32
Sollefteå
Arno awoke in the middle of the night. He wondered where he was; he saw a woman sleeping beside him. Who is she?
He looked around the room: a double bed, a traditional tapestry, a window with curtains, a table and chair, white and brown wallpaper. Moonlight seeped through a gap between the blind and the window frame. He remembered the present. Aha, I’m home in Sollefteå, he thought, I’m not at the front with its explosions, rattling MGs and roaring aircraft; I’m at home in the peaceful land of Sweden, with my girlfriend. Arno was certainly a fire-eater who liked action in hard times but now he tried to settle in the peacetime Army’s relative lack of excitement.
As intimated, by now Arno had become a regular member of the Swedish Army. The technicalities of it were these: His ‘desertion’ in 1941 had been punished on his return to Sweden in 1946. And even after that it was still held against him when he approached the military authorities to investigate the possibility of becoming a Swedish Army NCO. But with the Cold War in full swing and the land having a large conscript army to train, the authorities decided to turn a blind eye to his transgression. It had been done for many others with a history similar to Arno’s, those who had abandoned the Swedish Army to serve in the German Heer or the Waffen-SS.
After taking an NCO Course in Uppsala Arno was promoted to Sergeant in the spring of 1950. He was then posted to I 21 in Sollefteå, Norrland, halfway between Stockholm and the ultimate north of Norrbotten. I 21 was also called Västernorrland Regiment. Arno was assigned to 7th Company as a trainer, responsible for the education of a school platoon. When each platoon was fully trained it could be mobilised for war service, then to be headed by officer cadets trained in parallel, aspirants who after two years or so became commissioned officers in the Regular Army or in the Reserve.
After awaking in the middle of the night Arno feel asleep again. In the morning he awoke – to another day – a day in May 1955, May 7 to be precise, a day in Arno’s life as a Sergeant in I 21. The previous training battalion (in Swedish, GU-bat) had ended its service in April and the new cohort was expected in June. In the meantime, there were no grunts to train. So the workday started with Arno attending the NCO mess.
At home Arno got dressed in grey woolen cloth uniform M/39, riding boots, breeches and uniform cap. He only lived about a kilometre from the regimental barracks, so he walked. It was uphill, the barracks proper being placed on a sort of shelf overlooking the town, the river and all. Along his way the trees shimmered in fresh green for the spring had begun in earnest and the soft splendour of the birches was bursting forth. He entered the gates as a bugler sounded reveille and the Swedish flag was hoisted on a pole. 0800.
Entering the regimental yard Arno admired the buildings, the barracks or kaserner as they were called. They reminded him of I 14, the Hälsinge Regemente – and indeed, like the kaserner Arno saw during his military service in 1938 the I 21 buildings were four storey palatial structures with yellow plastered façades. This is the proper color Arno thought, golden yellow in the sun, not grey like the barracks in Poland and Germany.
He headed for the NCOs’ mess, situated southwest of the barracks, on a plot surrounded by birches. This two-storey house also had a yellow plastered façade, otherwise it was a rather discreet structure, not palatial, more like a large villa.
Once inside the mess hall on the ground floor, Arno sat down and talked with his colleague Rickard Balk, who happened to be there. Balk was a Sergeant Major and Adjutant of the 8th Company. He was a man with a furrowed face, prominent cheekbones and a long, drooping moustache. Like Arno he was dressed in grey M/39 uniform. The room had oil paintings with nature motifs on its paneled walls, red and black carpets on the floor and an oak table with chairs, adorned with ornaments in the form of lizards, wolves and eagles.
The adjutant looked out the window and said:
“Your horse seems to be ready for the ride.”
Arno looked down into the kasern yard and nodded, watching his horse standing there held by a groom. It was a gelding, brown with black mane.
He had learned to ride while in NCO School in Uppsala. Another part of that school curriculum was motor vehicle service and this he had also attended, learning to drive a jeep and assorted other army vehicles. As already noted he was no vehicles man, so he particularly enjoyed the opportunity to get some riding lessons as well.
They were joined at the table by Sergeant Gunnar Lekatt, the pale chief of indoors schooling. Amid the small talk he mentioned that Cinema Rio would be showing the 1941 film Första divisionen that evening.
“Fine,” Arno said. “A Swedish flight movie. I’ve heard it’s good.”
“And so it is,” Lekatt said. “I saw it during the war.”
They decided to have coffee. When they had been served Arno asked Lekatt if he had seen some other flight movies, films starring the Swedish Air Force:
“Indeed I have,” Lekatt said and put down his cup. I’ve seen Tre söner gick till flyget. But Första divisionen is better, it’s more operational.”
Lekatt took a bite from a biscuit, chewed on it and asked Arno:
“Going out for a ride, are we?”
“Maybe,” Arno said. “I did a riding course at NCO School in Uppsala in 1950. Bugger all use of course, with the army about to be completely motorised – but they still wanted some riding NCOs for ceremonial jobs. And I thought it might make it a nice hobby, and a fine military pastime on days like these when there isn’t that much to do. Hence the groom has got me one of the remaining regimental horses ready for riding this morning.”
Arno took a sip from his coffee and relaxed. He felt rather at peace, having seen so much during the last fifteen years, with the war-time experience as main event. And having survived that, physically and mentally, was something of a feat, he figured. So after all this, being in the peacetime military wasn’t so bad. And on this day things seemed promising; unless something cropped up he would ride towards the marshlands of Tjärnmyren firing range. That would be a good ride.
Having finished his coffee Lekatt rose and excused himself. But Balk was still sat there, now reading a grey-covered book. The spine was adorned with stylised artillery explosions, blazing stars in the air. This caught Arno’s attention. He asked the title of the book and was told that it was Unknown Soldier by Väinö Linna, a Finn. Balk added:
“Linna was a machine repairman at Finlayson’s in Helsingfors. And then he was in the war too.”
“And his book, is it any good?”
“I’d say so. Very substantial.”
This novel was a minor phenomenon at the time. It was particularly popular among the officers of I 21 – indeed, among all Nordic soldiers, army men and fire-eaters and all sorts, even pacifists. The novel depicted a modern Nordic war. It was grey uniforms and pine forests, it was spruce branches and dugouts, it was World War II in the northern latitudes. It was a fictional story set in the Finnish Continuation War 1941-44. The entire war was depicted through the experiences of a machine gun company, supporting an infantry battalion. Even young squaddies liked the book, more than one grunt believing that he was a Rokka or a Koskela when he sneaked around the training grounds firing blanks with his K/45.
Balk opened the book and said: