Introduction 11

Chapter 1

The making of an “officer-diplomat” (1895–1930)

August Torma was born in 1895, at the end of an interesting period in Estonian history. After a few decades of national awakening the Estonians had been able to identify themselves as a nation in the territory that had for centuries been ruled by Germans on behalf of a succession of foreign rulers, culminating with the Russian . Curiously, a substantial number of German intellectuals chose to be involved in their national quest for identity. The second half of the 19th century was a vibrant, positive period when new books and papers were printed, aspirant writers and poets emerged and a national song festival was held. Politi- cal thinking also developed. After the abolition of serfdom the newly freed peasants started sending petitions to the tsar to obtain further rights. Land was the key issue. The country was functioning in a trilingual mode, with German, Russian and Estonian widely spoken, if not by everybody at the same time and same place. Many Lutheran believers adopted Orthodoxy in the hope of obtaining land and Russification had become a factor, although not oppressively so. How- ever, just before Torma’s birth began to strengthen its hold on its prov- inces. In 1885 a double appointment to this end was made: Count Sergey Shakhovskoy was to take charge of in the north and Gen Mikhail Zinovyev of Livonia in the south, the two areas covering more than today’s Estonia and spilling over into Latvia. Shakhovskoy left a highly visible land- mark – the pretty onion-domed Nevsky Cathedral right in the heart of , built in 1900 with donations he had secured from all over Russia. Significant changes affected schools during this period of Russification: all subjects except religious education were to be taught in Russian. Torma’s father, Jaan, who had been teaching schoolchildren until then, took the unusual step of abandoning his profession. He did odd jobs until he met and married a pretty but strict governess, Marie-Elvine Grünberg. She had been working for the baron of Voltveti (also known as Tignitz; today’s Tihemetsa), had travelled to foreign parts with the baron’s children and spoke several languages. The baron must have rated her highly because on marriage he gave her a house on his land, three horses and four cows plus stacks of bedlinen, as the young couple were going to run a government guest house, later known as Kärsu inn. An innkeeper’s job was, incidentally, highly respected and seen as progression on the social scale. Despite his German-sounding surname, Jaan Schmidt was Estonian and the young couple spoke Estonian at home. It was quite common for Estonians to 12 Tina Tamman have German names that had been “donated” to them by the local landowning Baltic barons. August’s grandfather had been a blacksmith on the estate – hence the name “Schmidt”, not uncommon in Estonia. It was much later that President Päts persuaded the nation to replace German-sounding names with Estonian equivalents and August opted for “Torma”. August Johannes was the couple’s first child, born on 19 February 1895, and Wilhelmine von Stryk from the manor house witnessed the baptism. Subse- quently three girls were born. The youngest, Marie, died in childhood. Linda, the eldest, was bright, but rebellious. She married early and produced three children, defying her father’s plans for further education. In 1944, when the second Soviet occupation loomed and thousands of Estonians fled the country, Linda’s family was split. One of her daughters stayed behind in Estonia while Linda, her husband, a daughter and a son fled to ; some of them subse- quently moved to Canada. The offspring in the West later featured in Torma’s will, unlike his younger sister, Anna, who also stayed behind in Estonia, sur- vived the rigours of Soviet rule unmarried and childless, looking after Linda’s grandchildren, who did not benefit from the will either. Anna fed the grandchildren endless stories describing Uncle August as orderly and methodical, academically brilliant and altogether first-rate in every way. Schoolbooks were produced to prove the point – they were spotless and August’s handwriting was always neat and tidy. The grandchildren resented this, while very much aware of a mysterious aura that surrounded him and the Iron Curtain. When in the 1950s he was, despite Soviet jamming, heard speak- ing on the Voice of America, the great-niece, a small child at the time, thought the winking green light on the radio set was the curtain she had heard people talking about, behind which her great-uncle was living. August attended a local primary school where Russification had less of an impact on education, then moved to nearby Pärnu, a sizeable seaside town, where he joined a gymnasium for boys. This was a big change for the 11-year- old who had not lived away from home before. He was lucky to have relatives in Pärnu with whom he could stay. Uncle Theodor and his daughter Fanny formed an important link for the family also in later, Cold War years when direct com- munication with Estonia was difficult, with the KGB checking all correspond- ence. August in London would address his letters to Theodor living in West Germany, who communicated the news to Fanny in East Germany, who in turn would write to August’s sister Anna in Estonia.1 The gymnasium was a reputable one – a large brick building in central Pärnu. It produced a crop of early Estonian statesmen (Konstantin Päts, Jüri Vilms, , Friedrich Akel, Heinrich Laretei), as well as well-known lawyers and musicians. In Torma’s time the school was highly international: there were Latvians, Lithuanians, Poles, Russians, Germans and Estonians