Aksel Jacobsen Bogdanoff

Aksel Jacobsen Bogdanoff (1922-1971), from Lille Ekkerøy, is noteworthy for two reasons. He was one of those Norwegians who fought as Soviet-controlled partisans in eastern Finnmark in World War II^{[1][2][3][4][5]} and, in 1953, he was one of two brothers who encountered and shot the last polar bear seen in Finnmark, at Lille Ekkerøy.^[6][7]

Part of the last generation to live on Lille Ekkeroy

Aksel Jacobsen Bogdanoff was one of eleven children born to Signe Victoria Bogdanoff (1892-1963), née Dahl, from Tromsø, and Jacob Wilhelm Bogdanoff (1878-1940), whose father came from Russia. The other children included: Alfred; Francis; Olaf (1917-2002); Karl; Frits; Ingvar (1920-1995), also known as Ingvald; Daniel; and Agnes. The children, three of whom died at an early age, were the last generation who lived on Lille Ekkerøy. They were evacuated during the war, moved to Krampenes, but returned and lived there until about 1953, when they moved back to Krampenes. As part of their subsistence tactics, they collected driftwood on the beach and picked cloudberries in the fields. Aksel married Anne Lise and, before their divorce, had a son called Arvid.^[8][9][10]

Partisan service

After training as a radio operator in the Soviet Union, Bogdanoff, in April 1944, parachuted alone onto Kvaløya island and set up a radio bearing on the Torskefjord height between large stones. In connection with the Porsa action, he was captured and tortured by a German search party on 9 June 1944. He revealed nothing but he is supposed to have made some deal which the Germans honoured,^[11] resulting in his survival.

Polar bear

In 1953, when Aksel Bogdanoff and Ingvald Bogdanoff were out inspecting their salmon nets in the Lille Ekkeroy area, they encountered a polar bear which is believed to have come on an ice-floe from Svalbard.^[12][13] They shot and killed the bear. This is the last time that a polar bear was seen in Finnmark.^[14][15]

References

1. Kåre Wahl, Partisanene Sibblund og Søderstrøm, 2002
2. Partisanen und Spione in Nord-Norwegen
3. Kjell Fjørtoft, Lille Moskva – den glemte krigen (Little Moscow - the forgotten war), ISBN 8205147256, 1983. A book about the partisans in Finnmark and their fate during and after the war which led to a documentary film of the same name that won awards at film festivals in Moscow and Krakow. Bogdanoff is among the list of partisans which starts on p. 202.
4. Birger Bakken, Reidar T. Larsen, Arne Jørgensen og Åge Fjeld, Død over de tyske okkupanter - de norske kommunisters motstandskamp 1940-1945 (Death to the German occupiers! : The Norwegian Communist resistance 1940-1945), ISBN 8299485908, Oslo 1998
5. Troms og Finnmark, an excerpt from Død over de tyske okkupanter - de norske kommunisters motstandskamp 1940-1945
6. Oddbjørn Gundersen, 53 år siden sist (53 years ago), Finnmarken, 19 May 2006
7. All Public Member Photos & Scanned Documents results for Bogdinoff on Ancestry.com.au
8. Private communication from Monica Milch Gebhardt, a collections consultant and project manager in the museum in Vadsø, August 2012.
9. All Public Member Photos & Scanned Documents results for Bogdinoff on Ancestry.com.au
10. All Public Member Photos & Scanned Documents results for Grunnett on Ancestry.com.au
11. Partisanen und Spione in Nord-Norwegen
12. Oddbjørn Gundersen, 53 år siden sist (53 years ago), Finnmarken, 19 May 2006
13. All Public Member Photos & Scanned Documents results for Bogdinoff on Ancestry.com.au
14. Oddbjørn Gundersen, 53 år siden sist (53 years ago), Finnmarken, 19 May 2006
15. Robert Greiner, Fryktet det var isbjørn, Nordlys,19 May 2006