The twelfth man A true story Th original Old Norwegian fairytale Askeladden There is alway something true in every story
The 12th man tells the story of Jan Baalsrud's legendary escape from the Nazis during World War II. Twelve resistance men went on board a fishing vessel in Shetland and crossed the North Sea to fight the Germans. Betrayed by a Norwegian Nazi eleven of the crew caught and killed. Only the twelfth man, Jan Baalsrud, managed to get away. Jan Baalsrud was born in Kristiania (now Oslo), and moved to Kolbotn in the early 1930s, where he lived until the 1950s. He graduated as an instrument-maker in 1939. World War II[edit] During the German invasion of Norway in 1940, he fought in Vestfold. He later escaped to Sweden, but he was convicted of espionage and expelled from the country. He eventually arrived in Britain in 1941, after having travelled through the Soviet Union, Africa and the US, where he joined the Norwegian Company Linge. In early 1943, he, three other commandos and the boat crew of eight, all Norwegians, embarked on a mission to destroy a German air control tower at Bardufoss, and recruit for the Norwegian resistance movement. This mission was compromised when he and his fellow soldiers, seeking a trusted resistance contact, accidentally made contact with an unaligned civilian shopkeeper of the same name as their contact who betrayed them to the Germans. The morning after their blunder, on March 29, their fishing boat Brattholm – containing 8 tons of explosives intended to destroy the air control tower – was attacked by a German vessel. The Norwegians scuttled their boat by detonating the 8 tons of explosive using a time delay fuse, and fled in a small boat; however the small boat was promptly sunk by the Germans. Jan and others swam ashore in ice cold Arctic waters. Jan was the only commando to evade capture and, soaking wet and missing one sea boot, he escaped up into a snow gully, where he shot and killed a German Gestapo officer with his pistol. He evaded capture for approximately two months, suffering from frostbite and snow blindness. His deteriorating physical condition forced him to rely on the assistance of Norwegian patriots. It was during this time in a wooden hut at Revdal, which he called Hotel Savoy, that Jan was forced to operate his legs with a pocket knife. He believed that he had blood poisoning and that drawing the blood out would help. Not long after that Jan was left close to death on a high plateau on a stretcher in the snow for 27 days due to weather and German patrols in the town of Manndalen, Kåfjord. It was during this time while he lay behind a snow wall built round a rock to shelter him that Jan amputated nine of his toes to stop the spread of gangrene, an action which saved his feet. Fellow Norwegians transported Jan by stretcher towards the border with Finland. Then he was put in the care of some Sami (the native people of northern Fenno-Scandinavia) who with reindeer pulled him on a sled across Finland and into neutral Sweden. From Saarikoski in northern Sweden he was collected by a seaplane of the Red Cross and flown to Boden. He spent seven months in a Swedish hospital in Boden before he was flown back to Britain in a de Havilland Mosquito aircraft of the RAF. He soon went to Scotland to help train other Norwegian patriots who were going back to Norway to continue the fight against the Germans. After a long struggle to learn to walk properly again without his toes, he eventually got his own way, and was sent to Norway as an agent, where he was still on active service at the time of the war's end in 1945. The end of the war signalled the end of German occupation - and he was able to travel to Oslo and re-unite with his family, whom he had left 5 years before. (Source:- 'We Die Alone' by David Howarth, written in 1955 ISBN 978-1-84767-845-4). He was appointed honorary Member of the Order of the British Empire by the British.[1] From Norway, he received the St. Olav's medal with Oak Branch. He was a Second Lieutenant (Fenrik). Later years and death[edit] After the war Baalsrud contributed to the local scout and football associations, as well as the Norwegian Disabled Veterans Union of which he was chairman from 1957 to 1964. In 1962 he moved to Tenerife, Spain where he lived for the most of the remainder of his life. He returned to Norway during his final years, and lived there until his death on 30 December 1988, aged 71. His ashes are buried in Manndalen in a grave shared with Aslak Aslaksen Fossvoll (1900–1943), one of the local men who helped him escape to Sweden. An annual remembrance march in his honour takes place in Troms on July 25 where the participants follow his escape route for nine days. A meadow in Oppegård is named Baalsrud plass in his honour.
