To document allied and German operations in Nordland county, Norway, Peder Axensten and yours truly (Lars Gyllenhaal) set out on a ski trip from Sweden to the Norwegian port of Bodø between 4-11 March 2001. To be honest we only did the first stretch on skis, the rest by train and bus. Nevertheless it was an exciting trip and as you will see Nordland has many fascinating sights from WWII.

The first objective of the tour was to locate and document the former Norwegian -American special operations base called Sepal III or "Truls". It was established late 1944 by the allied Special Forces Headquarters (SFHQ) in the UK but essentially run by the US Office of Strategic Services (OSS) and the Norwegian Defence Forces from the US and Norwegian embassies in Stockholm.

Overall commander of the top-secret allied Sepal bases on Swedish "neutral" soil was Norwegian captain Håkon Kyllingmark, whose base mostly was Sepal I by Treriksröset in northernmost Sweden. This Sepal III "Truls" base was commanded by SOE-trained Company Linge captain Leif Schanche (laler colonel). Under him were 15 men, some from Company Linge and some from Milorg, the Norwegian resistance army. Thanks to colonel (retired) Schanche and captain (retired) Kjell Ågren we had a good idea of what to expect.

After a brief search we located "Truls" just some 30 metres south of road 95, the road that connects Swedish Arjeplog with Norway. The base lies some four kilometres from the border. It is the last large wooden building before reaching Norway. The base was open and evidently today serves as shelter and snack room for snowmobile enthusiasts. The names that have been carved and burnt into the walls date back to at least 1938. However, we found no trace from the war years.

Nevertheless it was a special feeling to sleep here and later on we found out that some people who had done so before us had experienced nightmares. Evidently these nightmares stopped once a skeleton had been found under the house. Presumably it was the remains of a refugee who had fled from Norway, perhaps from one of the slave labour camps in Salten valley.

The following day we set out on our skis in the tracks of captain Schanche who on the 8th of May 1945 skied in full Norwegian (British) uniform to the closest German garrison in Junkerdal to start the capitulation procedures. Our ski trip was fabuluous as we had bright sunshine all the way and no wind, which is very unusual for this very bare and mountaineous area. Today there is no kind of control on the actual borderline. Passports and goods are instead (occasionally) checked just outside the first Norwegian village, Junkerdal. As soon as Schanche reached Junkerdal he was arrested and was to be shot as a spy. He was saved by insisting on written orders. When the order arrived the next day it essentially stated: the war is over - we can´t execute him anymore...

Our stay in Junkerdal was much more pleasant. First we skied through this long village by using the charming old road that passes over two beautiful old bridges. Then we "sort-of" climbed the peculiar Solvågstinden mountain, after which we retired to our tent.

Next day the family on whose ground we had been sleeping gave us a free ride to the Blood Road Museum in Rognan. The main building of the museum is a former German barracks, made in Sweden! It houses a German army office, the interior of a slave worker hut and many items made by slave labourers, i.e. Soviet and Yugoslav prisoners of war. Lieutenant Odd Mjelde from Sepal III has donated his battle dress and camouflage overall to the section on the liberation of the camps. The museum also has many tools used by the slave workers and a German slave camp lorry. Museum director Jan Ivar Trones and Norwegian Road Authority historian Torstein Hansen then showed us some of many local monuments and sites connected with the Yugoslav partisans and Soviet soldiers who built the local roads and railway. Strangely enough a German war cemetary has been built right on top of the slave labour camp of Botn.

The night in Rognan we stayed with Ivar Knoph who just after the war organized a "special operation" to rid the local mountainside of a giant swastika. He got good help from some Soviet former prisoners. Strangely enough the Austrian who painted the swastika recently turned up in Rognan and met Ivar. Photo: Peder Axensten

Our next stop was in Klungset, just west of Fauske. Here a German hospital was taken over by the Swedish Red Cross in June 1945 and treated Soviet former prisoners of war for over a month. After this the hospital was turned over to Soviet medical staff. From the outside the wooden hospital buildings look unchanged but inside they are either empty or used by the Norwegian home guard. Thanks to the local home guard commander Leif Kvael we could see the entire complex and take some "after the battle" type photographs (that have not been developed yet).

Bodø is the capital of Nordland county and here we were given a royal reception by the KGB, i.e. Krigshistorisk Gruppe Bodø, or, in English, the Bodø War History Group. The KGB is led by Odd Horsdal, here lying on the ice (!) in a German bunker. Photo: Lars Gyllenhaal

Much of Bodø was destroyed by the Luftwaffe already in May 1940 but the Grand hotel survived and remains much the same today. So it was pretty easy for us to find the place where the US Army Air Force personell from Luleå once had been and to take a picture on the same spot today. The USAAF came to Bodø essentially to deliver goods to the starving former prisoners of war. They also transported the Swedish hospital staff and equipment from Luleå to Klungset (Fauske).

Bodø is the main base for Norwegian military aviation and also has a large civilian airport ad thus houses Norway´s national Aviation Museum which we of course spent several hours in ad still had not seen enough of. Truly spectacular! We also visited a fortress from 1810 in the harbour of Bodø: Nyholmen skandse. It was restored in 2000 to what it looked like in 1810. The Germans of course used it during the war for artillery so it has some relevance to this page too.

In Bodø we got to know another active member of the KGB, Knut Kosmo. He has so far produced twelve video films of good amateur quality on local wartime history and we had the opportunity to watch several of them. The fate of the Tirpitz, the battle of Narvik, the Russian slave labourers, the local resistance and the Luftwaffe in Norway have all been made into documentaries by Mr Kosmo. We recommend those interested of Nordland´s wartime history (and who fully understand Norwegian, as there are no sub-titles) to order Mr Kosmo´s films. Ask for the current film list and prices by writing to Mr Kosmo directly:
TVP, Knut Kosmo, Innersvingen 6, N-8008 BODØ, NORWAY.

Going back to Sweden we stopped in Storjord, just some 20 km from Sweden, and saw the site of a slave labour camp once containing Soviet soldiers. Today there remains only a stone explaining in Russian and Norwegian that once this was a slave camp. Still, it is very moving to simply stand here, so close to the Swedish border, and to imagine the pain that once was here. Also, just north of the memorial a German defensive position may still clearly be identified.

Published 25-03-2001

© Lars and Ann-Sofie Gyllenhaal