International Autumn Expedition 2019

Very early on the morning the last day of September my Girlfriend dropped me off at the airport in Tromsø in Northern Norway. A few hours later I stepped out of a taxi outside the hotel downtown Riga where I almost collided with our American member Jason who had arrived a few hours before me. Later on the day we met with Victoria and in the evening Andris joined us and took us to the "Brothers Cemetery with the Eternal Flame". That was a very interesting cemetery in the middle of Riga where thousands of Latvian soldiers from both world wars is buried. On tuesday Anton arrived from Sweden and Anders flew in from Denmark but he drove directly to the resort in Kurland since our host there, Kristine, arrived at the same time as him. Next morning we gathered up by the Riflemen monument and met up with Talis and part of the Latvian team and took off towards Jelgava where the rest of the team also arrived. 

In Jelgava is a Commonwealth cemetery where 36 British soldiers from WW1 is buried and here we put down flowers and candles before we drove to the house of an old lady in a forest near the Lithuanian border. Since 1944 7 German soldiers have been buried between the apple trees in her backyard and she has cared for these graves her whole life. She had kept a diary from 1944 with the names of these soldiers written down. At one point she had contacted the German Volksbund about them but Volksbund found it too few soldiers to spend money on a recovery, so she finally contacted us. We quickly found the outlay of the graves and went to work. Soldier after soldier was uncovered and two of them was still wearing their helmets. The reason for this was that they both had big head injuries as we could see on the heavily damaged skulls. Around mid day she brought us a big lunch with coffee, sandwiches and cake and a few hours later we had completed the work. It had been an emotional day for all of us. 

We strolled into Lithuania.

Looks like a shrapnel ball just below the rim of the helmet.

Anton carefully cleaning the remains...

...and lifting out the helmet with the skull after removing all the other bones first.

One of the soldiers had a silver skull ring.

After the job was done we put back the cross cleaned up after us.

Next morning it was nice and foggy when the diggers gathered for breakfast. Today we were going to WW1 positions outside Riga where Vlad again had located several fallen soldiers that had been dumped into shell holes after the battles. In one of the holes was five soldiers laying on top of eachother and a kilometer away another two soldiers was exhumed. For lunch Talis prepared his legendary tomato soup which really warmed and filled us up good. This day we also helped a famous Latvian band who was making a music video for an upcoming movie about WW1. 
Some of the diggers roamed around with the detectors and collected live ammo for the EOD to dispose of and doing that one of the Latvians found a Latvian Riflemens badge in quite good condition. Other than that lots of shrapnel and rifle ammo was found. In the evening, after dinner, Gary held a safety- / First aid course which is important in case of an accident.

Before going to the forest we stopped at the shop for supplies and Gary saw it fit to take a shift at the cashiers desk.

The bottom of a clay bottle.

Arisaka ammo.

Arnis with an exploded 77mm shell.

Piece of a 77mm shell.

Aleksander with a dum-dum bullet.

Soldiers made dum-dum bullets by turning the bullet with the tip inside.

Fired but unexploded 77mm shrapnel grenades.

A small piece of glass stuck in the spine of a soldier.

British produced stripper clip for Arisaka.

Enjoying lunch.

Arisaka ammo.

Regina at work.

One of the soldiers had a shrapnel ball in his head.

Two small silver crosses found on a soldier.

Badge found while metal detecting.

Knowing what to do in case of an accident doing this kind of work is important and can save lives.

Friday morning we went to a farm near Priekule where fieldgraves belonging to Division Nordland had been located. Thanks to maps and the story of an old lady Talis and the team had found this place earlier this summer. The old lady remembered that it had been several wooden crosses near the farm she grew up on. One day soldiers had come and told her and her family to leave as the frontline came closer. A few months later she returned to find the whole area destroyed, no house nor crosses was there any longer. Our mini-digger took off the top layer of the soil and we could get to work. Several of the soldiers had ID tags, most of them belonged to a SS Panzer unit but between them was a soldier from Kriegsmarine as we could tell from his uniform buttons. A few meters away from the fieldgraves a digger had a signal from his detector and carried on to dig out a shovel,but next to the shovel was bones and another soldier laying where he had fell was exhumed, missing in action since the war.
On this site we dug out a lot of unexploded ordnace which was collected for the EOD, and also lots of bits from a blown up Sherman tank was found.
After the job was done we drove to the Red Army Cemetery in Priekule and prepared for next days reburial. Back at the resort Kristine served us a great dinner, some of us got special treatment and had cheeseburgers, and we celebrated Talis` and Ralfs` birthdays.