Documentary ... Denmark on the prairie - Elk Horn, Iowa : The Price brothers Special: Jul (Christmas) in Elk Horn ... Adam Price is a Danish DR1 TV screenwriter ... In Denmark he is well-known both as a famous TV cook and a restaurant owner and screen writer doing the.TV series Borgen, Taxi and the brand new Danish Christian TV series Herrens Veje (The Way of the Lord): Jul (Christmas) in Elk Horn, part 1 : Part 2 :
Is that a series about Christians or a Christian series? Because the later I find a bit odd in such a secular country like Denmark
Herrens veje (Ride upon the storm) explained : Though less than 20% of the Danes believe in the kind of God you find in ancient dusty books like the Bible or Quran, Denmark is actually not a "secular" country as such ....section 4 of the Constitution of Denmark confirms that the Evangelical Lutheran 'Church of Denmark' ('Den Danske Folkekirke' or just 'Folkekirken', literally: "the Danish People's Church" or more correctly "the Folk Church"),is the "established" State church and Christainty is the State religion. Our present Danish culture is build on Christianity ...Obviously it's in our flag, which is the oldest national flag of the World ... our constitution of 1849 was compiled by the Christian bishop Ditlev Gothard Monrad, and all our key values are build on Christianity and Christian philosophers like Grundtvig (creater of the folk high school) and Søren Kierkegaard ( considered to be the Worlds first existentialist philosopher) and his Christian existentialism, where a person must make independent choices taking personal responisbility for his actions, which then constitute his existence. .. There is also very little support for the separation of church and state in Denmark even today, so Danes are actually not an atheist country, though most of us pretend that we are not religious, while still living by the basic Christian ethics, rules and laws,. I'll quote the liberal Jewish journalist and writer Herbert Pundik, who was born in Denmark, saved from the nazis during the war and subsequently immigrated to Israel, who once wrote : "The Danes are a chosen people. They just do not know, and this is their luck." The point being, that unlike most Jews, Muslims and perhaps some American Christians, Danes do not believe they are chosen by God, but in principle they, perhaps even unintentionally, try to do by heart what Jesus said in the Gospel. .. unlike in the USA where different churces have different view points and political agenda, the 'Danish Folk Church' is non-political and embrace all who believe in Jesus, no matter their personal weaknesses and struggle with sinfulness ... it's all considered to be a matter between the individual and God only .... it's this personal struggle the TV series is proably really about ...
Perhaps I should add the official trailer for the TV series ... no English subs as of yet though ... the lead role is played by Mads Mikkelsens older brother, Lars Mikkelsen :
Thanks. I saw him in a few Danish films. I can't recall whether it was that WW2 film with Pilou Asbaek or another. I def recall him from this Euro series where he was a cop on a case with a Belgian and German officer. Oh and of course he was on House of Cards for a season or two. Real good actor.
The Danish DR1 elite girls choir perform in honor of the crew of the full-rigged Maritime Training and Education ship 'Danmark', returning from one of it's long training voyages abroad :
New Danish film (in English) starring Ben Kingsley opened last night, Backstabbing for Beginners (Dobbeltspil) inspired and based on the memoirs of the aspiring Danish diplomat Michael Soussan who, at the age of 24, lands his dream job as a program coordinator for the UN.’s Oil for Food program but then suddenly find himself thrown into a post-war Iraq, where government agents are fighting for the country’s oil reserves... It's written and directet by Per Fly manily known for his highly acclaimed trilogy about the lower, middle and upper class in Denmark, The Bench (Bænken, 2000) about hitting rock bottom, Inheritance (Arven, 2003) about the Danish upper class and the last film of the trilogy, Manslaughter (Drabet, 2005) ... but here is the trailer for Backstabbing for Beginners : Michael Soussan's 'Backstabbing for Beginners: My Crash Course in International Diplomacy' book trailer :
If you did not get to watch the Danish 1864 TV series, then here is the final (and honestly brutal) battle scene showing what real war is all about ...it was also the most advanced battle using the most advanced weapons the World had seen at that point in time :
That was one heck of a ride, Ceres. And it must have been a pain to have to use a ramrod in the midst of a bloodbath...
