Post by Freddy the Finn on Feb 17, 2010 4:58:10 GMT
Account E-Mail: Everyonelikesth@hotmail.com
Name: Fredrick Davidson
Nationality: Finnish American
What Army will Your Character Serve Beneath?
SS
Character History:
It was 1917 when the Bolshevik Revolution ripped Russia apart and Finland chose this time to declare her independence. And, like in Russia, Civil War broke out, polarizing the nation between the Conservative Whites and the Socialist Reds. Fighting between these two forces were brutal and terrible, atrocities were performed on both sides by death squads flying the two banners. This was a serious problem for Rikhard Davidson, whose career as Professor of Philosophy in the Finnish Language University in Turku made him one of the “intellectuals” targeted by the Red Terror gangs. It was early in the Civil War, when the Reds were at their top strength that Rikhard prepared to escape the madness. He was not just looking out for himself, he had a wife, Karolina, and two young twin boys, Hendrick and Fredrick, to protect. So, in early 1918 the Davidsons fled Finland to the safety of the Greatest Nation in the World.
Richard’s clan settled in Shippensburg, Pennsylvania, where his international scholarly connections earned him a position in Enlightenment Period Philosophy, especially German philosophers such as Immanuel Kant. It was a modest income, and throughout the roaring twenties the family lived the average American dream of Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. Then came the 1930s and with it the Great Depression, and the Davidsons had to tighten both their purse strings and belts to carry on. And then came their darkest hour since leaving the Civil War behind them, when Rikhard lost his job because, in his own words, “Like the man said, when humans go hungry the first thing they give up is their humanity and culture” But even though they smiled at the thought of having migrated away from Finland when they had been given the chance, despite the Whites having turned victorious from the Civil War and Finland institutionalized a capitalist democracy, the fighting had wasted much of the country, and so like most of Europe after The Great War, rendered it in a worse situation during the Depression than the untouched America.
With the master of the house just another man roaming the streets, looking for any odd job he was overqualified for, the Davidsons went back to their agricultural roots and till the few acres they owned to produce food for the cupboard that was once filled with store bought items. This received mixed reaction from the twins, now growing teenage boys. Hendrick, the more Americanized brother, thought that the blue collar living was a failure in the progress that modern Americans thrived on. On the other hand, Fredrick, his dislike of poverty notwithstanding, thought of the Depression as an adventure that showed how life was back in “Suomi” and turned hunting from a hobby into the only way of getting fresh meat onto the dinner table; back then, however, he didn’t realize that it was all practice for the greatest adventure of his life, where instead of hunting turkeys to survive the hunger, he would be hunting humans to survive the war.
Not World War II, of course. When it started in September of ‘39, it was a foreign squabble that didn’t concern the Davidson family or America at all. They were too busy trying to earn enough money to buy what they couldn’t grow, or hunt to care about the continent across the waves. But then in November of the same year the Davidsons were forced to care. It was the Winter War, when the Soviet Union started an invasion of Finland by using the same false flag tactics that the Nazis used to invade Poland. Talk of Talvisota spread through the Finnish-American circles that the Davidsons socialized. Plans were made, especially by those able to remember living in Finland, to form a volunteer American force to return to Finland and defend it from the communists. And although he was too young to remember Finland, Fredrick was one of the first volunteers, for he had grown up on his father’s stories of the old country and the fear he once had of the communists hunting him down, his friends and his family, solely because they believed in the freedom from ignorance and teachings on what they were familiar with. Hendrick, on the other hand, was the Abel in the Cain and Abel twins. He paid more attention when their father talked about philosophy, not personal history, and declared himself a pacifist, wanting no part in the foreign war. So, for the first time in their 22 years the brothers separated, Hendrick stayed in the Home of the Brave as Fredrick retraced their parents' steps 19 years prior to keep Finland the Land of the Free.
The Winter War should have been a turkey shoot for the Soviets. They had more men, planes, ammo, and tanks than the Finns could even imagine. The only thing the Finns had going for them was the will to fight, knowing they would either win or die and let their beautiful democracy fall into the hands of the invading oppressors; there were no other options. They also had the home court advantage, but Fredrick and the other volunteers did not. They soon learned, however, how to use the environment to their advantage, how to use the rough, formidable forests to encircle and box in the Russians, how to ambush them, and use cover and noise camouflage to sniper without being found. And with a little help from the Germans those Finnish soldiers did the impossible, they survived, and the longer they survived the more Russians died. But it was still a lost cause, no matter how many soldiers Fredrick and the others would sniper or tanks they would blow up, the Soviets always had a thousand more behind it. The Finnish defenses were crumbling, slowly, battle by battle, they had to pull back and Free Finland got smaller every day.
