Tervaruukki memorial

In the summer of 1941 the world was in political turmoil. Germany had long prepared an invasion of the Soviet Union and persuaded Finland to join the war as an ally.

On 16 June 1941, Finnish President Risto Ryti issued an order for general mobilisation under the guise of "additional refresher training”. Men from the municipality of Ilomantsi were assigned to the 24th Border Jaeger Company.

The unit was assembled at Tervaruukki, Ilomantsi, an area that the military had used for field exercises for a long time before the war. The varied terrain, served by a good road network and dotted with lakes and rivers, was an ideal training environment for the Defense Forces, Frontier Guard and Civil Guard.

The company was deployed from Tervaruukki to the village of Möhkö to shore up border defenses. The area had seen fighting during the Winter War (conflict between Finland and the Soviet Union from 30 November 1939 to 13 March 1940) over a year previously, and the company commander, Major Viljo Kivikko, knew the terrain well.

When the Continuation War between Finland and the Soviet Union began on 25 June 1941, an order was issued for the immediate evacuation of Möhkö. This was the second time the villagers had to leave their homes – the first had been in the winter of 1939.

The company pushed toward the east and on 7 July 1941 they crossed the Koitajoki River, which marked the post-Winter War border. An advance in the direction of Ontronvaara did not go as planned and cost the company 14 men killed in action.

No-one could at that time expect that a decisive battle in Ilomantsi would be fought on the same terrain three years later.

An anti-tank rock stands at Tervaruukki as a war memorial. It commemorates the 24th Border Jaeger Company. The memorial was installed in 1991 by the North Karelia Border Guard Guild.