SOPHOMORE RETURNS FROM YEAR IN FINLAND, FRANCE

After ten months fighting with the Finish army and the French Foreign Legion and serving the Czech, Norwegian, and French civil governments, this year may well seem a bit tame for John Crane-Baker '43.

Caught in France last fall when the war began, Crane-Baker, who would have been a Sophomore had he returned to college then, began immediately to serve the Allies in any capacity which he could fill. His jobs ranged from machine gunner in a Finish bombing plane to translator in the French bureau of North American Propaganda, and he ended his year's career with an amazing Odyssey which carried him through Norway, Sweden, Germany, Italy, and German-occupied France before he arrived at Lisbon and the Atlantic Clipper.

A love of France gained during a half-lifetime of residence in the country as well as a dislike of the Axis governments prompted him to join up with the French Foreign Legion at the outset of the struggle, but as an American citizen he encountered difficulties which made it impossible for him to enlist. Balked in this first attempt to serve, he spent five months in Paris first working under Andre Morize, professor of Romance Languages, in the Propaganda Bureau, and then working for the Czech National Committee.

Beat Hitler by Nose

In January he resigned and enlisted with the Finns, for two months serving in the infantry and in the airforce, until peace was declared in March. He reached Oslo less than a week before Nickolas von Falkenhausen, Hitler's invading general, and he departed from the German-infested city with a Belgian friend in a vain attempt to join the Norwegian army by traveling through Sweden.

"Finally when I had spent all my money trying to get back to Norway, I decided to return to France, Crane-Baker related last night. "The only way was through Germany. I shook in my boots all the way through on the train, but I got to Rome safely and crossed the border into France. Two days later Italy declared war."

By this time he was able to join the Foreign Legion without trouble, but it was only in time for a bombing by the Germans and a 100 mile retreat with 2000 wounded and convalescent Legionnaires from Lyons to Grenoble, completed in four days.

Until they heard that peace terms had been decided on, the soldiers expected to be shipped to the colonies to continue the fight.

The nineteen-year old veteran escaped through Spain and Portugal and returned to take up his work here which he had dropped for a year.

Debunke Legends

Crane-Baker delights in blasting several notions which the press has instilled in American minds. "Over here you have tended too much to mistrust all Allied information as propaganda," he stated, "and the result is that you fall back on the German claims."

In any fight, he predicted the Germans would walk through the Russian army. "However," he added gloomily, "I don't think there's any chance of that happening. They're getting friendlier every day. The Nazis are Germanizing Russia.

Concluding his tale, Crane-Baker returned to his favorite subject, the Finns. "They haven't been praised enough," he said; "they are the most remarkable of people."