German Baltic Division in Finland 1918
Interesting photos, Moulded. I took some tonight too from those places I could recognize:
- Attachments
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- Hotel Kämp
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- The Cathedral and Senate Square
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- The crossroad of Unioninkatu and the Esplanade
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Two more.
- Attachments
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- Altough not featured in the old photos, I photographed this bridge that separated working class and wealthy parts of city, as the scars created by the firefights of 1918 are still clearily visible here.
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- This was a bit more tricky, but the tower of railway station in the background was a good hint, as well as the granite building of Hotel Seurahuone on the right side.
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Harri,
The source of the 19th Landwehr deployment is from Histories of Two Hundred and Fifty-One Divisions of the German army which participated in the War(1914-1918),AEF Intelligence Section,1919.It says towards "the end of July all three regiments of the Division were indentified in Finland,but seem to have gone to Estonia by August".Until I find a German source to verify this deployment,it could be faulty intelligence.However they were right about the 12th Landwehr Division operating in Finland.
The best known 'Finnish' Corps in the Russian Army of 1914 was the 22nd Finnish Corps.It fought in the Masurian Lakes region in September 1914,and was moved later south to fight in the Carpathian Mountains in 1915.
This was its OOB:
1st & 3rd Finnish Rifle Bdes (FRB)
2nd Finnish Rifle Div
4th Finnish Rifle Div
The source of the 19th Landwehr deployment is from Histories of Two Hundred and Fifty-One Divisions of the German army which participated in the War(1914-1918),AEF Intelligence Section,1919.It says towards "the end of July all three regiments of the Division were indentified in Finland,but seem to have gone to Estonia by August".Until I find a German source to verify this deployment,it could be faulty intelligence.However they were right about the 12th Landwehr Division operating in Finland.
The best known 'Finnish' Corps in the Russian Army of 1914 was the 22nd Finnish Corps.It fought in the Masurian Lakes region in September 1914,and was moved later south to fight in the Carpathian Mountains in 1915.
This was its OOB:
1st & 3rd Finnish Rifle Bdes (FRB)
2nd Finnish Rifle Div
4th Finnish Rifle Div
More on the formation of the 27th Jager Battalion:
http://www.pp.clinet.fi/~pkr01/history/lockstdt.html
http://www.pp.clinet.fi/~pkr01/history/lockstdt.html
Ike_Fi, thank you for sharing the pictures. But are you certain the scars in the Pitkäsilta bridge are from 1918, or were they caused by aerial bombardments of the Winter War or the Continuation War?
Slight wartime bomb fragment damage to old stone structures in buildings, bridges, and statues are still visible in Helsinki, if you know to look for them (athough Helsinki air defence was a success story in WWII). The pedestal of the statue of Snellman in front of the main office of Bank of Finland has visible pits on it with stone chipped off, as a result of Winter War bombing AFAIK.
Cheers,
Hanski
Slight wartime bomb fragment damage to old stone structures in buildings, bridges, and statues are still visible in Helsinki, if you know to look for them (athough Helsinki air defence was a success story in WWII). The pedestal of the statue of Snellman in front of the main office of Bank of Finland has visible pits on it with stone chipped off, as a result of Winter War bombing AFAIK.
Cheers,
Hanski
I'm quite sure they are from 1918's skirmishes, more detailed battle description was published ages ago in the paper version of Helsingin Sanomat, but you can find some online references athmononen wrote:Ike_Fi, thank you for sharing the pictures. But are you certain the scars in the Pitkäsilta bridge are from 1918, or were they caused by aerial bombardments of the Winter War or the Continuation War?
http://www.helsinginsanomat.fi/uutisark ... 7ka09.html and http://www.pitkasilta.hai.fi/kukkulalle/tori.htm
That's correct, traces of bombing can be also found for instance in the buildings around the Senate Square (at least from Feb 44 raids) and in the building of Technical College in Hietalahti, some blocks away from where I live. My grandmother who is still very smart-minded what it comes to things that happened during the war was in the city during the first day of Winter War and has told me about how she witnessed the first surprise bombings - his brother was studying in the T.C. by that time and after noticing that bombs had hit the neighbourhood, she feared the worst for some time, luckily unnecessarily.Slight wartime bomb fragment damage to old stone structures in buildings, bridges, and statues are still visible in Helsinki, if you know to look for them (athough Helsinki air defence was a success story in WWII). The pedestal of the statue of Snellman in front of the main office of Bank of Finland has visible pits on it with stone chipped off, as a result of Winter War bombing AFAIK.
Cheers,
Hanski
Ike_FI, you proved your point! According to one of the links, it seems the scars on the bridge were actually caused by German fire, related to the subject of this thread. Thank you for clarifying this historical detail, which all of us will now remember when crossing the bridge in Helsinki.
Cheers,
Hanski
Cheers,
Hanski
More on the 27th Jagers and the helmets they wore:
http://home.tiscali.be/be033830/jukka/j ... allery.htm
http://home.tiscali.be/be033830/jukka/j ... allery.htm
I live about 100m from that trench. It is located in Kannelmäki, near those maununeva forts. When i was young we used to play in those trenches. Sadly those trenches are full of rubbish now.
from http://www.novision.fi/viapori/eavaus.htm