Swedes in the Great War 1914-1919

The story about three Swedes who joined the 2nd Battalion in the Auckland Regiment, all of whom got wounded on the Somme, on September 15, 1916. They were followed by two others, in the days that followed.

Sometimes I wish I knew much more information about a specific place on the French battlefield from the Great War, when I was there. In 2022, Wendy Maddocks and I visited the battlefield of the Great War, and went along the Western Front, in the areas from Ypres, down to the Somme.

It was especially rewarding to follow the events described in her grandfather’s diary, from Poperinge and Bailleul to Trônes Wood and further on.

On that trip, I wish I had known more about the terrain and its connection to the three other soldiers who also saw action just a little north of Trônes Wood.

When I look at the photos from where we were standing at the New Zealand Memorial, between High Wood and Delville Wood, I now realise—while reading about the fate of three Swedish-born soldiers who fought for New Zealand in the war—that they were actually there on that specific day, September 15, 1916.

It was a significant day for the New Zealand Expeditionary Force (NZEF) during the Battle of the Somme.

I remember taking a photo of the information sign, but at the time I did not know that I would later return to these images of this specific place—one involving both Crest Trench and Switch Trench, also referred to as the Switch Line in some war diaries.

One evening, I decided to go through all the service cards I had found of Swedish emigrants who left Sweden and ended up in New Zealand. So far, I have identified at least 42 Swedish-born individuals who entered service and fought in the Great War in Kiwi uniform.

Two of them were killed in action, 13 of them were wounded in action, one took his own life during his service in France, and one is missing in action, assumed to have drowned when their ship was hit by a torpedo from a German submarine.

I quickly noticed a specific pattern among some of them when reading their service cards—regarding when they left for war, where they were stationed, and when and where they were wounded.

At least three of them were wounded during the Battle of the Somme on September 15. When I began reading the war diary of their unit—the 2nd Infantry Battalion of the Auckland Regiment—I could also see where they were most likely positioned on that specific day.

The Auckland Regiment served as the Auckland Battalion at Gallipoli in 1915 before being divided into the 1st and 2nd Auckland Infantry Battalions in March 1916. An additional battalion, the 3rd Auckland Infantry Battalion, existed between March 1917 and February 1918. The regiment served on the Western Front from 1916 until 1918. (NZ History)

The three soldiers

The first service card I examined belonged to the Swedish-born soldier John William Lewin (Johan Wilhelm Arkadius Levin). He was born in the parish of Kristianstad, Skåne County, on January 12, 1873. He was raised by his mother, Hanna Levin (née Molin), and his father, Carl Adolf Levin, along with five siblings.

John was a farmer when he received permission from the Swedish king to emigrate to Australia. This event is noted in the church records from November 1894. He is also mentioned in The Swedes in New Zealand (Sten Aminoff, 1988) and was one of approximately 3,300 Swedes who emigrated to New Zealand up to 1940.

It was quite rare at that time not to be a sailor when emigrating to Australia or New Zealand, as this was the most common profession among emigrants to those countries. As with many before him, it is highly likely that the mining industry—and the search for gold—motivated John’s emigration.

John joined the New Zealand Army after being attested at Trentham on August 24, 1915. He was assigned to the 2nd Battalion of the Auckland Infantry Regiment. He passed through Suez and Alexandria before arriving in France. After a few months, he was wounded in action in the area between High Wood and Delville Wood, just southwest of the village of Flers in the Somme sector.

John was treated in hospital in England before returning to New Zealand. He was discharged in October 1917, due to wounds received in battle.

The unit diary describes the activities of the 2nd Battalion along the Crest Trench, specified on the map, from September 15, 1916. John and the other two Swedish soldiers were among the other 228 ORs (Other Ranks) who was wounded that day.

You can also see the Switch Trench and Crest Trench described in the photo gallery above the map gallery, the photo of the information sign.

The second Swedish born soldier who was wounded that day was James Lawrence Peterson, who also served in the 2nd Battalion.

