The Dragoons of Lapland

On the 3rd May 1918 Reginald James Elsey (who would become the husband of my great aunt in law) was serving on board HMS Cochrane as an Ordinary Signalman

Reginald James Elsey was born on the 8th May 1898 in Reigate, Surrey. He was the son of James and Charlotte Elsey (nee Buck). He had an older sister Winifred (born in 1896, also in Reigate). In 1901 the family were living in Burstow, Surrey.

Reginald had joined the Royal Navy as a boy on the 11th May 1915 and transferred to HMS Cochrane as a Signal Boy on the 17th January 1916 and then aged 18 became an Ordinary Signalman on board HMS Cochrane on the 8th May 1916 signing up for 12 years duty.

HMS Cochrane

Prior to joining the Navy Reginald worked as a Garden Boy and Poultry Feeder. He was five foot 4 ½ inches tall with brown eyes and a dark complexion. He had a scar on his forehead and upper lip.

HMS Cochrane and the rest of the 2nd cruiser squadron, were assigned to the Grand Fleet for most of the First World War. She took part in the Battle of Jutland on 31 May–1 June 1916, along with the cruisers Minotaur, Shannon and Hampshire under the command of Rear-Admiral Heath. However, the ship remained unengaged throughout the battle, and did not fire her guns at all during the engagement.

In November 1917 HMS Cochrane was transferred to the North America and West Indies station, but in early 1918 re-joined the 2nd Cruiser Squadron. HMS Cochrane was then sent to Russia as part of the allied intervention in the Russian Civil War arriving in Murmansk on the 7th March 1918 and the following day at 12 noon she fired a 21 Gun salute to the Russian Flag.

On the 3rd May 1918 HMS Cochrane, with Reginald Elsey on board, transported Soviet troops to Pechenga (also known as Petsamo in Finnish), on the border of Russia and Finland, to forestall an attempt by White Finns to seize the town during the Finnish Civil War.

The Finnish Civil War was a conflict for the control and leadership of Finland during the country's transition from a Grand Duchy of the Russian Empire to an independent state. The civil war was fought between the Reds, led by a section of the Social Democratic Party, and the Whites, conducted by the conservative based Senate. The paramilitary Red Guards were composed of industrial and agrarian workers, controlled the cities and industrial centres of southern Finland, whilst the paramilitary white Guards, composed of farmers, along with middle-class and upper-class social strata, controlled rural central and northern Finland.

World War I led to the collapse of the Russian Empire, which in turn had caused a power vacuum in Finland, and a subsequent struggle for dominance leading to militarisation and escalating crisis between the left-leaning labour movement and the conservatives. The Reds carried out an unsuccessful general offensive in February 1918, supplied with weapons by Soviet Russia. A counteroffensive by the Whites began in March, reinforced by German troops in April.

In May two battalions of white Finnish civilian volunteers, about 200 armed men, led by two doctors, the so called “Dragoons of Lapland” arrived in Petsamo

The British considered these Finnish expeditions as a threat, since they were worried that the Germans might arrive in the area after them and take it over for their own purposes.
So, on the 3rd of May HMS Cochrane brought troops to Petsamo (100 men of naval infantry, 40 sailors and 40 Russian Reds lead by Captain Brown). The Finnish Expeditions fought against them for three days and on the 6th of May HMS Cochrane brought further reinforcements (35 soldiers and five Lewis-machine guns plus sailors also landed 12-pound gun as additional support).

On the 10th of May the British captured Petsamo and succeeded repelling Finnish counter-attacks. After this the British replaced their troops with 200 Serb soldiers. The Finnish expeditions headed back to Finland. Finland and Britain exchanged diplomatic notes and Britain informed Finland that it didn't have anything against Finnish demands concerning Petsamo.

Reginald Elsey’s service record notes – “For service in Land Operations”, but does not specify if he took part in this engagement.

Following victory in the decisive engagements by the Whites and German forces, the Finnish Civil War ended officially on the 15th of May. Around 12,500 Red POW’s died of malnutrition and disease in camps and about 39,000 people, of whom 36,000 were Finns, perished in the conflict.

In the aftermath, the Finns passed from Russian governance to the German sphere of influence with a plan to establish a German-led Finnish monarchy. In the end this did not materialise due to the defeat of Germany in the Great War. Finland instead emerged as an independent, democratic republic, however The Civil War continued to divide the nation for decades.