Much has been written about the various maritime avenues of escape across the Baltic Sea for the fleeing Estonians in that chaotic and desperately fateful period. These included the larger transport ships that departed from the ports of Tallinn and Pärnu, the numerous coaster sailing freight vessels such as the Helene and the Elli departing from Saaremaa and the Venus departing from Rauma, Finland. And then there were the hundreds of small motorized fishing and row boats – many jammed to capacity, many practically unseaworthy, many encountering attacks from airplanes and patrol boats, and all facing an uncertain sailing destiny. All totalled, it is estimated that approximately 80,000 people left Estonia during the Great Escape – 32,000 from Estonia to Sweden, 7,000 from Finland to Sweden, and another 40,000 made it to Germany.
One of the lesser known but intriguing maritime escape stories involves the role of two Swedish wooden runabout cuddy boats known as the OK 1 and the OK 2 Boats commissioned by the USA’s War Refugee Board through its attachés and Swedish contacts. These two boats made several covert and daring trips from Sweden to Estonia and back from July to September of 1944 and managed to carry over 275 Estonian escapees to Sweden.
President Roosevelt, the Baltic States and the WRB (War Refugee Board)
In spite of the broad and overwhelming world-wide turmoil and devastation of WW II in 1944, President Roosevelt and the USA State Department were mindful of the situation in the Baltic States. After all, President Roosevelt and his two State Department officials Sumner Welles and Loy Henderson, only a few years earlier in 1940, were the main initiators of the famous “Welles Declaration” (“The 1940 Welles Declaration – Further reflections on its authors and its lasting impacts,“ T. Eichenbaum, Eesti Elu # 38, 25.09.2020). Although in the summer of 1940 the USA was hesitatingly maintaining a policy of non-involvement in the outbreak of war in Europe, Roosevelt and his senior administration officials had resolutely issued the Welles Declaration to condemn the nefarious 1939 Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and the subsequent occupation of the Baltic States by the Soviet Union. Through all the upheavals of World War II and the subsequent Cold War years, it is acknowledged that the Welles Declaration served as an undercurrent of continued support and hope for the cause of self-determination of the Baltic nations.
With the declarations of war against the USA by Japan and then Germany in December of 1941, the USA joined the Allies already in the fight against the Axis powers.
But the fate of the Baltic nations became a very complicated matter for the USA between the time of its signing of the Welles Declaration and the situation in the Baltics in August 1944. By the time the USA was compelled to enter the war in December of 1941, the Baltic nations had already endured the first wave of Soviet occupation and then subsequently had been overrun by the Nazi Barbarossa invasion of Eastern Europe that commenced in June 1941. With the declarations of war against the USA by Japan and then Germany in December of 1941, the USA joined the Allies already in the fight against the Axis powers. That of course complicated the USA’s interests in the Baltics as those countries had been overrun by the Germans and earlier by the newly allied Soviet Union.
While it may be surmised that the USA felt some moral dissonance for not entering the conflict sooner against the Nazi invasions, it is surely known that by 1943 the USA felt remorse at not being more proactive on saving Jews from the increasingly obvious persecution and genocide by the Nazi regime. In this context the Roosevelt administration felt compelled to take deliberate action to save Jewish and other persecuted peoples from the Nazis.
In January of 1944, a Roosevelt directive created the WRB (War Refugee Board) to fund, coordinate, and carry out missions to save those endangered by the Nazi regimes in their various occupied countries. The focused actions of the WRB for the Baltic area were assigned expeditiously in 1944 to Iver C. Olsen, an attaché in Sweden for the USA Treasury Department. Information sources indicate that Olsen had already been engaged in Sweden by 1943 not only to provide intelligence on a wide scope of economic and war matters but also on espionage activity that was ongoing in Sweden. As it became increasingly clear then, and even more so after the war, Sweden was a very compromised and conflicted “neutral zone” during WW II. It benefitted economically, for example, with the supplying of raw material to Germany while at the same time harbouring Danish and Norwegian refugees from the Nazi invasion of those countries. Seemingly, Sweden may have also had an underlying suspicion and fear of an outright Nazi invasion against themselves. In that context background sources indicate that Swedish authorities were already sympathetic to British and USA intelligence activities against the Nazis that were underway in Sweden in 1943.
While the initial mission of the WRB Baltic evacuations was to save Jews who had been reportedly transported to Estonia and Latvia from France and Czechoslovakia, the contacts and access to those detainees did not prove promising. In turn, Olsen and his network turned to identify Estonians and Latvians persecuted or endangered by the Nazi regime as a priority for evacuation. With the advancing of the Red Army into the Baltics, the mission also turned to evacuate Estonians and Latvians who would be in danger of capture by the Red Army.