John Lawrence is noted in the book of Swedish emigrants to have emigrated in 1884. He stated in his NZ attestation papers that he was born in 1870, but he is noted to be born in 1864. It has been hard to confirm who James Lawrence was in Sweden, but I will try to find his correct identity. I do not want to speculate if he gave the wrong date of birth when he was attested in Trentham, in 1916.

James went via Wellington in New Zealand, through Suez and Alexandria, and disembarked in Southampton in August 1916. He left for France on August 17th, and passed Etaples on the French west coast before he joined his unit in August 31st, 1916. Just about 15 days later he was wounded in action when he served for the 2nd Battalion, in the same area, and on the same date as John, mentioned above.

James went back to England on the hospital ship “Asturias” on September 20, before he went back to New Zealand, and was discharged due to his wounds in March 1917.

The third Swedish born soldier who served together with the others on that specific day, the 15th of September, 1916, was a soldier that I has been written about before. He was Arthur Phillip Grey.

Arthur was born in Arvika parish in the landscape of Värmland on June 15th, 1894. He had a British born father and a mother who was born in Elgå parish in Värmland, Sweden. Arthur had five siblings. His father, Alan Hopwood Grey, who at the time was a Saw Mill owner.

In the Swedish book about New Zealand Immigration it is noted that he arrived to New Zealand in 1920, however, according to the documents I found in the archive he signed the NZEF attestation papers in Trentham in October 1915. 

Arthur left New Zealand in February 1916, and he also passed Suez and Alexandria before he embarked for France in April 1916. Just over a month later he served in the area between the High Wood and Delville Wood, together with his fellow servicemen, just before the advance towards the village of Flers was about to start.

Arthur was wounded in action by a Gunshot Wound through the chest, on September 15, 1916, during the battle of the Somme.

15 September 1916 was the first real day in action on the Western Front for the New Zealand Division – and it was also the first day that tanks were ever used in battle.

However, in the upcoming days, on September 16 and September 17, two more Swedes were wounded in the advance towards the village of Flers.

John Person, Johan Gustaf Persson, was born in Sweden on June 16th, 1893. He emigrated from Sweden in May 1912. From the Swedish church book I can also see that he went back to Sweden from New Zealand in 1921.

John was attested in Trentham in February 1916 and joined the 1st Battalion in the New Zealand Otago Regiment. He left the camp in Sling, England, for Etaples, France, in mid June, 1916.

John was, according the war diary of the Otago regiment, in the area south-west of the Crest Trench, along the trench area described in the yellow box below. The unit was ordered to advance towards the Switch Trench, alongside the 2nd Auckland Battalion.

John was wounded during September 16th, 1916, and was brought back to England already on the 18th, on the Hospital Ship “Asturias”. John was finally discharged in New Zealand in November 1917.

The day after John Person was wounded, another Swede, Gustave Adolph Swanson, joined the group of wounded Swedes in the same area as the others.

Gustave Adolph Swanson was born as Gustaf Adolf Svensson on October 10, 1884, in Karlskrona parish, in Blekinge county.

Gustaf was a sailor and he is noted to have emigrated from Sweden to New Zealand in 1907. He signed his attestation papers for the New Zealand Army in April 1915. He left New Zealand in September 1915, and initially he disembarked in Alexandria, to later on embark for France in Port Said in April 1916.

After he spent a short period in a hospital in St Omer in France he joined his unit, the 1st battalion in the Canterbury Infantry Regiment, in the French town of Armentieres.

The unit advanced to the Somme area, and on September 17, 1916, Gustaf was wounded when the unit advanced, according to the unit diary, towards the Groove Avenue Trench, also called Groove Alley on some other trench maps.

He was wounded in the chest by enemy fire, and the bullets broke some ribs in his chest. Gustaf embarked in Southampton for New Zealand on the hospital ship “H.S Marama” in mid January 1917. He was finally discharged in New Zealand in April 1917.

