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WW2
Click the icons/tabs to view the Finnish items I make.
There are several items of Finnish equipment on the website, as it is an area I spend a great deal of time studying, plus I attend a few UK shows a year as part of a Finnish reenactment group - having portrayed a Finnish inti at events in the UK for a decade or so solo, well before the unit I am in was formed....plus I still carry out a few solo displays.
Why Finnish?
Examples like the one below, of what the normal Finns did during the war, when neutral Finland was invaded by the Soviet Union in 1939 - after the Soviets had already invaded and occupied Poland & the Baltic states - and no doubt expected the same result with Finland...
A very overlooked aspect of WW2 - so attending UK shows to educate the public a little is a good use of free time!
....to translate his name to English, he'd be Bill...a man spending his days on his farm, until the Soviets invaded his country....
The word HERO is too lightly used in modern times, yet some real hero's are barely known outside their home country....
Farmer Viljam Pylkäs was one such man - and his exploits were known worldwide due to the fictional story of a WW2 Machine Gun Platoon, Tuntematon Sotilas; which, while acknowledged as fiction, did draw on the wartime experience of the writer.
One such true exploit became fictionalised in the book and movies based on it
- when the character Corporal Rokka ambushes a squad of Soviets in a clearing with his kp/31 SMG & prevents the Finnish positions from being surrounded.
This encounter was based on the actual exploits of Viljam Pylkäs, in ambushing the Soviets; the encounter earning him the Cross of Liberty, 4th Class - plus a 2nd Class Iron Cross from the Germans who were in the same combat area.
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