The Battle of Määritsa ( et, Määritsa lahing), or the Battle of Osula ( et, Osula lahing), was a battle in

Osula Osula is a village in Võru Parish, Võru County, in southeastern Estonia. As of the 2011 census, the settlement's population was 335. The Battle of Määritsa was held in Osula village between the Estonian partisans Forest Brothers The Gue ...

village, at that time in

Võru County Võru County ( et, Võru maakond or ''Võrumaa''; vro, Võro maakund) is a county in southern Estonia. It is bordered by Valga County and Põlva County and is the only Estonian county bordering two countries - Latvia (Alūksne Municipality and ...

Estonia Estonia, formally the Republic of Estonia, is a country by the Baltic Sea in Northern Europe. It is bordered to the north by the Gulf of Finland across from Finland, to the west by the sea across from Sweden, to the south by Latvia, a ...

. It began on the night of 31 March 1946, involving members of the

Forest Brothers The Guerrilla war in the Baltic states was an armed struggle which was waged by the Latvian, Lithuanian, and Estonian partisans, called the Forest Brothers (also: the "Brothers of the Wood" and the "Forest Friars"; et, metsavennad, lv, mež ...

and Soviet occupation forces. Seven Estonian fighters based at the Hindrik farmhouse were besieged by up to 300 Soviet soldiers. The battle lasted about seven hours before the farmhouse caught fire and the Soviets demanded that the rebels surrender. Only two fighters managed to escape alive from the farmhouse, but were subsequently killed in battle with the besiegers.

References

Battles in Estonia Battles involving the Soviet Union Cold War military history of the Soviet Union Occupation of the Baltic states Battles involving Estonia Conflicts in 1946 1946 in Estonia Võru Parish Battles post-1945 March 1946 events in Europe Estonian Soviet Socialist Republic {{battle-stub