SECRET.
To Admiral of the Polar Coast (?)
Chief of the Air Force Lofoten
Commander Airfield Territory Moen
1: Concerning the Sabotage vessel Toftesund:
Establishment of five vessels between Tromsø and Bergen to build comprehensive sabotage groups under the direction of the best possibly educated men, modern equipment and large quantities of explosives and hand grenades. Administrated from England. The saboteurs are seeking to make contacts with willing Norwegians patriots.
The enemy has the most accurate information about the military units in Storsteinnes, Setermoen, Finsnes, Kvernmones, Harstad, from Bardufoss Airport extremely good documents regarding their own work.
Continuous vigilance, critical evaluation of sabotage defense, all military quarters, stations and important communication centers and continual education of the troops concerning sabotage Io Nr. 143/43 geh.II. Dangers and sabotage defense is necessary.
Commanding Officer in the Polar Territory.
THE HELPFUL MIDWIFE
MIKKELVIK, EARLY morning, March 31, 1943: A small rowboat moved quietly toward the glazed, frost-covered rocks by the water’s edge at Mikkelvik on Ringvassøy Island.
“That house over there in the middle of the field is where the Jensens live.” Ingvald pointed to the wooden house. “I’ll introduce you to the Jensen family,” offered the 17-year old.
“Thanks, but no. I’ll be just fine.”
“It’ll just take a minute. We know them well.”
“No! You have risked too much on my behalf already.” Jan was firm. “I do not want anyone to see you with me. Row back home and comfort your mother and family. They need you,” he directed.
Jacoba Jensen’s home in Mikkelvik.
The discussion ended; Jan climbed out of the boat. The men shook hands and said their goodbyes. Ingvald rowed homeward and Jan headed straight for the house some 200 feet from the shore. In the darkness the house stood out like a large boulder; no bushes or trees surrounded it, and Jan hoped he could get inside unseen.
The women on Hersøy Island had told Jan that Jacoba Jensen, the midwife on Ringvassøy, lived in that little house. They felt sure her husband Alfred could give him a lift to Tromsø. Because of the birthing mothers on the second floor, Jan hesitated to disturb the household in the middle of the night. His choices were few though, as his life was at stake.
Jan half-limped up to the entrance door rather optimistically. When Jacoba Jensen, the midwife, opened the door at that hour of the night he was somewhat taken aback. He explained his untimely arrival. Disappointment showed on Jan’s face when he learned that Jensen had left for Tromsø a few hours earlier with his boat, Vesle Tor.
Jacoba opened the door wide, stepped aside and bid him enter. She tried to make up for his dashed hopes and showed him the same warmth and friendliness the women on Hersøy had earlier. The first floor of the little home had only a kitchen and living room. Jan was ushered toward the small wooden kitchen table, which soon was set with food Jacoba had on hand. He was hungry and the food comforted him.
Jacoba had a couple of women upstairs ready to give birth but this didn’t stop her from wanting to help this brave patriot.
“Stay until my husband returns tomorrow.”
“Nei, nei, it is too risky.”
“I have an idea. We can dress you up as a birthing mother, and tie a scarf around your head.”
“No, no this is foolishness,” Jan chuckled.
“Being a midwife, I’ll come along and care for you,” Jacoba offered. “The Germans will not suspect a thing.”
“I will not hear of it! You have already done so much. It’s too dangerous for you and your family, and the birthing women upstairs.”
“At least stay the night and rest up after your ordeal,” she coaxed him.
“I cannot take advantage of your kindness. The Gestapo could flock in anytime. The worst scenario would be that I might have to kill myself. I cannot inflict such a drama on you women.”
Jacoba waved her hand as if to say, “Nonsense.” She realized she could not change Jan’s mind. The midwife offered suggestions on where he could safely go, and who to avoid.
“A thousand thanks for all your help,” Jan reached his hand out and shook hers firmly. He left without telling her in which direction he was heading.
