Peraküla radio station and cobblestone road

At the beginning of the 20th century, a covert radio station, also known as the Spitham radio station, was built on the peninsula of Lake Allikajärv in Peraküla along with a cobblestone road leading up to it.

Initially, Spitham was to be a receiving station to maintain discipline in the radiocommunication of ships, but as the military situation escalated it was converted into a special purpose radio station. The top secret radio intelligence receiving and deciphering station for the Baltic naval fleet of the Russian Empire for the service and control of the fleet in the Gulf of Finland operated on the Allikajärve peninsula from 1915 to 1917. It was the first radio station in the world built for intelligence purposes only (conventional radio stations had intercepted enemy signals before). It was among the most classified military sites of the Russian Empire.

Construction of the radio station was delayed due to opposition from landowners, but after the intervention of Nicholas II, construction began in 1914-1915.  The radio station was intended to employ 57 people. 13 buildings of different sizes were built on the peninsula. The main building, i.e. the telegraph station, housed four 24/7 radio intelligence posts, a deciphering office and officers’ quarters. The territory also included a sauna, barracks for sailors, two dwellings for commanding officers, a garage, a cellar, an outhouse, a slaughterhouse, a barn, a stable, a pumping station and an oil depot. A power station supplied electricity for the radio equipment. A 57-millimetre anti-aircraft gun was mounted on a wooden platform. Three 52-metre-high radio masts made of wooden beams were erected, one of which was supposed to be a direction-finding antenna. The station was enclosed by barbed wire and off-limits to outsiders. 

In addition to intercepting communications from the German fleet, the secret radio station was also used to decipher encrypted messages. Intercepted messages were written down on paper and taken to the deciphering department. Radiograms intercepted by other coastal stations were also sent to Spitham for deciphering. Direction-finding data was not shared with Spitham’s decryption department, but sent to Tallinn separately.

Ernst Fetterlein, a Baltic German who was Russia’s top cryptographer at the time, worked at the radio station. After the revolution, he moved to England and spent two decades as head of the Soviet branch of the Government Code & Cipher School.

In 1917, the Czar was overthrown and it was feared that the station might fall into the hands of the Germans during hostilities. This is why the station was evacuated at the end of 1917 or the beginning of 1918, and everything that remained was blown up. The Republic of Estonia sold the remaining buildings for demolition.

The bases of radio masts and the foundations of buildings can still be seen buried in the forest on the Allikajärve peninsula. The cobblestone road that was built in 1915 straight across the fields of Paali, Põlluotsa and Vanatoa in Peraküla and through the state-owned forest to serve the station is in better shape.

The Maritime Ministry transferred the land for the construction of the road and the  delivery of the stones began in the winter of 1914/1915. Some were obtained from Peraküla, but most were hauled from the stone fences found when heading towards Nõva off the road to Peraküla. Larger stones were broken up into smaller ones on the spot. The construction of the road was supervised by Ado Targama (Tõksu Ado) from the village of Tusari. Local peasants provided the workforce, transporting stones from around the village with horses and oxen.

A wooden bridge was built across the narrower part of the lake in the winter of the same year to provide access to the peninsula. Coarse logs were driven through the ice to the bottom of the lake. Men from Pskov and Pechory were brought in to build the bridge.

The cobblestone road is well preserved, although the condition of the road is worse on the peninsula itself, where only a few stones can be seen where the road is located. The old cobblestone road is partly covered with gravel. Gravel was dumped on the road after a major storm in 1967, when heavy machinery clearing storm debris broke up the cobbled roads.