Danish highly left-wing but no nonsense political comedian Jonatan Spang trying to give a helping hand to the Swedes by poking fun at Swedish political correctness, censorship, immigration problems and feminism gone wild in the 'Tæt på sandheden' (Close to the truth) comedy show aired by usually non-bias but still quite left-wing prime-time Danish National TV DR1 (comparable to the English BBC)... Part 1 : Part 2 : Part 3 :
The finals at the Eurovision Song Contest 2018 is getting close ... the Nordic contributions are as follows . Iceland (our choice) : Finland (Monsters) : Norway (That's How You Write A Song) : Sweden (Dance you off) : Denmark (Higher ground) :
Just to clarify... then Jonatan Spang is poking fun at both left and right-wing politics and politicians in Denmark and also both the left and right-wing comments he recieved due to the comedy he made about Swedish politics ... so actually he is rather balanced, but obviously not in favor of political correctness in any shape or form ...
why exactly is Denmark more prone to center or far right thoughts whereas Sweden tends to be more of a bastion of the left wing? Even if it's simply the news media being of a left wing orient, there seems to be an ideological difference accelerated in recent decades between the 2.
There are far more neo-nazis, islamists and far right-wing Trump supporters in Sweden in compare with Denmark ... and I'm pretty sure the Swedish nationalist party Sweden Democrats (SD) will grow to become the 2nd largest party in Sweden at the next election even though they have no say in the parliament or media. So it's not really about more or less far-right thoughts. The big difference is how political correctness and censorship seem to prevent an open free debate culture in Sweden, while even a highly left wing Danish comedian like Jonatan Spang has no problem poking fun at both right and left wing issues on Danish prime-time TV, which you would not be able to do openly in Sweden ... I mean, womens rights are highly up for debate in Sweden, but only when we are talking about native Swedes. As soon as you mention the lack of womens rights in sharia law and in the ghettos, the debate is shut down and censored due to political correctness, which is what Jonatan Spang is poking fun at, by bringing up the case of the sharia-like ruling in a Swedish court, which really should be unthinkable in any European country, no matter if they use lay judges or not: https://www.thelocal.se/20180305/controversial-assault-ruling-sparks-debate-in-sweden-thelocal I'm sure Spang find all lack of womens rights to be a far-right issue no matter who are opressing the women in question... The point being that if you are not able to bring up any kind of problem for an open debate, but try to hide the problem, then it will just grow bigger and bigger and become an unreal absurdity ...
Btw ... regarding Swedish censorship, the selected Danish entry for the Eurovision Song Contest 2018, Higher ground posted above, is actually composed and written by Swedes as a possible entry for the Swedish contribution, but it was rejected by the entry jury to even participate in the Swedish competition, not doubt because it's not considered politically correct to promote this kind of native Viking heritage and culture ... so instead it was picked up by a Danish stage actor, who is not really a singer by trade ... and so it won in Denmark, where there is no censorship.,.. Sweden have now also started to destroy their own ancient artifacts sending loads of items for metal recycling : http://www.ancientworldreview.com/2017/08/sweden-destroying-archaeological-finds.html
Btw, that Sweden destroy and recycle their own artifacts is well known, It was first made public by the Swedish archaeologist Johan Runer who works at Stockholm County Museum. https://imgur.com/gallery/vxv1m But it also came to light in the Danish media after Swedish and Danish archaeologists had been working together and the Swedes had asked how much of our Danish artifacts were send for metal recycling, and obviously the Danish archaeologists were horrified because it would be unthinkable to deliberately destroy and recycle artifacts like that..
The highly talented Swedish producer and DJ Tim 'Avicii' Bergling has unfortunately just died at the age of only 28 ... Avicii - Hey Brother : Avicii - Wake me up :
Danish Netflix series 'The Rain' will be on Netflix from April 28th : English trailer : Danish trailer .