Upstairs on the second floor, in addition to the birthing mothers, slept the Jensen’s 14-year old daughter, Gunnvor. She awoke when she heard her mother talking with a man down in the kitchen. “Strange,” she thought. “With Dad out of town. Could it be?… No! I don’t believe it!”
She crawled out of bed and laid her ear to the floor. But the voices were muffled and she could not make out what they said. The next morning Gunnvor decided to get the story straight.
“Mother, who visited with you last night?”
“Oh that. It was only Søren from Fagerfjord. He just wanted to know if Dad was going to make a trip to Tromsø, because he wanted to come along.”
That was all her mother would say and Gunnvor did not have the courage to ask any more questions. When her father came home the next day and her mother hustled him into the living room and closed the door, she was really puzzled. This was very unusual.
Gunnvor was unable to forget the incident, and when her brother Oddmund came home, she took him aside and told him about the mysterious visit. He understood the gravity of it all.
“You are to shut up about this,” he cautioned her sternly. “If this should get out we might lose both father and mother.”
Not another word was mentioned about this incident in the Jensen house until Norway’s Liberation on May 8, 1945; then Jacoba Jensen told her daughter the whole story.
Outside in the darkness Jan’s feelings tugged at him. Once more, without a moment’s hesitation, he had been received with abundant kindness. The honorable woman who had helped him never expressed any fear for her own safety, though she knew it meant her death if she was discovered. Across the sound he saw the outline of Rebbenes Island where he had left his other newfound friends. He could only wish them the best.
Jan headed west, though his plan was to go east. His training in Scotland had taught him, and his own instinct was, to mislead. If someone was on the way to a barn, or watched from a window somewhere, he wanted them to see a stranger walking toward the west.
After several hundred meters he made a sharp turn southward and disappeared between some small round knolls. He then changed direction anew, toward the east. His chosen path took him around the few houses in Mikkelvik. Jan then headed for the water, and followed the rocky beach toward Fagerfjord. He stopped at a house at the end of the fjord, which Jacoba had suggested he do.
Engenes, March 31, 1943: About seven in the morning, Jan arrived at Engenes farm, home of Nelle and Leonhard Johansen, siblings. A friendly pair, the brother and sister welcomed him. Jan told them his story, the same story he had related to the midwife, without revealing any names. After a nice meal, they prepared a comfortable bed for him with several sheepskins in the summer-barn. Jan’s concern was always for his helpers first and he had refused to sleep in the house.
Worn from hours of limping and trudging through deep snow and climbing over slippery rocks, Jan gratefully accepted their offerings, but not before he warned them about the Germans. He instructed them on what to say should the Germans come asking questions. Jan fell into a deep sleep that lasted the whole day through and into the late afternoon.
Around 7 p.m. Jan was again on his way, this time to a small hamlet called Karanes. In spite of his wounded foot, he felt refreshed and confident. He chuckled as he looked down on his feet with one rubber boot and one seaman’s boot. He had studied and memorized maps of the area and felt sure, even with his footwear, he could scale the mountain that loomed ahead of him.
The mountain abruptly rose and was awkward to climb. Several times he thought he had reached the top only to discover another precipitous clim
b ahead, more difficult and higher than the last. In the distance, yet another wall rose up before him. Jan fought his way upward, making detours to reach the next cliff. The knitted Selbu mittens given to him by Ingvald were soaked, his fingers frozen. The snow was unduly deep and he sank to his waist often. When he fought to get out, his rubber boot filled with snow and with each step the snow packed itself firmly around his freezing legs. Sometimes the rubber boot came off and Jan turned it upside down and shook it to empty it of the snow.
Toward midnight the Arctic darkness deepened. Yet he could still make out the contour of ridges and gaps of precipices. Some four hours into the climb the ashen-gray clouds merged above. Large fluffy snowflakes began falling. Suddenly the wind increased and the snowfall thickened. Within minutes Jan was in the midst of a gale. In the darkness the wind tore at him and whipped the blinding snow around him, lashing his face and making it impossible to see but a few feet ahead. He pushed upward but soon realized it was futile to continue. Jan knew the fickleness of the Arctic winters; he had to get back to lower ground.