But Talvisota ended with a miracle. Although Fredrick and the rest of the Finns eventually realized they could probably not last another month in the frozen hellhole they called home, neither could the Soviets, apparently, and the Russians called for peace. It might not have been the best deal for the Finns, they did lose some real estate, and although a part of Fredrick wanted to keep fighting just so he could kill more Russians in revenge of the insult of a treaty, he wasn’t completely insane and as long as there was still a Free Finland, no matter the size or shape, they had won. The sacrifice of those who did not see the end of the Winter War was not in vain. But it was not the end, it was just a pause, like the Phony War that had taken place on the other side of Europe.
Everyone knew that’s what the lousy peace was, just a pause in-between fighting. It was not a question whether the Soviets would try again to extinguish the Finnish Flame of Freedom, but when. This time though, they would be ready. Not only were they training harder than ever, but they were receiving more help from an old ally, the Germans. Together they could crush the Soviet invaders and drive them back so it would never happen again, but to do so, the Soviets would have to invade.
It was this waiting Fredrick hated the most; at least while you were in the middle of war you knew what you did, were doing, and had to do, but idleness was capable of making a man lose focus, it made him soft. That’s when he learned of a little something the Germans were cooking up, called “Barbarossa”.
Military Rank:
SS-Sturmscharführer
Writing Sample:
Scenario: You’re alone behind enemy lines and you get the eerie feeling someone’s watching you. You’re trying to remain quiet, stay low, work your way back to the frontlines - but you can’t help but feel you’re being followed… (How does your character React? What’s running through their mind?)
8 American made, Russian operated trucks barreled down the simple Finnish dirt road. This path was the easier route out of the few that went through this section of dense forest that impeded Russian conquest as much as the enemy soldiers did. But this route was blocked, and as the lead driver gestured out his window for the rest of the convoy to stop, and then did the same himself, he imagined what had happened here.
It seemed one of their tanks had hit a landmine and broke it‘s left tread. That looked like the extent of the damage, and the only casualties that could be seen was a single Russian tanker sitting upright against the tank in a pool of frozen blood. After carefully sticking his head out of the second truck’s passenger window to see for himself what the holdup was, the Russian Captain, the leader of the regiment, ordered a soldier from the soft top in front to get out and inspect the area for more mines or other traps. Carefully and nervously, the order was carried out. As the private slowly trotted towards the wreckage, every soldier held their breathe, waiting for the brave little trooper to be struck down or blown up. Everyone knew it was a trap, another Finnish ambush, the most effective way to slaughter the invaders. Many soldiers begged silently to themselves that the shooting would start quickly and that they wouldn’t be ordered to leave the “safety” of the trucks and to make themselves even bigger targets. The Captain was also impatient and opened his door just to shout at the private to move faster. Visibly shaking, the private bent down to examine the body. He had slowly bled to death from a single bullet wound to the leg and the rifleman wondered if in a moment or two he would suffer the same fate. He did not know that it wasn’t his moment to die.
BANG! A small unimposing snow covered bush erupted fire for a single moment and the Captain’s spine was spliced with hot lead. Quickly, the canvas flaps and doors of all the trucks opened up and soldiers spilled out, randomly firing into the invisible Finns hiding behind every tree. No one knew what they were shooting at until another shot rang out and splattered the driver of the last vehicle’s brains all over the inside of his cab. Then everyone saw the face of the enemy. The face of Fredrick Davidson.
The Finnish born, American raised sniper leapt from his hiding spot and started to run in the opposite direction of the angry men with guns. One of those men, a Lieutenant, jumped out of his truck, once he was sure there weren’t any other enemies around, and took control of the violent mob and ordered only a platoon sized force to go after the sniper, while the rest quickly worked to get the trucks out of there as fast as possible.
This was the same speed Fredrick ran has he rushed, slid, and dodged through the forest and it‘s natural minefield of brush, rocks, and roots. His body ached, it wasn’t healthy to suddenly go from being an ice cube freezing in the snow to a wolf charging through it. Every time a foot pounded against the snow it felt like his legs were on fire. But at least the pain told Fred that he was alive, something he couldn‘t be sure of if he didn‘t outrun the Russians.
Soon, every moment seemed like an hour, and it seemed like Fred had been running for weeks through the same frozen forest, breathing the same ice needled breath. The only break from the monotony was the occasional gunshot splintering trees around him, but as long as he kept running, he could stay out of range. As long as he kept running was the problem, and as soon as he returned to the cover of the forest after crossing another dirt road, Fred’s legs gave out and he tumbled into the frozen snow. Leaving his rifle on the ground and choking for air, he used a tree to pick himself up and hid from the Russians that were already crossing the road into his side of the forest. They would soon be upon him, but he had to laugh through the sharp pain of breathing.
“Yippee Kii Yay, Stalinin perkeleet!” Fredrick Davidson shouted a moment before the platoon of Russians noticed the hidden machineguns surrounding them. A moment later, the Mgs fired.
