Vater (Water) Jury (20.08 1917, Riga- ) - doctor, brother of Eva Vater.

Jury Vater studied at the Jewish school ‘Ezra’, and from 1931 - at the 4th gymnasium, which was characterised by social-democratic orientation. He actively participated in the activities of the youth organisation of the Latvian Social Democratic Labour Party (‘Labour Youth’), which later merged with the youth organisation of the Communists to form the Latvian Labour Youth Union. In 1936, having passed the entrance exams with honours, he entered the Medical Faculty of the University of Latvia. In 1939 he was mobilised into the Latvian Army. In 1940, after Latvia's occupition by the Soviet Union, he was appointed People's Commissar of the Latvian People's Army. Before the outbreak of war he had managed to finish his 4th year of study. With the beginning of the war he left Riga on foot with Communists and Komsomol members in the direction of Pskov. He volunteered for the army and was a paramedic of the 220th artillery regiment of the 201st Latvian Rifle Division. He took part in the battles near Moscow. On 14 January 1942 the division was transferred near Staraya Russa. For rescuing six wounded men from the battlefield he was awarded the Order of the Red Star. After a three-month stay in a hospital in Gorky he went to Gorokhovets camps, where on 8 June he met his sister Eva. On 1 September 1942 he went to the front. He was appointed commissar of the headquarters battery of the artillery regiment. In the summer of 1943, thanks to his knowledge of the German language, he was sent to the Political Department of the 1st Ukrainian Front as an instructor-literator. In February 1944 he was in the Korsun-Shevchenkovski cauldron with a sound installation. Twice wounded in the Ukrainian village of Shenderovka, continued to fight unequal battle, was captured by the Nazi and was killed. On the place where his body was hanged, after the war an obelisk was erected. The head of the Political Department of the front, General Shatilo presented Juri Vater posthumously to the title of Hero of the Soviet Union, but he was not awarded the title. He was awarded the Order of Lenin.

Lit:

The first article about Yu.Vater Max Shatz-Anin published in the newspaper ‘Einikait’ (in Yiddish) in February 1944; Wolfson Mavrik. Cards on the table. Riga. 1999, pp. 39-40; Zilmanovich D. If you believe in the dawn Memories and sketches about dead Komsomol members 1918-1944 (in Latin). Riga,. 1964, pp.307-315; Ingrida Sokolova. How young we were (in Latin). Riga, 1969.