On his way up he had caught sight of a small sheepcote built on a hillside; he needed to reach it. The descent was agonizing and slow but as he neared the empty shed, his distress faded. The wind blew the slat door from his hands and he breathlessly stumbled in and brushed himself off. Farm implements lay scattered around the floor between the piles of hay. Jan gathered enough hay to make a mattress. The wet snowstorm left him soaked and frozen. Ice bits clung to his hair and eyebrows making them frosty white. He removed his boots packed with snow and massaged his feet and legs, trying to bring feeling back into them.
The cracks in the timber along the walls blew the snow straight through, filling corners and other areas with snow, but at least he had cover overhead. Inadequate as it was, Jan was grateful for this shelter from the raging storm. It did shield him from the powerful wind gusts and snow squalls. He buried himself deep into the hay but the night was a cold and sleepless one.
April 1, 1943: The following morning at 6:00 the storm ceased as abruptly as it had begun. Jan left his little shelter and took up his battle with the mountain afresh. Within a few hours a penetrating wind with a thick obscuring mist overshadowed him. The visibility diminished, but this time Jan felt it imperative to reach his goal if he was to survive. Every step he forced himself to take gave him a sense of victory. After several hours, the storm subsided, but heavy storm clouds hovered over him. He reached the ridge of the mountain plateau and far below he saw Veggefjord. (Vegg means wall, an appropriate name for this fjord bordered on two sides by mountains jutting straight up from the water.) As soon as he descended the steep mountain, Jan found that he next needed to traverse a white-shrouded marshland covered with shrubs and dwarfed birch trees. The marshland led to a cove at the head of the fjord; after crossing the rocky beach, Jan needed only to climb up the mountain wall on the other side; then he should be able to see Karanes close-up.
The Norwegian soldier expected the large rocks along the beach to be easier to cross than plodding through the deep snow in the marshland, but he found them to be cumbersome and slippery. When he came to the end of the beach where the mountain met the water, he realized the impossibility of scaling it. Should he slip, he would end up in the fjord. Instead, Jan turned inland several dozen yards where the mountains were not quite as treacherous. The snow was deeper, but there was less chance of falling. Once on top, Jan headed back toward Karanes. Thirteen hours he had struggled against the elements, but when he reached the tip of this mountain plateau looking down on the small forest below the tree line, he saw that it bordered a field running down to the shore. Toward the bottom of the field stood the house he had been longing to reach. He was in Karanes. Before him the silver-gray DÅfjord stretched long and wide and at the head laid the little village of DÅfjord, his next goal.
Caught up in his own struggle, Jan did not know that the storm he had been grappling with was the same storm which detained merchant Sørensen from Bromnes at Sheriff Hoel’s home following their visit with the Gestapo in Tromsø.
KARANES
KARANES, APRIL 1-2, 1943: Karanes protrudes at the end of the northeast point of Ringvassøy Island, between Veggefjord and DÅfjord. The Hansens were the only people living at Karanes, accessible only by boat. Eighteen miles in a northeast direction lay the island of Vanna. Past Vanna was the Arctic Ocean.
Jan worked his way down the mountainside and through the forest, arriving at the farm of Ragnhild and Morten Hansen around one in the afternoon. In the clearing he spotted a young girl playing by herself in the snow. The little house he had noticed from the plateau looked warm and inviting. At the lower end of the sloped field was a small barn. A little boathouse stood near the breakwater where a rowboat lay tied up.
“Hello, little lady. I came to see your parents. Are they home?”
“Ja da. Come with me.”
Ragnhild Hansen opened the door as they approached. Working at the kitchen sink, she had seen Jan coming down from the mountains and watched him greet Margareth, their daughter.
Unexpected visitors seldom came to isolated Karanes, and if they did, they always came by sea. Ragnhild wondered who this man was, handsome and terribly frozen.
“Please come in,” she said as she stepped back for Jan to enter. “My husband is just firing up the wood stove. Sit down.” Ragnhild offered him a chair close to the fire.
Morten Hansen looked a little surprised at their guest, but he was friendly and made Jan feel welcome.