Name: Fredrick Davidson
Nationality: Finnish American
What Army will Your Character Serve Beneath?
SS
Character History:
It was 1917 when the Bolshevik Revolution ripped Russia apart and Finland chose this time to declare her independence. And, like in Russia, Civil War broke out, polarizing the nation between the Conservative Whites and the Socialist Reds. Fighting between these two forces were brutal and terrible, atrocities were performed on both sides by death squads flying the two banners. This was a serious problem for Rikhard Davidson, whose career as Professor of Philosophy in the Finnish Language University in Turku made him one of the “intellectuals” targeted by the Red Terror gangs. It was early in the Civil War, when the Reds were at their top strength that Rikhard prepared to escape the madness. He was not just looking out for himself, he had a wife, Karolina, and two young twin boys, Hendrick and Fredrick, to protect. So, in early 1918 the Davidsons fled Finland to the safety of the Greatest Nation in the World.
Richard’s clan settled in Shippensburg, Pennsylvania, where his international scholarly connections earned him a position in Enlightenment Period Philosophy, especially German philosophers such as Immanuel Kant. It was a modest income, and throughout the roaring twenties the family lived the average American dream of Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. Then came the 1930s and with it the Great Depression, and the Davidsons had to tighten both their purse strings and belts to carry on. And then came their darkest hour since leaving the Civil War behind them, when Rikhard lost his job because, in his own words, “Like the man said, when humans go hungry the first thing they give up is their humanity and culture” But even though they smiled at the thought of having migrated away from Finland when they had been given the chance, despite the Whites having turned victorious from the Civil War and Finland institutionalized a capitalist democracy, the fighting had wasted much of the country, and so like most of Europe after The Great War, rendered it in a worse situation during the Depression than the untouched America.
With the master of the house just another man roaming the streets, looking for any odd job he was overqualified for, the Davidsons went back to their agricultural roots and till the few acres they owned to produce food for the cupboard that was once filled with store bought items. This received mixed reaction from the twins, now growing teenage boys. Hendrick, the more Americanized brother, thought that the blue collar living was a failure in the progress that modern Americans thrived on. On the other hand, Fredrick, his dislike of poverty notwithstanding, thought of the Depression as an adventure that showed how life was back in “Suomi” and turned hunting from a hobby into the only way of getting fresh meat onto the dinner table; back then, however, he didn’t realize that it was all practice for the greatest adventure of his life, where instead of hunting turkeys to survive the hunger, he would be hunting humans to survive the war.
Not World War II, of course. When it started in September of ‘39, it was a foreign squabble that didn’t concern the Davidson family or America at all. They were too busy trying to earn enough money to buy what they couldn’t grow, or hunt to care about the continent across the waves. But then in November of the same year the Davidsons were forced to care. It was the Winter War, when the Soviet Union started an invasion of Finland by using the same false flag tactics that the Nazis used to invade Poland. Talk of Talvisota spread through the Finnish-American circles that the Davidsons socialized. Plans were made, especially by those able to remember living in Finland, to form a volunteer American force to return to Finland and defend it from the communists. And although he was too young to remember Finland, Fredrick was one of the first volunteers, for he had grown up on his father’s stories of the old country and the fear he once had of the communists hunting him down, his friends and his family, solely because they believed in the freedom from ignorance and teachings on what they were familiar with. Hendrick, on the other hand, was the Abel in the Cain and Abel twins. He paid more attention when their father talked about philosophy, not personal history, and declared himself a pacifist, wanting no part in the foreign war. So, for the first time in their 22 years the brothers separated, Hendrick stayed in the Home of the Brave as Fredrick retraced their parents' steps 19 years prior to keep Finland the Land of the Free.
The Winter War should have been a turkey shoot for the Soviets. They had more men, planes, ammo, and tanks than the Finns could even imagine. The only thing the Finns had going for them was the will to fight, knowing they would either win or die and let their beautiful democracy fall into the hands of the invading oppressors; there were no other options. They also had the home court advantage, but Fredrick and the other volunteers did not. They soon learned, however, how to use the environment to their advantage, how to use the rough, formidable forests to encircle and box in the Russians, how to ambush them, and use cover and noise camouflage to sniper without being found. And with a little help from the Germans those Finnish soldiers did the impossible, they survived, and the longer they survived the more Russians died. But it was still a lost cause, no matter how many soldiers Fredrick and the others would sniper or tanks they would blow up, the Soviets always had a thousand more behind it. The Finnish defenses were crumbling, slowly, battle by battle, they had to pull back and Free Finland got smaller every day.
