PEACEMAKER

New Zealand Listener, Volume 19, Issue 470, 25 June 1948, Page 14

PEACEMAKER

| OR the second time in the space of three years, Count Folke Bernadotte, youngest son of Prince Oscar of Sweden and vice-president of the International Red Cross, stands in the centre of world events. As the mediator appointed by United Nations in the present Palestine dispute he has been given one of the most exacting assignments that international diplomacy could offer, but one for which he has particularly fitted himself by training and experience. For this is not the first time he has had such a role. During the closing stages of the Second World War one of the major sensations was the offer of peace made by Himmler to the Western Powers. But it was an offer made only to. the West-Russia ,was *not included-and the offer was rejected by Mr. Churchill and President Truman only a week before Germany surrendered unconditionally on all fronts. On that occasion, however, it was Count Bernadotte, then in Germany negotiating (under the aegis of the International Red Cross) for the exchange of war prisoners, who was called on to facilitate these diplomatic exchanges. Count Bernadotte was born at Stockholm in 1895, and is descended from Jean-Baptiste Bernadotte, one of Napoleon’s marshals, who became Charles XIV. of Sweden in 1818. The Count’s father, Prince Oscar of Sweden, is a brother of the reigning king, but renounced his rights to the throne when he married Ebba Henriette Munck of Fulkila, a lady of noble but not royal blood. Count Folke was the youngest of five children and was brought up according to strict Christian principles. At school he won successes in his study of the Bible and the English language, and later he entered the Karlberg military school, from which he graduated as a cavalry officer in the Royal Guards. Married an Heiress In 1928 he married Estelle Manville -an American heiress whom he met on the French Riviera and married : after only a few weeks’ acquaintance-and in later years he acted on several occasions as an unofficial ambassador of goodwill between his country and the United States, representing Sweden at the Chicago Exposition of 1933 and -the New York World’s Fair of 1939. When war broke out his country remained neutral, but in his position as head of the Swedish Boy Scout movement Bernadotte was supposed to have been responsible for the organisation of his scouts into a defence corps which provided medical assistance and helped to man anti-aircraft guns. As vicepresident of the Swedish Red Cross he organised the exchange of disabled British and German prisoners of war in 1943, and in the succeeding years it became necessary for him to make frequent air trips to the capitals of the two belligerent countries on this work.

While he was,in Germany arranging for the release of Scandinavian political prisoners in 1945 he came into contact with the Nazi Gestapo Chief, and in April Himmler again sent for him, explained that Hitler was dying, and suggested that he act as neutral intermediary between Germany and the Western Allies with his proffered peace terms. Bernadotte flew to Stockholm, from where the message was sent to the British and American Governments through the Swedish Foreign Office. Bernadotte’s part in the affair was kept secret, and following the rejection of Himmler’s terms he flew back to Germany with that answer. It was not until April 30, just before the final surrender, that the World found out that Bernadotte had been acting as a_ courier behind the scenes. In those days he was described as a tall and handsome man with smiling, grey blue eyes and a long, lean ‘face, favouring in his dress double-breasted suits and fedora hats, and fond of horses and cycling, Recent photographs, however, show a lined and prematurely aged face. They reveal what a wearying business peace-making must be, and whet a strain it must throw on the shoulders of this lone man who makes peace his personal busines.