It has been very interesting to connect these individuals to the specific area described in the war diaries and to see the trench names on the maps, knowing that I have been there. If and when I visit the area again, I will definitely view the terrain from a different perspective.

My knowledge has increased, and it has made me more interested in the specific units the soldiers served in and their history. For me, it is also important to follow up on every Swedish soldier who served in the war, not only those who fell.

Lest we forget.

I have just looked through some printed documents that I found when cleaning out shelves and sorting in books in newly bought bookshelves.

I have earlier been concentrated in telling the stories of those who fought and fell in the Great War, and back in the days I put documents from those who participated but survived aside, however, I am now starting to realize that these stories is of course of great interest as well, as they become small movies in my head, when connecting the text to the terrain, especially in terrain where I have spent a lot of time.

This is the story about the Captain in the Swedish Army who chose to end his service, to apply for service in the German Army during the Great War.

This is the story about Knut Gustaf Stålhandske.

The first part is about the background of Knut Gustaf Stålhandske, and the later part is the text from his dairy. I have only been able to find a paper version of the text, which originally came from a webpage called www.gotlandsforsvarshistoria.se. The page cannot be reached for the moment, so I have translated the text into english.

I hope the text from the diary will be interesting, especially for those who have been in the specific terrain along the Ypres Salient mentioned in the diary. At least it gives me a very special feeling, and can certainly be compared to diaries from soldiers on “the other side”

Background

Knut was born on May 6th, 1872, in a house called the “Captain’s quarter” in Ludgo parish in Edeby, Nyköping, in Södermanland county.

He was the son of Laura Sofia Löfgren and Axel Daniel Stålhandske, and he was raised by his parents together with his seven siblings.

Knut became an officer in October, 1893, and initially became a sub lieutenant at Gotland Infantry regiment. In November 1894, Knut moved to Karlsborg Garrison parish, in Skaraborg county, in the landscape of Västergötland. He started his military career as a sub lieutenant in the Royal Logistic Corps, T 2, where he also became a lieutenant. He moved to Örebro in 1895, to serve with the Royal Logistic Corps, T 1.

In August 1898, he was granted permission to take a break from his Swedish military service, to spend three years in the Army of the Kongo State in Africa. He started his service in Boma area, in the Zambi Training Camp, to learn the way of Belgian Colonial military service, which he found, compared to the Swedish way, very old fashioned.

His activities in the camp took most of his time, and he found the environment quite hard to live in, with a lot of mosquitos and other hard circumstances. After two months in Zambi he got permission to go to “Province Orientale” in Upper Congo, to the city of Stanleyville. In Leopoldville he met a lot of Swedish merchant Captains and engineers, who had a very good reputation in the area at that time.

He quickly found out that his service against the opponents didn’t became as he expected, as the commander, Baron Dhanis didn’t had the resources when it came to ammunition and equipment. Knut experienced a lot in different places and positions, before he became ill and finally, after a long period in trying to be cured, cancelled his service in the State of Congo. He cancelled his service in Brussels and came back to Sweden in 1900.

In German Service

He came back to Sweden, to serve with the Royal Logistic Corps, T 2, in Karlsborg in 1902, and became a Captain at Boden-Karlsborg Artillery Regiment in October 1905.

Knut was married to Ida Helena Tillberg in December, 1906. Ida later died in Karlsborg 1915, from a heart failure. Knut married a second time in Berlin, in September, 1917, to Edith Berta Anna Elise von Bülow, who was born in Germany. She later died in Stockholm, 1973. Knut had four children in his both marriages.

In 1916 Knut Stålhandske asked for permission, as a Captain, to end his duty in the Swedish Army, to serve on the German side in the Great War. He was granted service in the Prussian “Artillery by foot” After training service in the city of Jüterbog, south of Berlin, he was ordered to the Eastern Front. There he became a commander, as a Captain in the reserves, of the 4th battery of the 17th Reserve Artillery Regiment, which was a unit in the 8th Army.

Knut served in fightings which was held in Dyna and by the river Aa, west of Riga. In those fightings he received the Iron Cross. 2nd Class.

