August 1942: Heinrich Himmler on holiday in Finland

The SS leader, Heinrich Himmler vacationed at the beginning of August 1942 at the Suolahti family's villa located in Petäys near Tavastehus. From this visit, a beach path known as Himmler's path still recalls the surroundings of Hotel Petäy.

The hotel belongs to the Service union PAM. In the hotel's shelter there is a heteka (Finnish sofa bed made of metal tubes and wires) in which the Third Reich's second most influential leader slept for four nights.

- No one has slept since Himmler in Hetekan, says the hotel's managing director Arja Hurme.

Himmler's path is also known as the path of the royalists. The name refers to the royalists who visited Petäys and who worked in 1918 for the monarchy in Finland.

The story also tells that Himmler fell in love with a light-haired waitress who had been hired for the visit. With her, the SS leader admired the summer evening views of Lake Vanajavesi from the path. 

It is not known who this waitress was. Lt. Eino E. Suolahti, selected by Headquarters as liaison officer, could tell from his vantage point only that the waitress was in the villa, but mentions nothing about the alleged holiday romance. Suolahti was later a doctor and a cultural personality of his time. His article was first published in 1963 in the journal Suomen Kuvalehti.

Cozy holiday

In Petäys, Himmler made excursions and picked mushrooms and rowed and fished in Lake Vanajavesi. The evenings were spent convivially during discussions by the fire.

- After changing his uniform to civilian clothes, he increasingly resembled a public school teacher, whose thirst for knowledge was unimaginable, writes Suolahti. He drew attention to Himmler's tremendous nervousness, which was already noticeable on the first day of vacation.

For two evenings, Himmler asked Suolahti to contact Hitler's headquarters. During the visit, a direct telephone line had been established from Petäys to the German military headquarters in Helsinki.

The phone call during the last evening celebration in Petäys worried Himmler. After the conversation, he retired to his room with his life medic Felix Kersten.

- There had been alarming messages from Stalingrad, which Hitler wanted to convey to the leader, despite the fact that his holiday peace would be disturbed, Suolahti recalls.

By flight to Parola

Himmler and his party arrived in Petäys on 1 August late in the evening from the Parola military airfield near Tavastehus. He had flown there from Kiestinki in Lapland, where the SS leader was inspecting the SS Mountain Division North.

The plane's crew was accommodated in the famous Aulanko hotel in Tavastehus. Himmler, Kersten, SS-Hauptsturmführer Grothmann, SS-Obersturmführer Kiermayer and Suolahti traveled to Petäys. The party also included three police officers from the Finnish state police Stapo. For the visit to Petäys, a chef had been hired in addition to the previously mentioned waitress.

Long before the arrival of the guests, inquiries had been made regarding a suitable vacation spot. It should be off the main road, well sheltered and lightly guarded. According to Suolahti, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs had made inquiries in the Tavastehustrakten and finally settled on the villa in Petäys, located on the headland in the then municipality of Tyrvändö.

The villa was owned by Suolahti's parents, the man of independence and the then Chief Medical Officer of the Armed Forces, Sanitation Major General Eino Suolahti and his wife Anna Suolahti.

Rangell determined

From Petäys, Himmler made a drive to the Vehoniemi ridge in Kangasala near Tampere and from there to Prime Minister Jukka Rangell's villa at Lake Kukkia in Luopioinen. Felix Kersten tells in his memoirs how Himmler brought up Finland's Jewish question during the car ride with Rangell. Rangell, however, was determined. According to him, there was no Jewish question in Finland and Himmler had to settle for that.

- When we arrived at Luopioinen, the question had obviously been rejected from the agenda, because it was not returned to during Himmler's visit, writes Eino E. Suolahti.

According to wartime censor chief Kustaa Vilkuna, Stapos' detectives managed to photograph the contents of Himmler's carefully guarded document portfolio. In it, among other things, a list of a thousand names of Finland's Jews was exposed.

During his visit, Himmler met in Helsinki with President Risto Ryti, Foreign Minister Rolf Witting and in St. Michel Marshal Gustav Mannerheim. The Jewish question of Finland was known not to be discussed in these discussions.

In Petäys, Himmler and Sanitation Major General Eino Suolahti discussed the possibility of sending disabled Finnish officers and soldiers to German medical institutions.

- Many hundreds of invalids know the importance of this care from the days of the Continuation War. This was probably the most positive thing during Himmler's visit, writes Eino E. Suolahti.

By car to Helsinki

On a country road in Tyrvändö, Himmler was almost moved to tears when he met a blonde Tavastland boy, who had lost his father or eldest brother in the winter war. According to Eino E. Suolahti, Himmler offered to take also Finnish war orphans to Germany. However, this intention did not progress.

The departure from Petäys took place on August 5. Junkers 52 awaited the travelers at Parola airfield. At the last moment, Himmler changed his mind. He wanted to travel by car to Helsinki.

- From Tavastehus, a large passenger car had been reserved for this case, which was ordered to look for us and with it we drove via Turengi and Hyvinge to Helsinki, writes Suolahti. The first stop was the Church of the Holy Cross in Hattula.

In the local newspaper not a row

Himmler's visit to Finland on July 29 - August 6 was unofficial. According to Eino E. Suolahti, it was shrouded in deep secrecy, although the SS leader appeared surprisingly openly in Helsinki's street scene. The local newspaper Hämeen Sanomat did not write a single line about the visit.

Suolahti met Felix Kersten after the war in Stockholm, where he told that Himmler did not have a single day of rest or vacation after his visit to Finland.

Other celebrities of the time also visited Suolahti's villa in Petäys, including Gustav Mannerheim twice. The Suolahti family sold Petäys in the 1950s to the then Business Association, which built a holiday and course center on the site.