A recent article in the Estonian newspaper Postimees (17. august 2024) by Meelis Saueauk entitled “Ameeriklased aitasid põgeneda eestlastel, kes olid nende liitlase Stalini vastased” (“Americans Assisted the Escape of Estonians who were against the Stalin regime”) provides a wonderful description of the intrigue and surreptitious actions of USA officials, Swedish authorities, and the Baltic diaspora in Sweden for the Estonian and Latvian evacuation effort.
Heinrich Laretei, an Estonian diplomat already in Sweden, along with other Estonian counterparts of the Swedish-based EVR or Eesti Vabariigi Rahvuskomitee (the National Committee of the Republic of Estonia) played a key role with Olsen and the WRB in the evacuation of Estonians. It can be imagined how onerous it was for Laretei and his contacts to coordinate the “who, how, and where” for the evacuation of the Estonian escapees.
The OK Runabout Boats and the evacuation of Estonian and Latvian escapees
Through the efforts of Iver Olsen of the WRB, and individuals such as Heinrich Laretei, two wooden runabout boats (referred to as the OK Boats) were purchased and captains recruited for several daring evacuation runs from Gotland or Nynäshamn over to the west coast of Estonia and Latvia.
The initial lists for the OK Boats attempted to identify politicians, intelligentsia, and public officials who were in danger of arrest by the Nazis and the Soviets. It seems that this prioritization was based on an aim of saving key persons who in the future could be essential for reinstating the Estonian and Latvian governments and institutions – once the German and Soviet occupations would be overturned.
The OK Boat runs managed to evacuate 275 Estonians and 700 Latvians, but sadly this fell short of the several hundreds more that were planned by the Olsen and the Baltic diaspora team.
The OK Boat runs started in earnest in mid-July of 1944. Storms on the Baltic, coordination challenges, and avoidance of German patrols and Soviet airplanes made for an often chaotic desperate run by the OK Boats. The evacuation runs lasted until the end of September, at which point the Red Army had reached the coastal areas of Estonia and Latvia and made further landings and pickups impossible. The OK Boat runs managed to evacuate 275 Estonians and 700 Latvians, but sadly this fell short of the several hundreds more that were planned by the Olsen and the Baltic diaspora team.
The OK Boat Escapees:
The lists of the OK Boat Estonian evacuees have been researched by several sources, such as Martin Jungermann in Sweden and by the Estonian Mälu Instituut (Estonian Institute of Historical Memory) Names, birthdates, landing points, and social standing or occupation of many escapees are now known.
Examples of those saved by the OK Boats included the family members of Otto Tief, who was the interregnum and last prime minister of Estonia before the Soviets occupied Estonia. Sadly, Tief himself did not manage to escape and was arrested by the Soviets in October of 1944.
Another example of evacuees was Jaan Kopvillem and his family. Kopvillem was an Estonian diplomat, a chemical engineering professor at Tallinn University in the 1930’s, and was involved with the startup of the shale oil energy initiative in Kiviõli. Once in Sweden, Kopvillem joined the leadership of the EVR Committee and was an advisor to the Estonian government in exile until his passing in 1956.
As noted, while the first priority for the Estonian OK Boat evacuees were community leaders, the evacuation conditions became chaotic, which resulted in available spots in the OK Boats to evacuate other escapees. Such was the case of Ellen Aasamäe, who was 17 at the time, and her younger brother Martin. Their parents, who had a successful farm in southern Estonia, managed to secure 2 spots on the OK Boat for their children while they themselves remained in Estonia with other family members. The fate of such families torn apart by the war and the subsequent Soviet occupation was a common story.
Also noteworthy was that the OK Boats delivered a copy of the important Riigi Teataja The State Gazette of Sept. 18, 1944 in which the hastily organized and re-established Estonian Government issued its declaration of renewed sovereignty. This declaration was a particularly important legal document for Estonia in its subsequent pursuit of independence from the illegal Soviet occupation.
What became of the OK Boats?
After the final evacuation runs by the OK Boats, they were repaired from the damage incurred during the numerous runs and sold by the WRB to private interests. The OK 2 Boat (now known as the “Melodi”) still exists and the current Swedish owner has maintained it over several decades. In commemoration of the Great Escape of 1944, the owner offered cruises in August on the Melodi in Dalarö to several descendants of those who had the fortune of escaping to Sweden on the boat in 1944. One of these guests on the cruises was Anne Maandi Collius who was but 5 years old when she was carried by the OK 2 Boat to Sweden in September of 1944.
The OK Boats and their role in the Great Baltic Escape of 1944 is one of so many dramatic stories of that turbulent time for the Baltic nations.
