Code Name Apple
By
UCSBdad
Disclaimer: My code name is I Don't Own Castle. Rating: K Time: The year 1919, mostly.
The USS Thomas Ford left Stockholm before dawn, headed for Estonia. When Kate came onto the bridge the crew was shocked to see she was wearing heavy boots, trousers, a bulky sweater and a knitted watch cap. No one said a thing when Captain Castle glared at one and all.
They eventually found Admiral Cowan's small fleet. The two cruisers were sailing in a racetrack pattern firing their six-inch guns at the enemy ashore. The destroyers were much closer to shore, firing their guns as well.
Admiral Cowan radioed Castle.
"Have you come to join in the fun?"
"No," he replied, "I'm just here to observe."
"We can't see a bloody thing from here." Kate said. "We'll have to go ashore. Where can we land?"
Castle sighed. He should have known something like this would happen.
"About five miles behind you there's a large white painted house just off the beach. That's the headquarters of General Johan Laidoner. I'd be very careful taking your ship in. The Russians and the Germans have laid minefields through this whole area, and we've not swept or charted all of them."
Castle decided to leave the Thomas Ford out to sea and take a small boat to shore once his ship had sailed the five miles to the white house.
Rick and Kate got into the boat and headed for shore. The sea was calm, but there was an occasional barrage of artillery that hit both the sea and the shore.
Once ashore, they were stopped by a patrol of half a dozen men dressed in German Army uniforms. Kate spoke with them.
"These are Finnish volunteers fighting against the Bolsheviks and for the Estonians."
"Why are they wearing German uniforms?" Castle wanted to know.
"During the war some fifteen hundred Finns left Finland and offered their services to the Gernans to free Finland from Russian control. When the Finnish Civil War began back in late 1918, the Germans sent them back to Finland. Now that the Reds have been driven out of Finland, some have come here to fight."
While the patrol led them to General Laidoner's headquarters, Kate gave Rick some background on Laidoner.
"He was born here in Estonia back when it was part of Russia. He was from a poor family and joined the Imperial Russian Army as a private. But, he was sent to officer's school and fought as an officer during the Great War. Eventually, he returned to Estonia and was given command of their army."
Castle quickly found that the general's headquarters wasn't at the white house since it was too good a target for artillery, but in a bunker some hundreds of yards away. The bunker was cramped, dirty, and smelled of stale cigarette smoke and unwashed bodies.
Laidoner greeted them both, but he spoke no English. He discussed the situation with Kate who brought Rick up to speed as best she could. As far as Rick could tell, the Estonians were on one side and the Russians on the other.
Kate turned to Rick and smiled.
"Good news. General Laidoner is going to let us visit the frontlines."
"Oh." Castle said, trying to sound pleased.
Then Laidoner and several other officers began examining Rick and talking to Kate.
"You'll need to change. Your white hat will be a dead giveaway to a sniper and your blue uniform makes you stand out as well. And you need boots, not shoes."
Castle took off his overcoat, his jacket and his shoes. He was given a pair of boots that were too large, but two pairs of thick woolen socks fixed that. He was given a long, dark brown coat and woven ammunition pouches. Finally, he was handed a German steel helmet. It was painted dark grey and had black skull and crossbones on the front.
Laidoner handed him a rifle.
"General Laidoner says he wishes he could give their American friends an American rifle, but they don't have any. You'll be getting a British Short Magazine Lee Enfield rifle. About half of the Estonians here are equipped with British arms and equipment. The rest have old Russian uniforms and Mosin-Nagant rifles. The Finns were equipped by the Germans and carry the Mauser 98K rifle. You do know how to shoot, don't you?" Kate asked.
"I've qualified." Castle didn't bother to mention that small arms excellence was not usually required for s ship's captain.
They headed off to the front, led by a shabbily dressed officer and two tough looking Estonians. They went through zig zag trenches walking on duckboards that only covered some of the ground. Rick was glad be had boots on. In his shoes, his feet would have been soaked in icy water.
The Estonians stropped them at another trench.
"This is the main defensive line." Kate said. "Ahead of us about five hundred yards, or about halfway to the Bolshevik lines, is the outpost line. They've said they can hear the Russians moving up. We can expect an attack at any time. Here. This is a trench periscope. You can study the enemy lines without taking a chance that you'll get your head blown off."
Looking through the periscope Castle could see a lot of mud, smashed and abandoned equipment of all sorts, barbed wire and dead bodies. The dead all seemed to have red rags tied around their arms which he assumed meant they were Reds.
Kate took a turn at the periscope.
"I think something's about to happen." She said.
No sooner had she spoken than dozens of red flares were shot in the air. Then hundreds of Russians dashed out of their trenches and through their own barbed wire, all shouting OORAH!
At the same time, someone began screaming and pounding on an empty artillery shell casing. Estonian troops dashed out of dugouts and bunkers, carrying rifles, machine guns and trench mortars. They began firing into the advancing Russians.
"We should shoot too." Kate yelled over the din on the gunfire. "The Reds won't pay much attention to the fact that I'm a woman or that you're a neutral American if they take the trench."