Due to the Russian Revolution, which led to lower level of combat activities, he asked for permission to be moved to the Western Front.

He participated in the battles in the area of Arras during June to September, 1917 and with the &th German Army in the battles West and North of Lens, from September to November 1917. Knut became a Major in November 1917. During November and December, 1917, he participated in the fightings around Verdun, in the German 5th Army. Then he served in the 1st german Army in the area of Reims (Seize of the fort La Pompelle) from the beginning of December 1917, to end of February 1918. On February 28th, 1918, he received the Iron Cross 1st Class.

Between March 21st, to April 6th, 1918, he participated in the Offensive against Amiens, where he fought in the battle of St Quentin around La Fère and Noyon. He also served around Avre, Montdidier and between the rivers of Avre and Metz in June 1918.

From the Diary

In September 1918 he returned to his old regiment and participated in the fightings along the static front in the areas of Ypres, Tournai and Oudenarde.

In the diary the following text is to be read:

“The division’s defense area extended from Lake Zillebeke, located about 1 km east-southeast of Ypres, to the area south of St. Eloi, on both sides of the much-discussed Lys-Ypres-Yser canal. With great delight, I learned that no less than 14 batteries
(8 mortar, 4 howitzer and 2 heavy 10.5 gun batteries) were placed under my command, divided into two “Untergruppen”. After the troops had been received on 10 September, I made a longer orientation march the following day along the entire front of the division. We visited the support points close behind the infantry’s front line, namely “Höhe 60”, “Zillebeke” and “Doppelhöhe 60”, where four of my batteries had their fire control positions.

“Doppelhöhe 60” in particular offered an excellent overview of the entire area, also north and west of Ypres. On the front slope of this height lay no less than 9 large English tanks, shot to pieces and completely destroyed by rust. During an English attack in the spring, they had tried to climb the steep slope, at least 6 of which had been set on fire by a “Tankabwehr battery” with two field guns installed on the crest, which was particularly well installed.

The infantry had managed to take the rest with the long tank guns or with hand grenades. I did not neglect to photograph this strange sight of 9 “tank corpses” in one place, but unfortunately the photographs failed due to poor lighting. It rained almost all day. The entire terrain between Tembriel and the front was crisscrossed with old positions with several obstacle lines that had been taken and lost several times during the war. In addition, the ground was so riddled with shell holes that it was impossible to find any way north of Zandvoorde.

It was impossible to move straight forward in the terrain at all, there was a constant crossing between the shell craters. Almost every night during the next two weeks the English made minor attacks. Small trenches were occupied by the enemy from time to time, but were retaken without difficulty by our troops, with or without the participation of artillery. The trenches consisted mostly of so-called shell hole positions.

These were simply made so that the shell holes, more or less filled with ochre-green marsh water, were connected to a rifle range in which our infantry had a very unpleasant time. The difficulties were not inconsiderably increased by the dense autumn fogs in these marshes which required careful precautions to secure the connection. Extra fog posts had to be set up by both the infantry and the artillery, they were equipped with light guns, so-called signal lights, sirens or small megaphones.”

Further on in the diary the following text is found:

“On September 20, 1918, the two batteries of the mortar battalion and the howitzer battalion no. 406 were taken from us, after which I had only 8 batteries. After the 24th, a sudden calm set in with the enemy, not even patrol battles occurred anymore. This peace seemed highly suspicious to me. Vigilance was heightened even more. The spark telegraphs, of which each battalion had one, were always to be set to “reinforced reception”. The wavelength was usually 200. In order to determine whether the enemy had received reinforcements or the regiments opposing us had been relieved, our division made a minor attack on Vormezeele on the night of the 27th, during which, among other things, 5 prisoners were taken, belonging to a regiment that had not previously been deployed at Ypres.

