Tallinn Trip – Soviet Statue Graveyard (Memorial to Lembit Pärn)

This memorial commemorates the life of Lembit Pärn (1903-1974) and it’s unusual in this little series of posts to have someone that actually wasn’t executed by the Soviets and then forgiven a couple of decades later. Pärn was born in Suure-Kõpu Parish in Estonia and he began his military career in the Estonian Army in 1926. He furthered his training at the Military Academy in Tallinn and held various officer positions. When the Second World War erupted and the Soviet Union occupied Estonia, Pärn was drafted into the Red Army. He rather liked this arrangement and he steadily climbed the ranks and was ultimately appointed commander of the 8th Estonian Rifle Corps in 1942. This corps, largely made up of Estonian conscripts, participated in crucial battles on the Eastern Front, including the Battle of Narva.

At the end of the Second World War (and above is a photo of him in Tallinn on 16 June 1945) Pärn remained in the Soviet Army, holding several high-ranking positions, such as serving as the Estonian SSR’s People’s Commissar of Defence in 1945. He was also instrumental in establishing Estonian military units within the Soviet military structure and trying to resist any attempts of the country becoming independent.

This bronze and granite memorial was unveiled on 5 May 1985 in Tallinn, designed by Arseni Mölder, and it lingered for longer than many others in this museum collection as it was only removed on 29 May 2001 on the orders of the Tallinn City Government. He was probably a brilliant military commander (and he did well not to be executed in the Great Purge) and is buried in Novodevichy Cemetery, the same location that Boris Yeltsin was interred.