Mr. Johan Laidoner is also introduced as a member of the Riigikogu, Commander-in-Chief during the period 1934–1940 and a member of public life. His family and homes in Tallinn, at Õllepruuli Street and Viimsi Manor, and his imprisonment in Russia are shown separately.
Collection of decorations, awarded to General Johan Laidoner by the Republic of Estonia and other countries, which were returned to Estonia from the United States of America in 2004, also form part of the exhibition; some personal items belonging to General Laidoner are also being exhibited.
In opening the exhibition, Mr. Jaak Aaviksoo said that sometimes when speaking of events related to Estonia gaining its independence we get carried away with historical abstractions, and speak about the emergence of favourable conditions that served as the pre-requisites for the birth of the Republic of Estonia.
“However, we should be speaking of real individuals, who fought for Estonia with both weapons and pens, and who paid the ultimate price. The grand old man of Estonian history, General Johan Laidoner, stands tall among these people,” the Minister said.
According to Mr. Aaviksoo, all over Estonia something visible and audible should remain of General Johan Laidoner, the man who won and has become the symbol of the Estonian War of Independence.
“The heroes of the War of Independence have a fundamental importance today and even more so for the future. Only an individual willing to give up everything in the name of his/her future can be free within the real meaning of the word; this is the bitter truth,” the Minister of Defence said.
General Johan Laidoner (1884–1953) was the Commander-in-Chief of the Estonian Defence Forces during the War of Independence. He was a member of the Riigikogu from 1920–1929, representing Estonia as a member of the Riigikogu’s Committee of Foreign Affairs at international conferences and was the special representative of the League of Nations, which solved the Turkey-Iraq conflict over the Mosul region.
After the institution of authoritarian regime in March 1934, Mr. Konstantin Päts invited General Laidoner to become the Commander-in-Chief of the Estonian Defence Forces again. In summer 1940, after Estonia’s annexation by the Soviet Union, the People\'s Commissariat for Internal Affairs (Narodny Kommisariat Vnutrennikh Del, NKVD) captured Johan Laidoner in Tallinn. Laidoner and his wife were deported together to Russia where he died in March 1953 in the Vladimir Prison Camp.