In order not to neglect any precautionary measures, I ordered a technical combat exercise on the afternoon of the 27th. A major enemy attack south of Ypres was given as a condition. Everything went smoothly, all telephones, light signals, report drivers and smoke mail lines worked flawlessly. When the exercise was over at 6 o’clock I gave the order for a critique the following morning at 8 o’clock when a battalion commander and an officer or officer cadet from each battery were to report to me in Tembriel.

But the good Englishman spared me the trouble. During the night of Sunday the 28th the enemy began a major attack north of Ypres. The 12th Bavarian Division, our neighbor, became heavily involved in the fight. At 5.20 a.m. there was also loose fire against us and against our neighbor on our other flank, drum fire against our batteries and fire control positions and against the roads behind us. In about an hour the progressive artillery attack (the fire roll) followed.

This fire roll, which slowly approached at dawn, offered an unforgettable, stately and imposing battle scene. The wall of the demanding shells and the sky-high columns of smoke and mud that they caused, resembled almost a line of cloud pillars, a firing line of giants approaching to destroy us. But strangely enough, our batteries suffered little damage, well adapted to all the terrain folds as they were.

Everything indicated an upcoming “Grosskampftag” of the first order. About the first hours of the battle, my war diary says the following: At 7 a.m. our main support points were “Bastion” (a former fort in the Ypres fortress belt) on the Lys-Ypres canal. “Höhe 60” and “Doppelhöhe 60” despite the most tenacious defense in the hands of the enemy.

As a result, 6 of my batteries had lost their fire control positions with the commanders and telephone operators present there. My batteries, which had been firing barrage fire on the advancing British, were now ordered to shell the lost heights where the British lines were visible from time to time, when the smoke and fog were swept away by the wind. It was necessary to help our infantry to retake the heights through a counterattack. At 8 a.m. our telephone lines to the subgroups were destroyed.

The enemy’s incessant artillery fire made it difficult both to repair the lines and to maintain communications through reporting men on foot, horseback or bicycle. At 9:40 a.m. a message came from the distribution commander that the army corps reserve of the 36th West Prussian Infantry Division would arrive in Menin by rail at around 11 a.m. and be immediately deployed across Geluveld to retake the heights. Geluveld was a village on the main road from Menin (at Lys) to Ypres.

At about the same time, a report came that my most advanced battery, 3/Liw 65, which was 150 meters behind “Höhe 60”, had been surrounded by the enemy. The battery commander continued the fire regardless until his remaining 2 usable howitzers had sunk so deep into the marshland that they could no longer be loaded. Then he blew up the guns, spread the personnel into a firing line and, under incessant fighting with carbine fire and hand grenades, broke through and, taking with him six captured Englishmen, reported at 10.45 at his battalion commander’s fighting post, where the men asked for new guns.

Such was the spirit among these soldiers. At 10.20 the English slowly continued their advance towards Geluveld. My three batteries closest to this village also received new machine-gun fire but continued to fire tirelessly regardless. South of that, on the line west of Zandvoorde-Houtem, the combined fire of the field artillery and ours pinned him down. The mortar battery 1/140 (20th Foot Artillery Regiment) had fired no less than 850 rounds during the battle. Now the battery had only one usable mortar and it had almost disappeared into the marsh, although it had been re-erected three times.

The brave battery commander now went on the attack with carbines and hand grenades, spreading his unwounded 30 men in very thin firing line and stopped the enemy’s advance about 2 km west of Geluveld. Batteries 2, 4 and 5/Liw 65, which were surrounded shortly afterwards, had to blow up their guns sunk in the marshy ground, after which they fought their way through with small arms.

Saving the guns was impossible as the battalion lacked horses. The bravery of the 2nd battery deserves special praise. When the enemy had come a few hundred meters past the right wing of the battery, the battery commander ordered one of his two howitzers, which were still in combat condition, to face back and fire at the enemy in the rear, while the other continued to fire at its previous target, a field battery southeast of Ypres (the battery’s main observer had not been discovered by the enemy).