But Talvisota ended with a miracle. Although Fredrick and the rest of the Finns eventually realized they could probably not last another month in the frozen hellhole they called home, neither could the Soviets, apparently, and the Russians called for peace. It might not have been the best deal for the Finns, they did lose some real estate, and although a part of Fredrick wanted to keep fighting just so he could kill more Russians in revenge of the insult of a treaty, he wasn’t completely insane and as long as there was still a Free Finland, no matter the size or shape, they had won. The sacrifice of those who did not see the end of the Winter War was not in vain. But it was not the end, it was just a pause, like the Phony War that had taken place on the other side of Europe.
Everyone knew that’s what the lousy peace was, just a pause in-between fighting. It was not a question whether the Soviets would try again to extinguish the Finnish Flame of Freedom, but when. This time though, they would be ready. Not only were they training harder than ever, but they were receiving more help from an old ally, the Germans. Together they could crush the Soviet invaders and drive them back so it would never happen again, but to do so, the Soviets would have to invade.
It was this waiting Fredrick hated the most; at least while you were in the middle of war you knew what you did, were doing, and had to do, but idleness was capable of making a man lose focus, it made him soft. That’s when he learned of a little something the Germans were cooking up, called “Barbarossa”.
Military Rank:
SS-Sturmscharführer
Writing Sample:
Scenario: You’re alone behind enemy lines and you get the eerie feeling someone’s watching you. You’re trying to remain quiet, stay low, work your way back to the frontlines - but you can’t help but feel you’re being followed… (How does your character React? What’s running through their mind?)
8 American made, Russian operated trucks barreled down the simple Finnish dirt road. This path was the easier route out of the few that went through this section of dense forest that impeded Russian conquest as much as the enemy soldiers did. But this route was blocked, and as the lead driver gestured out his window for the rest of the convoy to stop, and then did the same himself, he imagined what had happened here.
It seemed one of their tanks had hit a landmine and broke it‘s left tread. That looked like the extent of the damage, and the only casualties that could be seen was a single Russian tanker sitting upright against the tank in a pool of frozen blood. After carefully sticking his head out of the second truck’s passenger window to see for himself what the holdup was, the Russian Captain, the leader of the regiment, ordered a soldier from the soft top in front to get out and inspect the area for more mines or other traps. Carefully and nervously, the order was carried out. As the private slowly trotted towards the wreckage, every soldier held their breathe, waiting for the brave little trooper to be struck down or blown up. Everyone knew it was a trap, another Finnish ambush, the most effective way to slaughter the invaders. Many soldiers begged silently to themselves that the shooting would start quickly and that they wouldn’t be ordered to leave the “safety” of the trucks and to make themselves even bigger targets. The Captain was also impatient and opened his door just to shout at the private to move faster. Visibly shaking, the private bent down to examine the body. He had slowly bled to death from a single bullet wound to the leg and the rifleman wondered if in a moment or two he would suffer the same fate. He did not know that it wasn’t his moment to die.
BANG! A small unimposing snow covered bush erupted fire for a single moment and the Captain’s spine was spliced with hot lead. Quickly, the canvas flaps and doors of all the trucks opened up and soldiers spilled out, randomly firing into the invisible Finns hiding behind every tree. No one knew what they were shooting at until another shot rang out and splattered the driver of the last vehicle’s brains all over the inside of his cab. Then everyone saw the face of the enemy. The face of Fredrick Davidson.
The Finnish born, American raised sniper leapt from his hiding spot and started to run in the opposite direction of the angry men with guns. One of those men, a Lieutenant, jumped out of his truck, once he was sure there weren’t any other enemies around, and took control of the violent mob and ordered only a platoon sized force to go after the sniper, while the rest quickly worked to get the trucks out of there as fast as possible.
This was the same speed Fredrick ran has he rushed, slid, and dodged through the forest and it‘s natural minefield of brush, rocks, and roots. His body ached, it wasn’t healthy to suddenly go from being an ice cube freezing in the snow to a wolf charging through it. Every time a foot pounded against the snow it felt like his legs were on fire. But at least the pain told Fred that he was alive, something he couldn‘t be sure of if he didn‘t outrun the Russians.
Soon, every moment seemed like an hour, and it seemed like Fred had been running for weeks through the same frozen forest, breathing the same ice needled breath. The only break from the monotony was the occasional gunshot splintering trees around him, but as long as he kept running, he could stay out of range. As long as he kept running was the problem, and as soon as he returned to the cover of the forest after crossing another dirt road, Fred’s legs gave out and he tumbled into the frozen snow. Leaving his rifle on the ground and choking for air, he used a tree to pick himself up and hid from the Russians that were already crossing the road into his side of the forest. They would soon be upon him, but he had to laugh through the sharp pain of breathing.
“Yippee Kii Yay, Stalinin perkeleet!” Fredrick Davidson shouted a moment before the platoon of Russians noticed the hidden machineguns surrounding them. A moment later, the Mgs fired.