Castle didn't know if he'd ever killed anyone. During the war, a German U boat had shot to the surface not far from him after being depth charged. His destroyer had managed to fire one round which hit the conning tower of the U boat. The U boat disappeared under the waves again. He never knew if he'd sunk the ship or if it had just crash dived.
He pulled the rifle into his shoulder and took aim. He pulled the trigger, but nothing happened. He pulled the bolt back and found that there hadn't been a round in the chamber. He seated a round and aimed. This time the rifle fired, but he had no idea if he'd hit anyone.
He kept firing until Kate grabbed his arm.
"They've gone. You can stop shooting. Have you ever done this before?"
"Never."
"It can be hard."
There was one wounded Russian just outside the barbed wire. Perhaps thirty yards from them. Castle noticed that he seemed to be a sailor, with a blue jumper, a striped undershirt and a naval cap. One of the Estonians shot him.
"What are sailors doing on land?" Castle asked, noticing that there were other dead sailors out there.
"Russian soldiers are traditionally gotten from the peasantry. They's illiterate and are unfamiliar with machinery. If a machine gun breaks down, it'll take them forever to repair it, if they ever do. Sailors are recruited from the better educated parts of the population and a lot of them are factory workers. Used to working with machinery and repairing it. They're more likely to fervently support the Bolsheviks. They've become the hard core of the Red troops."
"What happens to the Reds fleet if their sailors are on land?"
Kate laughed.
"Right now, it's iced in at Kronstadt. The ice has it frozen solid. The question is, what will happen to their Baltic Fleet when the ice thaws in the spring?"
The Estonian officer said something to Kate.
"We should go now. After the losses the Reds took today, nothing else is going to happen."
Castle was glad to leave the front lines. A trench was no place for a destroyer captain.
Once back at Laidoner's headquarters, Castle gladly put on his Navy uniform and left his boots, brown coat, web gear and helmet on a table.
"You need to take your infantry gear." Kate said. "There's going to be an amphibious landing tomorrow. Laidoner has said we can go along."
Castle sighed. No one had ever said wars were easy.
Once back on the Thomas Ford, Castle and Beckett had dinner in his quarters.
"You said there's an amphibious landing tomorrow?"
"Yes. The Royal Navy captured two Red destroyers and gave them to the Estonians."
"What are the destroyers like?" Castle was curious. This was more in his line of work.
"One was called the Spartak, now named Vambola. It's about fourteen hundred tons full load, a speed of 32 knots, and is armed with four 4-inch guns, an anti-aircraft gun and 9 eighteen-inch torpedo tubes, plus up to fifty mines. The Red Avtroil, now the Estonian Lennuk is bigger. Almost 1800 tons, she can do 30 knots and is armed with five 4-inch guns, two 20mm anti-aircraft guns and nine 18-inch torpedo tubes.
"They sound like good ships. But how good are the Estonian crews?"
"We'll find out." Was all Kate had to say.
They found out the next day when they boarded the Estonian flagship, the Lennuk.
Surprisingly, the Estonian admiral, Johan Pitka, spoke English.
"Good to meet you, Captain Castle. And, yes, I do speak English. I lived there for seven years, and I've been a sailor all of my life. There are so many English ships and ports in the world, that one must know English."
Castle looked over the small Estonian fleet gathered there and at the Royal Navy ships standing by. While there were a few soldiers on the two destroyers, most were in small coasting vessels and towed barges.
"The assault force is a bit under two thousand strong." Kate said. "Most are Finns with a few Estonians and the occasional White Russian and even Baltic German. Shall we go ashore?"
Once again, Castle climbed into his combat hear and went ashore in a boat from the destroyer.
The landing was well under way by the time they got to shore. Kate found the commander, a Colonel Martin Ekstrom, a Swede who had taken part in the Finnish Civil War and now was commanding Finnish troops fighting for Estonia.
As far as Castle could tell the landing was going well. Troops were moving off the beach rapidly and he could see light artillery pieces being dragged ashore by hand. There didn't seem to be any shooting at the beachhead, but he could hear rifle and occasional machinegun fire further inland.
Kate came back after talking to some of the officers.
"They've cut the main supply line for the Red's 6th Rifle Division. They can't retreat now and if they stay where they are, they'll run out of supplies."
"Will we be going inland?" Rick asked.
"No. I don't like or trust Ekstrom. He's a well-trained officer and his troops are all well-armed and well led veterans. But Ekstrom is supposed to have massacred prisoners during the Finnish Civil War. If he does the same thing here, I don't want us to be around."
Castle was quite happy to find himself back aboard the Thomas Ford and wearing Navy blue once more.
"Sir, we have a message for Miss Beckett from Admiral Cowan. It's encoded, so she'll have to decode it." Ensign Nagursky said, handing a slip of paper to Kate.
"This is a simple code. I can decode it with no trouble." She saw Castle start to move away to give her some privacy. "No need for you to go. We're partners, remember?"
TBC