The Kriegsmarine soldier in the process of being uncovered. He had lots of items in his pockets when he was put in this temporary grave.

ID tag from a SS Panzer unit.

Andris trying to read what was written on a zink ID tag.

Anders at work.

The soldier that was found next to the fieldgraves. Only covered by a few centimeters of soil.

When unexploded ordnance is found Police is informed, and they come to check and then call in the EOD.

Talis, the main man.

At the Rd Army cemetery we prepared a grave for soldiers found last year.

It is always good food at Kristines:)

The Birthday boy:)

On the TV news we could see ourselves :)

On Saturday we had an early breakfast because we had to prepare for the reburial ceremony. As the rest of the team drove to the cemetery in Priekule I took two Danish journalists to the German War Cemetery in Saldus so they could get some photos and videos from there. When that was done we joined up with the others for the reburial. Lots of people showed up, local people, Government officials and even a bus full of pensioners from Riga. As the sun heated the frosty grounds we laid 107 Red Army soldiers to rest. 
The rest of the day we spent on a nearby field where the frontline had been in 1944/45. Next to the road two German soldiers were found and next to them several live large caliber shells. Around on  the field more ordnance was dug up and a few war relics too, for example a SS belt buckle and a pocket knife with engravings from a SS soldier. Again police was called in and they contacted the EOD.

Saldus War Cemetery.

Coffins with the remains of 107 Red Army soldiers.

The farmers field was full of large caliber ordnance.

The local police had a busy week.

Kim with a Stalinetz tractor sprocket.

Kim and Jason uncovering a soldier from a Panzerjäger unit.

Mindaugas with some finds he made around the field.

Ralfs found a SS belt buckle..

..and Rolands found a pocketknife with an SS soldiers engravings.

Sunday , and the last day of the expedition we went on the check a few places. We had maps showing graves and field cemeteries which the Norwegian author Geir Brenden had given us. We dug alot but could not find anything this time unfortunately. Some live stuff was found and collected for the EOD on every site and on one of the site Steve dug out a nice German helmet. Around lunchtime we drove back the the site we had uncovered the fieldgraves two days ago to see if we could find any more missing in action soldiers. As the day went on the pile of live ammo grew and soon the EOD arrived to collect it all, and they filled their little trailer with probably 80-100 pieces of artillery shells, mortar rounds and anti-tank shells. As the day came to an end a single soldier was found between the rubble of a destroyed farm building, but no ID on him unfortunately. 
Evening was approaching and the expedition had to come to an end, so we shook hands and gave out hugs before some of us went back to Riga for a last dinner and a few beers together. In total we had found 25 soldiers who all will be buried on their respective War Cemeteries.
Talis and Ilgonis dropped us off near the hotel and we could finally get some clean clothes after some half hour long showers. Victoria went to get us a table at Rock Cafe and walked into one of our old friends and digger from Legendas early years, Richard West, and it was great seeing him again.
Next morning me and Anton shared a taxi to the airport where we randomly met another of our Diggers, Dainis who was going to USA for holiday so it was really a nice end of the expedition.
In the evening I was met by Girlfriend who picked me up and as we drove home the sky lit up with an amazing Aurora Borealis which we stood watching for a good half hour. It was good being back home :)

Thanks to all who made the expedition possible and all the participants. Can`t wait to see you all again.

​Keep Smiling :)

Live artillery shell.

Vilma searching.

The helmet found by Steve.

Lable from lendlease Sherman ammo.

A small headlight from Sherman or MB Jeep.

Jason with a big pice of shrapnel.

Pz.Schreck.

A little bit of the stuff collected for EOD.

Last dinner in Riga for this time,together with Richard :)

Anton, Dainis and me.

Waiting for check-in.