Kuressaare returns Otto and Agnes Pukk to Saaremaa

Otto and Agnes Pukk were reburied at Kudjape cemetery in Kuressaare on Saturday, bringing the couple back to Saaremaa, ERR reported. Otto Pukk was born on the island 126 years ago and died in Sweden 75 years ago.

Before fleeing to Sweden in 1944, Otto Pukk served in the Estonian War of Independence and worked as a journalist, lawyer and politician. He served in two terms of parliament and was the last chairman of the Riigivolikogu, Estonia’s legislative body, before the Soviet occupation. He was also a member of the Otto Tief government.

Their family arranged the couple’s return. Their grandson, also named Otto Pukk, said the family had long wanted his grandparents to come home. They considered reburial in the early 1990s, when several statesmen were returned to Estonia, but his grandmother was still alive and the family did not want to proceed then.

“It is a joyful occasion that my grandmother and grandfather are back home,” he said. “It was the family’s initiative, and in that sense a circle is complete and their wish has been fulfilled.”