Forty-eight Soviet partisans attacked the village of Seitajärvi in the municipality of Savukoski at 3:00 a.m. on 7 July 1944. The village was protected by nine soldiers of the Finnish Army. Barking dogs awakened the villagers, but the Finnish soldiers, taken by surprise, were quickly overrun by the partisans. The latter lured the civilians to come out of hiding by promising that they would not be hurt, speaking to them in Finnish. Then the partisans took the civilians with them and set most of the buildings in the village on fire. The Finnish anti-partisan unit Sau arrived on the scene nine hours after the attack and found dead bodies with the help of search dogs in a nearby forest. The women and children who were taken as prisoners by the partisans had been killed by shooting and stabbing them with knives and bayonets.
Among the victims were:
Johannes Arajärvi, a son was serving as a soldier defending the
village, was wounded.