The official AHF Winter & Continuation War quiz thread

[Esa K]

Hmmm... Both Mannerheim and Harrer meet Dalai Lama... ( but, think this too is a wrong track, cause cant figure out how that can be connected to the Continuation War, besides that it was during the last year of the Continuation War that Harrer arrived to Lhasa...????)

best regrds

Esa K

[Janne]

You (and apparently the others who do not even dare to guess) are making it too complicated! Forget Tibet and Lhasa, concentrate on Harrer's time in India! Take a trip to the Irish Sea first, if it helps to solve the mystery!

[Janne]

And once you've been to the Irish Sea, you can head for the Caribbean Sea and visit Trinidad and Jamaica and find the common denominator!

[Janne]

We could also pay a visit to Haifa or to Australia to crack this surprisingly hard nut...

[Esa K]

This went very hard to crack indeed... But, another guess then, Harrer traveled to India with a Finnish ship that didnt return to Finland untill the Continuation War had started...

Best regards

Esa K

[Janne]

Hot, hot, very hot! On Finnish ships you would've found...?

[Janne]

Well, I can only add the Bahamas, Gibraltar and Canada to make the list exhuastive, but I¨'m beginning to think the biggest obstacle to getting any a correct answer is the dreaded rule about the next question...

[Esa K]

but I¨'m beginning to think the biggest obstacle to getting any a correct answer is the dreaded rule about the next question...

No, no... Still working on this...

Best regards

Esa K

[Esa K]

OK, another guess then... Maybe this: The ship wich Harrer had intended to return with to Europe in 1939 had partly a Finnish crew, and the ship was not back to Finland before UK/Commonwelth declared war on Finland 6/12 1941 so those Finnish seaman was interned by UK etc etc...?

Best regards

Esa K

[Janne]

You are circling closer and closer to the correct answer, but also faster and faster so that I'm not sure that your next try wouldn't be further off again. This final hint should keep you frimly on target:

It's not a "would've could've" kind of connection, Heinrich Harrer and Finnish ______ did share the same fate in a ______ in _______, India.

(BTW is it really so that there isn't anyone else out there who could have solved this mystery? Do other posters simply skip over this thread as uninteresting or do they really feel that it's such a huge task to come up with the next question?)

[Tero T]

Carry on !! one of you will die from mental exhaustion. Tero T

[Esa K]

Carry on !! one of you will die from mental exhaustion.

Exhaustion... Nope, still som sisu left...

Heinrich Harrer and Finnish ______ did share the same fate in a ______ in _______, India.

How about this then: Heinrich Harrer and Finnish seamen did share the same fate in a prison in Karachi, India. (Well, kind of a variation of my last answer, but... )

Still, best regards

Esa K

[Janne]

I'm tempted to accept your answer, but Karachi (while it was still in India at the time) is a bit too far off geographically - and since at this point I want the details right, the correct term wasn't "prison".

[Esa K]

New try: Heinrich Harrer and some Finnish seamen did share the same fate in an internment camp in Dehradun, India.

Best regds

Esa K

[Janne]

Dehradun, Dehra Dun or Dehra Doon - anyway, we've finally got a winner! (If you hadn't been so stubborn and refused to consult for instance Wikipedia, it wouldn't have taken so long:-))

For over a thousand Finnish seamen the war meant not only hazardous voyages but also shorter or longer periods in interment in "Civilian Internment Camps" or in concentration camps. More than half were interned by the British (after December 1941) , over four hundred by the Germans (after September 1944) and the rest by the Japanese.

Most Finnish seamen were interred on the Isle of Man (in the Irish Sea), but about thirty ended up at the foot of the Himalayas in Premnagar (or Prem Nagar) in Dehra Dun where the conditions were quite POW camplike and for them the war wasn't really over until July 1946 when they were finally able to sail back to Finland.

(BTW Finnish seamen were also taken away from ships sailing to Britain or British colonies and then arrested by immigration authorities in the US, but they were released and allowed to live and work in liberty.)