Alfred Käärmann
Alfred Käärmann (14 September 1922 in
Life
Alfred Käärmann has written many books about his life as a resistance fighter. The Girl Guide of Udumäe (Udumäe kodutütar) is about his relationship with his beloved Kleina.
In 1941 he enrolled in a local technical school, where he met and fell in love with a girl named Kleina. Conscripted by the Nazis in February 1944, Käärmann was among those who fought the
On October 17, 1945, he was shot and wounded in a skirmish with Red Army forces. Evading capture by hiding in a swamp, then moving house to house, he was given refuge in the home of an elderly lady. Ten days later, after a message was sent via a Latvian Forest brother, a nurse from Latvia came secretly to the house and amputated his badly injured arm. After recovering from this near death experience, he was to spend another seven years in the forest. Eventually captured in 1952 by the KGB, he was sentenced to 25 years' hard labour and spent the next 15 years in various prison camps in the
Three months later he was given 72 hours' notice and expelled from Estonia. His internal passport was stamped "annulled", effectively making him homeless within the Soviet Union, nor was he permitted to take a job until 1972. Drifting from place to place, Käärmann was eventually permitted by the Soviet government to return to Estonia in August 1981. Again returning to his village, he found Kleina still waiting for him, where they spent 11 years together before she died in 1992.
Alfred Käärmann was elected a member of the Congress of Estonia in 1990.
Published works
- Metsavenna käsiraamat, Tallinn : SE&JS, 1999 ([Tallinn] : Pakett)
- Sissitegevuse käsiraamat, [Tallinn] : Kroonu Klubi, [2002] (Tallinn : ETPV Trükikoda)
- Surmavaenlase vastu: Eesti lõunapiiri metsavenna mälestusi Tartu : ISBN 978-9985-56-230-7
- Udumäe Kodutütar: lugu metsavenna armsamast, Tallinn : SE & JS, 1998.
- Vabaduse vaim: Alustatud 16. Okt. 1999, Tartu : ISBN 978-9985-56-519-3
Awards
In 1997, Alfred Käärmann was awarded the Order of the Cross of the Eagle, IV Class.
The Estonian Minister of Defence,
References
- ^ "Alfred's brother died of a legendary forest Käärmann". Postimees.ee. February 2010. Retrieved July 22, 2010.
- ^ New York Times, A Forest brother Remembers a Life on the Run, August 23, 2003
- ^ Estonian Ministry of Defence, Cross of Merit bestowed on Alfred Käärmann Archived 2007-10-07 at the Wayback Machine, 14th September 2007