after reading a very good article describing the conflict (the article was written in Portuguese).
听
Message 2 - Finland
Posted on: 22 September 2003 by Helen
Hi guys
Thank you both for your great stories. It's great to bring nations together in this way.
I just wanted to let you know, Alexander, that I've edited and categorised your story and you can now find it linked from these two pages:
C1201
C1271
I hope you are pleased with the final version and congratulations on such a great story.
Best wishes
Helen
听
Message 3 - Finland
I麓m glad you found the story about my graddads brother interesting, I will try to write some more about the finnish participation in WW2 later. Actually I hadn麓t heard about the brazilian participation in the war, but I麓d be glad to learn about it.
A. Bergenheim
听
Message 4 - Finland
Posted on: 14 October 2004 by SemiFinn
It never ceases to amaze me that the Finnish-Russian wars of the Second World War are almost forgotten. I found the story very very interesting. Your grandfather was fighting for my real homeland - my mother's family was forcibly ejected from the Karelian Isthmus, from a town called Terijoki (now Zelenogorsk). Sadly, my great-grandfather never made it out. We can only hope he was killed and didn't live his days out in Siberia or similar.
I have only recently started looking into the history of Terijoki, in the vain hope that I can find out more about my family.
It is people like you who keep the memory alive, making sure that people are reminded that there was another mass migration, but one that is largely unknown.
听
Message 5 - Finland
Posted on: 13 November 2004 by OldBraggs
I had the pleasure of living in Finland for 2 years and became very interested in Finnish military history. I am currently trying to put a book together about Britain and the Winter War and I have in my collection the medals of a man born in India (British father, Indian mother) who went to Finland with the British Volunteer Contingent and then came back to the UK and joined the RAF. He was killed in 1944 when his plane exploded over Arnhem.
But the story of Finnish resistance to the Soviet invasion is a most amazing one. The Finnish soldiers and airmen achieved a miracle and although they paid a heavy price, they won for Finland the precious right to freedom.
Min盲 pidan asua Suomessa. Min盲 haluan menee takaisin.
Hope that makes sense, trying to learn the language. Tosi vaikea!
Steve
Message 1 - A cold day in Finland
"HI Alexander"
In 1939 when Russia attacked Finland we youngsters in England who had turned on to the war even at the age of Ten, we read about it all, we thought Finland would be over run by the Russian masses in no time at all.
Imagine our surprise when this did not happen and I remember the press and the radio all talking about Brave Little Finland. We followed the bulletins and marked the maps with our little flags we could all sing the Finnish National Anthem (not in Finnish of course)and greatly admired the Brave Finns.
In 1941 when Finland sided with Germany the admiration soured a bit but never did the first impression of a brave Finnish people ever go away.
My Granddaughter was an exchange student in Finland early this year spending several months in Helsinki and traveling widely. I was of course very interested in her thoughts on the Country and the People, she loved them and was sorry to return home to Durham College. I am 74 Alexander and I too have been a soldier so know what it is like, never forget what your people have done and always try to keep war in its box with the lid nailed down, for good I hope.
Frank Mee.
听
Message 2 - A cold day in Finland
I麓m glad to hear that the English thought of us Finns fighting far up in the north, even when the war was knocking on your door, too. I麓ve heard a lot of stories about British people wanting to come to Finland and fight as volunteers during the war.
Although the war was a terrible thing , I still think it united the Finns in a way, and now we know that war should never be an option in resolving international chrisis.
A. Bergenheim
听
Message 3 - A cold day in Finland
Posted on: 14 October 2004 by SemiFinn
Finland's alliance with Nazi Germany was a sad byproduct of the alliance between Britain and Russia. Britain could hardly be seen to be supporting a country at war with one of the other Allied powers. So who else could Finland turn to for help?
I wish I knew more about what led to Finland and Germany becoming allies...
听
Message 4 - A cold day in Finland
I think the main reason for the alliance was that Finland needed weapons, tanks and planes to support their attack into Russia in the continuation war. It was a question of war material that was desperately needed.
Germany could provide this, but to the price that the Finns had to promise not to negotiate peace with the Russians without Germany's approval. At the end of the continuation war Finland needed to break out of the war, and started peace negotiations with the Russians. It is the actions of an extraordinary man, the finnish president Risto Ryti, that made this possible. Ryti had promised the Germans not to negotiate with Russia PERSONALLY, and therefore as he gave up the presidency, Finland was free from the promise to the germans. Peace with Russia was declared in the fall of 1944. This "pissed off" the Germans and they declared war on Finland, the Lapland war. This war was about the germans retreating out of Finland into Norway, and destroying as much as possible as they retreated. It was a very senseless war, but the Germans eventually left Finland and the country could begin rebuilding.
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