Weapons of World War II

The exhibition provides an overview of the weapons and engineering equipment used in the battles of 1944. The items originate from the private collections of Aku Sorainen, Kristjan Bachman and Leo Tammiksaar. The overview of the battles in 1944 in Estonia was written by Peeter Kaasik.

The exhibition includes about 200 items from Aku Sorainen’s collection, including 60 weapons. Kristjan Bachman, whose artistic name is Bach Babach, is displaying over 400 pieces of pioneer equipment, including nearly fifty mines and grenades. In addition, the exhibition features rare flags that have never been exhibited together before: the flag of the 354th Rifle Regiment of the Estonian Rifle Corps from Sorainen and the flag of the 1st Grenadier Regiment of the Estonian SS Legion from Leo Tammiksaar’s collection. Uniforms that could be seen worn by the warring parties in Estonia in 1944 are also exhibited. The trench art items of the Estonian Rifle Corps men come from the collections of Dmitri Tikhonov and Aleksandr Yarovoi.

Aku Sorainen, one of the curators of the exhibition, said that the exhibition is intended to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the heavy battles on Estonian soil in 1944. “To our knowledge, never before have so many Soviet and German weapons used in 1944 been on display at one exhibition,” he said, adding: “There are also real rarities here, such as sniper rifles, the MP-35 submachine gun, similar to which were distributed to members of the Erna reconnaissance group, and the German “Sturmpistole” grenade launcher.”

The exhibition of World War II weapons complements the new permanent World War II exhibition opened on the first floor of the War Museum, which provides an overview of Estonia and Estonians in World War II.