10-22-2002, 08:40 AM
12th Naval Infantry Brigade
This Northern Fleet units was the only naval infantry brigade that formed and fought in the Arctic. It was formed on 10 September 1941 at Arkhangelsk. It began life with three consecutively numbered rifle battalions. Before the end of the month it was transferred via 6 naval transports, 2 patrol boats and 3 trawlers to Kandalaksha at the front. In early October two more rifle battalions were added and its total strength was 5822 men.
I spent most of the war manning the defensive lines on the Ryabachiy Peninsula in the extreme north of the Kola Peninsula where its main mission was to defend Murmansk from possible overland invasion by German forces in northern Norway. It also conducted light amphibious raids into the German rear at strengths ranging from platoon up to complete brigade.
On 21 April 1942, the brigade made an amphibious landing near Pikushev on the Arctic Coast with 6065 men.
It is likely that your guy got the award for just such a raid. For many more details you MUST get the US Army’s Leavenworth Papers study from the 1980s entitled The Petsamo-Kirkenes Operation. I have it in storage in Canada but not with me. It is a few hundred pages devoted to this area.
There is also a memoir of a guy who served, I think in this unit, named Leonov and called Blood on the Shores. It is a paperback book.
Shawn
This Northern Fleet units was the only naval infantry brigade that formed and fought in the Arctic. It was formed on 10 September 1941 at Arkhangelsk. It began life with three consecutively numbered rifle battalions. Before the end of the month it was transferred via 6 naval transports, 2 patrol boats and 3 trawlers to Kandalaksha at the front. In early October two more rifle battalions were added and its total strength was 5822 men.
I spent most of the war manning the defensive lines on the Ryabachiy Peninsula in the extreme north of the Kola Peninsula where its main mission was to defend Murmansk from possible overland invasion by German forces in northern Norway. It also conducted light amphibious raids into the German rear at strengths ranging from platoon up to complete brigade.
On 21 April 1942, the brigade made an amphibious landing near Pikushev on the Arctic Coast with 6065 men.
It is likely that your guy got the award for just such a raid. For many more details you MUST get the US Army’s Leavenworth Papers study from the 1980s entitled The Petsamo-Kirkenes Operation. I have it in storage in Canada but not with me. It is a few hundred pages devoted to this area.
There is also a memoir of a guy who served, I think in this unit, named Leonov and called Blood on the Shores. It is a paperback book.
Shawn
