Barnyard Battleground

In the farmhouse beside the lake the correspondents saw a rickety white bed without bedding, a battered ivory-colored wooden divan, six straight chairs, a wall shelf filled with school books, a cupboard with a few dishes. An overturned bushel basket of frozen carrots lay beside a wooden butter tub, a grease-filled skillet stood on the cold stove, a woman's kitchen apron hung limply beside a muslin-curtained window. On the rough plank floor lay the frozen bodies of seven Russian soldiers, and outside was another one, sprawled beside a pile of knapsacks and gas masks, near a baby carriage on sled runners. Across the flat, open country the correspondents could see five miles in any direction. The fighting had moved eastward, toward the frontier, and on nearby farms Finns had already returned to their daily life.

Such barnyard battlegrounds were typical of the scenes in northern Finland, when the Russians last week retired 30 miles from the farthest point reached in their advance fortnight ago. There on the Salla front the troops of General Kurt Martti Wallenius engaged in another attempt to destroy a Russian Army. Typical of this fighting on the Arctic Circle were the short, sharp local attacks, the absence of any general engagement. Finnish detachments bit the Russian flanks and rear without succeeding in isolating the Russian Army. The Russians struck at the Finns with brief attacks while their main body effected an orderly retirement.

Little booty and few prisoners had General Wallenius to show, but he finally caught the Russians at a disadvantage. The Russian main body retired to Maerkaejaevi, about 15 miles southwest of its base at Salla (Finns described reports that the Russians were retreating to Salla as "premature"), when the Finns succeeded in cutting off a branch road leading to the town of Kuusamo, 50 miles to the south. This prevented a part of the Russian Army at Kuusamo from making liaison with the forces farther north. Fierce counterattacks by the Russians having failed to retake the road at week's end, the result of the battle was in doubt, but General Wallenius had divided his enemy and had a chance to attack it piecemeal.

> First Swedish volunteer to be killed in action was Pilot Zackau, whose plane fell while he was reconnoitering over the Russian lines. Two others followed him when Pilots P. E. Sterner and A. W. Jung (son of onetime Director Torsten Jung of the Swedish Match Co.) collided on reconnaissance. Swedish fliers were active on the Salla front and in bombing Russian air bases. Two of them brought down six Russian ships dogfighting.

> While most correspondents scratched for news of the fighting in the north, action developed on the southern front, which had been quiet for several weeks. Since General Grigory Stern took command in the Karelian Isthmus, the Russians have been digging in, bringing up artillery and ammunition, testing out the Finns' strength in occasional forays. This week the artillery went into action along the Taipale River, at the east of the Mannerheim Line, and the Russians attacked with tanks and infantry. North of Lake Laatokka, near Loimola, they made a simultaneous flanking attack. The Finns held fast, brought up reinforcements in anticipation of even heavier assaults.

> What taking pictures in Finland is like was graphically described by Cameraman Carl Mydans in a word-&-picture close-up in LIFE this week. Excerpt:

"I have never worked under greater hardship than when shooting the Kemi River battlefield. I carried two Contaxes inside my sheepskin coat to keep them from freezing. I would make a picture quickly with one, return it to its warmth and use the second camera for the next shot. It was necessary to work barehanded during the exposure and this was long enough to get nipped fingers. Changing film became a major task. The light came at 11 a. m. and was gone before two and at best it was bad. Pictures lay at every glance, but I have never suffered more in getting them."

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