The English battery was forced to break up and flee with the two guns that we had not had time to destroy. The two howitzers were then rendered unusable, after which the commander spread the service in a firing line and after a hard fight managed to break through in a southeasterly direction across Houtem with a loss of only two young recruits, who died of exhaustion and were taken prisoner.“

In the end of diary he wrote the following text:

“Suddenly my command post (battle post) was again subjected to a fire attack by the heaviest artillery. The rain of shells came so suddenly that a telephone non-commissioned officer and two men, who were resting on the ground in front of the cavity, were seriously wounded by a shell that exploded in front of them. It was heartbreaking to hear their wails, the former had his lower abdomen torn open. They were immediately dressed as best they could, whereupon a report was made by telephone to the main dressing station in Wervik. Within 18 minutes an ambulance arrived, and in the blink of an eye the three wounded were loaded and taken away.

Thanks to the instantaneous connection and the rapid transport, as well as the proven skill of the German military doctor, all three were saved. When the regiment returned to Altona at the beginning of December, who stood at the railway yard and gave a tight salute if not my magnificent telephone sergeant.

At 11.50 the great counterattack over Geluveld was finally launched with the two first arriving regiments of the 36th Infantry Division. The enemy was partly thrown back, his attack was completely stopped in the line west Geluveld-Zandvoorde-west Houtem. Nowhere had the enemy advanced more than 2.5 km. Now he opened machine-gun fire from a height at Zandvoorde against my “Gefechtsstand”, at the same time a field battery began to take us under fire, although the result of all this waste of ammunition was 0.

We still expected that the now assembled 36th Infantry Division and our infantry would continue their attack with all their might to regain the lost heights. However, the enemy had managed to get so entrenched in the old gun emplacements in the terrain that the attack failed. In addition, the artillery support was too weak due to the lost batteries and the lack of ammunition.

A few hours of waiting and tension passed. Although I had received permission at 2 o’clock in the morning to move my staff due east to Getraudenhof, I remained in Tembrielen in the hope that our infantry would succeed in throwing the enemy back to his old positions. In the end, however, I had to move my staff back to my new combat post designated by the artillery commander. The spark station, all maps and documents had already been taken there and after a 20-minute unpleasant walk due east through the terrain we arrived at the former village of Geluveld, only a few small huts were standing. Here at 6.30 I again arranged my command post, in an underground room made of concrete, which was uninhabited at the time.

It is clear that the loss of so many brave artillerymen of all ranks and no less than 5 batteries of material hit me hard. However, no usable piece had fallen into the enemy’s hands. The greatest comfort in my grief was to be brought to me by my Bavarian friends. Hardly had everything been finished in Gestraudenhof before I received 2 10.5 cm cannon batteries from the Bavarian Foot Artillery Battalion No. 18, which since the beginning of the month had been in rest and repair quarters in Halluin, a village on the Lys south of Menin.

In addition, late in the evening I received news that my former howitzer battalion No. 406, which had been in rest quarters for some time, was again placed at my disposal. Finally, during the night, a battery 1Lkw. 65, which had been withdrawn from the front before the battle for new equipment, returned. This meant that my regiment at dawn counted one more battery than before the battle, 9 instead of 8.

Not even in the face of adversity did the German organizational ability fail. My reorganized regiment was now arranged with one group north, the other south of the small town of Menin on the Lys. Our infantry had regrouped during the night and occupied the so-called “Flanders position” in the line Gheluveld-Wervik-Lys. As soon as the batteries were ready in their new positions, liaison officers were again sent to the infantry. Everything was ready for a new battle. On the same day the Johanniter Order was awarded.”

It is not known why or which type of the Johanniter Order Medal he received, according to his text in the diary.

The diary also mention text about the siege of the Fort la Pompelle in the area of Reims, but this text I will save for another article.

Knut Gustaf Stålhandske died in Stockholm at hospital, at an age of 80, in October 1952, and left his wife Edith von Bülow, and his children.

He is buried at Skogskyrkogården in Enskede, Stockholm.

The Coat of Arms of the family of Stålhandske (Steel Glove)