Veggefjord. Jan came down the mountains on the left, crossed the field, climbed up over the mountain ridge on the other side, and continued down to Karanes.
At first the Hansens had a difficult time believing Jan because he refused to tell them where he had come from. Jan’s earnest appeal for help won them over. The Hansens found him easy to talk to and were convinced when the commando revealed his Norwegian Navy uniform and pulled his boot off to show them his wounded foot. Shocked at his condition, they never pressed him for further information. The couple was convinced the stranger was telling the truth, and they were filled with amazement and admiration for him. They realized how much he had suffered, both emotionally and physically, and that he had to be totally spent.
The news of Toftefjord had preceded Jan. The Hansens believed his story in spite of the account that all the men of Brattholm had been killed. Seeing his sad condition, they offered to share all they had. If they worried about the Germans and the personal risk they were taking, they never let Jan know. Their concern was for this brave Norwegian soldier and how best they could help him to safety.
Jan was calm, but always on guard with his pistol nearby. He was anxious to get away from Ringvassøy Island as quickly as possible and on to Sweden.
The Hansens cleaned and bandaged Jan’s wounded foot. They hung his clothes to dry on a line over the wood stove, and they shared with him the best food they had. Both Ragnhild and Morten enjoyed visiting with Jan and hearing his stories of England and his travels. Jan appreciated their kindness.
“I’m eager to see a map of the Troms District. Do you happen to have one?” asked Jan.
“I’m sorry, but we only have a local map. Let me show you your next best bet.”
From a kitchen drawer across the room Morten pulled out a map and spread it out on the kitchen table. He brought a piece of notepaper and drew another map which he thought would be of help. Morten’s plan was to row Jan to DÅfjord the following day, after he had rested. Jan asked some questions about the map and studied it intently. After a while he tore it up and burned it. “I keep it all up here,” Jan said, pointing to his head.
“You’re quite a guy,” commented Morten. “You seem calm, yet I notice you are always on guard.”
“I’ve got to be; one never knows when the Germans will show.” Jan patted his pistol.
“Jan, we’d like for you to stay through the night. I’ll make up a bed for you,” offered Ragnhild.
“A thousa
nd thanks, but that is too risky for you. Would you mind if I slept in the barn?”
“All right then,” Morten said. “Mama, we’ll have to make him a comfortable bed of hay.”
Before retiring, Jan planned a possible escape route. Even in this remote area, he did not feel safe from the Germans. If they sent a patrol plane, it would be easy to follow his tracks in the snow; they were wide and deep and would lead straight to this house. There was no way to know if the Germans were still searching for him, but they were known to pop up in the strangest places at any hour of the day or night. Jan was not only grateful to the people who had been so generous and willing to sacrifice all for him, he was concerned for their safety; and always, with that concern, was the guilt of leaving his comrades behind.
Later that evening, after retiring and relaxing in his comfortable bed of hay Jan realized how exhausted he was. The last two evenings had not afforded him sound sleep. Fighting his way twelve miles through deep snow over wild mountain plateaus in dreadful storms had robbed him of his strength. He fell into a restless sleep but did not awaken fully until late the next day.
Karanes, April 2, 1943: Jan rested and visited with the Hansens during the remainder of the day until early evening. Though the stabbing pains running through his legs concerned him, Jan still felt good. Being with people and having someone to talk with minimized his discomfort.
During the day the Hansens left Jan alone for a while with their two girls, Margareth and Gerd, while they rowed out to sea to set the long line. “Hopefully the fish will take the bite today,” said Morten as he and his wife made ready to leave.
Jan worried when they left. He asked the Hansens’ daughters how far it was to a telephone; Jan was concerned the Hansens might report him. He needn’t have worried. The Hansens were solid patriotic people and they never said a word about Jan to anyone until after the war.
“In Bjørnskar there lives a man, Einar Sørensen. He is one dependable Norwegian. I know him well. I’ve been fishing with him several times. You need to go to him, Jan,” said Morten just before he was ready to leave.
The 12th Man Page 10
