Helene "Leen" Kullman (31 January 1920 – 6 March 1943 or 1978) was an

Estonia Estonia, officially the Republic of Estonia, is a country in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the Baltic Sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, and to the east by Ru ...

n agent of

Soviet military intelligence Main Intelligence Directorate ( rus, Главное разведывательное управление, Glavnoye razvedyvatel'noye upravleniye, ˈglavnəjə rɐzˈvʲɛdɨvətʲɪlʲnəjə ʊprɐˈvlʲenʲɪjə), abbreviated GRU ( rus, ГР ...

in the

Baltic Fleet The Baltic Fleet () is the Naval fleet, fleet of the Russian Navy in the Baltic Sea. Established 18 May 1703, under Tsar Peter the Great as part of the Imperial Russian Navy, the Baltic Fleet is the oldest Russian fleet. In 1918, the fleet w ...

during

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

Early life

Kullman was born on 31 January 1920 to an Estonian family in Tartu; she was the sixth of eight children of a shoemaker. Her father died in 1933, the same year she left secondary school and enrolled in the Tallinn Pedagogical School. After Estonia was annexed by the Soviet Union in 1940 she joined the

Komsomol The All-Union Leninist Young Communist League, usually known as Komsomol, was a political youth organization in the Soviet Union. It is sometimes described as the youth division of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (CPSU), although it w ...

, having graduated from the Tallinn Pedagogical School in 1937, after which she enrolled in the Tallinn Pedagogical Seminary. She became certified as a junior secondary school teacher in 1941, shortly before the German invasion of the Soviet Union.

World War II activities

After the German invasion of the Soviet Union Kullman was assigned by the Komsomol to help people evacuate Tallinn during the night. She was evacuated from the city on 28 August 1941 with her twin sister Anna to a collective farm in the

Chelyabinsk Oblast Chelyabinsk Oblast; , is a federal subjects of Russia, federal subject (an oblast) of Russia in the Ural Mountains region, on the border of Europe and Asia. Its administrative center is the types of inhabited localities in Russia, city of Chel ...

of Russia. After the creation of the 7th Estonian Division in December 1941 she soon joined in 1942 and was assigned to a medical battalion as a nurse until she was transferred to the intelligence directorate in April 1942. In September 1942, she was dropped by parachuted behind German lines in the forest near

Tartu Tartu is the second largest city in Estonia after Tallinn. Tartu has a population of 97,759 (as of 2024). It is southeast of Tallinn and 245 kilometres (152 miles) northeast of Riga, Latvia. Tartu lies on the Emajõgi river, which connects the ...

. She then began to radio information on the locations and numbers of enemy garrisons, defences, and ships in addition to information about the presence and degree of ice in areas of the Baltic. In January 1943, she was arrested by the local

Gestapo The (, ), Syllabic abbreviation, abbreviated Gestapo (), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe. The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of F ...

and subsequently shot by a prison guard after she spat in his face according to Soviet sources. She was declared a

Hero of the Soviet Union The title Hero of the Soviet Union () was the highest distinction in the Soviet Union, awarded together with the Order of Lenin personally or collectively for heroic feats in service to the Soviet state and society. The title was awarded both ...

on 8 May 1965.

Speculation

In 2000, the Estonian newspaper

Postimees is an Estonian daily newspaper established on 5 June 1857, by Johann Voldemar Jannsen. In 1891, it became the first daily newspaper in Estonia. Its current editor-in-chief is Priit Hõbemägi. The paper has approximately 250 employees. ''P ...

reported that Helene may have in fact cooperated with her captors and turned double-agent, continuing her radio transmissions, and then after the war relocated to West Germany under a new identity where she lived until 1978. No real evidence has been provided to support this speculation.

References

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Kullman, Helene Soviet military personnel killed in World War II Heroes of the Soviet Union 1910 births 1943 deaths Soviet female resistance members Estonian people of World War II Women in the Russian and Soviet military GRU officers People from Tartu Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic people

Early life

World War II activities

Speculation

See also

References