The history of Soviet intelligence has preserved the names of women who, at the call of their hearts, became fighters of the "invisible front" and who were protected by fate. The fate of the heroine of our story turned out to be completely different.
In 1920, the Nuorteva family returned to Russia from abroad. The father of the family, the ethnic Finn Santeri Nuorteva, was a very difficult figure. At one time, he made a personal friendship with Vladimir Lenin and helped him move from Finland to Sweden. After the 1917 revolution, he tried to support the red government of his country. He was forced to emigrate to the United States, where he became one of the prominent propagandists of the Russian revolution. Not having much success in this field, he returned to Russia, where he felt all the contradictions of the new regime on his own skin - he was both an employee of the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs, and a prisoner on charges of espionage, and the chairman of the Central Executive Committee of the Karelian ASSR.
Tempting offer
Santeri Nuorteva's daughter Kerttu, having successfully graduated from school and university, was appointed executive secretary in the city newspaper of Petrozavodsk. The year 1934 came, which determined the further fate of the girl. She received an invitation to go to work in the intelligence department of the headquarters of the Leningrad Military District as a translator.
The bosses very soon appreciated the abilities of the new employee. She twice traveled to Finland and Sweden as a liaison with illegal immigrants, as well as to study the operational situation. The scout has successfully completed the tasks assigned to her. Maybe that's why she was offered to head the illegal residency in Helsinki. But the girl refused.
Then came the bloody 1937. Almost all employees of the department were repressed. Kerttu did not escape this fate. She was sentenced to three years in the camps for being imprudent to tell her family about her business trips abroad. After serving her sentence, Kerttu left for Alma-Ata to stay with her husband.
At the end of 1940, she received a summons from the Police Department. There, two men in civilian clothes talked to her: "How would you look at returning to work in intelligence?" Kerttu agreed.
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Soon the war began, and the scout received an offer as an illegal to go to Helsinki to carry out an important mission. To prepare, she went to Kuibyshev, where a legend was developed for her. Now she is Elina Patti, a Swedish native who moved with her parents to Finland and now lives in the city of Vaasa. She was supposed to get a job as a secretary to Mrs. Vuolijoki, a lady close to political circles and listed in the personnel of Soviet intelligence under the pseudonym Poet. Having mastered, Elina had to establish contact with agents occupying a high position in society and who agreed to cooperate with the NKVD.
On the night of March 31, 1942, Elina was dropped by parachute over the territory of Finland. After burying her parachute in the snow and changing her clothes, she got to the railway station and got on the train.
Problem after problem
Mrs. Vuolijoki received her visitor coldly. She not only could not take Elina to work, but even more so she was not going to settle her in her estate. She motivated this by the fact that she is under suspicion of the police. However, she accepted the money and the task. After some hesitation, she allowed me to spend the night. In the morning the scout left for Helsinki, where she rented a furnished room. All this time she had to carry the radio with her.
Now it was necessary to establish communication with the agents. And again failure. When meeting with one, he did not respond to the password and subsequently avoided contacts in every possible way. Another agent left in an unknown direction. The third directly stated that it was sent by the secret service and that he had never worked for Soviet intelligence.
It was urgent to legalize. Spring was already coming into its own, and Elina still wore a fur coat and a winter hat - she did not have cards to buy clothes. Had to buy it at a thrift store. In an encrypted letter to an operational address in Stockholm, she briefly informed about the “refuseniks” and that due to the lack of a suitable apartment she could not use the radio.
Then Vuolijoki reappeared - she managed to get a visa to travel to Sweden. It was luck! Not only could a more detailed report be dispatched quickly, but further instructions could be received. The poet left, agreeing to announce her return with a conditional announcement in the newspaper.
In the meantime, an apartment suitable for radio sessions was found. But at the very first attempt to contact the Center, a short circuit occurred, and the radio broke down. Three weeks have passed, and here it is - the long-awaited announcement in the newspaper. But the meeting, alas, was not joyful. The poet said that she was arrested by the police and, during the arrest, destroyed the key to decrypting the instructions. It turned out that she was arrested on the denunciation of a servant who told the police about a visit to the estate of an unknown lady. Then the search for the unknown parachutist was in full swing. The poet disowned her acquaintance with the night guest, but named her omens, which she kept silent about in her conversation with Elina, and asked not to bother her anymore. The situation was critical. The scout could only rely on the agent of Vodnik, who conscientiously fulfilled his obligations.
Resident naivety
Elina faced an alternative: either to go into an illegal position, or … After all, there were acquaintances and connections, she was already planning to open a beauty salon. Then a summons came from the police department regarding labor service. Vodnik spoke out categorically: "This is a trap, and we urgently need to go into an illegal position." It was, of course, amateurism. If the secret police really suspected Elina of something, they could have taken her without any performance. But the agent managed to convince the scout.
Taking a bag with dirty linen and a suitcase with a walkie-talkie, she went to the laundry, where she gave the things to the hostess for storage, warning that her brother would take the luggage along with the washed linen. Quite quickly, Vodnik assigned her to an apartment with a communist friend and the next day he went to the laundry. The hostess was not there, and the second time Elina herself was forced to go there. But the police were already waiting for her in the laundry.
It is clear that the scout was being prepared in a short time. But who of those who were engaged in equipping her guessed to stick a label with the name and surname of the hostess on the inside of the lid of the suitcase, and why did she not pay attention to it herself?
However, the ring around her was already shrinking. Finnish counterintelligence officers have already compared the dates of the parachutist's drop with the dates of registration of new arrivals in Helsinki.
During the investigation, the arrested woman refused to testify. She only said that the purpose of her assignment was to prepare the ground for possible negotiations on a truce. In principle, this was true, since the intelligence officer was never able to receive any other instructions.
Elina had a nervous breakdown and was admitted to a psychiatric hospital. In the same place, apparently, in addition to drugs, she was also injected with "truth serum", which disinhibited her will. One way or another, the secret police learned the names of all the agents with whom it contacted.
Despite the fact that the investigators seemed to believe in the mission of the secret envoy, Elina and Vodnik on December 27, 1943, were sentenced to capital punishment - execution. The rest of the agents received various prison sentences. Two were acquitted.
The authorities asked the intelligence officer to petition for clemency, but she refused. Nevertheless, on August 22, 1944, her death penalty was changed to life imprisonment. And when a truce was concluded between the USSR and Finland, Kerttu was amnestied. Apparently, guessing what awaits her in her homeland, the authorities offered the pardoned spy to move to Sweden for permanent residence. But the scout again refused.
When she walked down the ladder of the airfield in Leningrad, she was arrested. A preliminary investigation was carried out in the NKVD department. On October 19, 1944, she was transported by plane to Moscow. The “reward” for dedication and courage was the sentence passed three years after the arrest, 10 years in the camps. From the certificate attached to the case, it is known that the brave girl managed to survive, and after her release she worked as a surveyor technician.
Sergey Uranov