Jēkabs Peterss (, ''Yakov Khristoforovich Peters'', ; – 25 April 1938) was a Latvian

Communist Communism () is a sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology within the socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered on common ownership of the means of production, di ...

revolutionary A revolutionary is a person who either participates in, or advocates for, a revolution. The term ''revolutionary'' can also be used as an adjective to describe something producing a major and sudden impact on society. Definition The term—bot ...

who played a part in the establishment of the

Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...

. Together with

Felix Dzerzhinsky Felix Edmundovich Dzerzhinsky (; ; – 20 July 1926), nicknamed Iron Felix (), was a Soviet revolutionary and politician of Polish origin. From 1917 until his death in 1926, he led the first two Soviet secret police organizations, the Cheka a ...

, he was one of the founders and chiefs of the

Cheka The All-Russian Extraordinary Commission ( rus, Всероссийская чрезвычайная комиссия, r=Vserossiyskaya chrezvychaynaya komissiya, p=fsʲɪrɐˈsʲijskəjə tɕrʲɪzvɨˈtɕæjnəjə kɐˈmʲisʲɪjə, links=yes), ...

, the secret police of the

Soviet Russia The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (Russian SFSR or RSFSR), previously known as the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and the Russian Soviet Republic, and unofficially as Soviet Russia,Declaration of Rights of the labo ...

. He was the Deputy Chairman of the Cheka from 1918 and briefly the acting Chairman of the Cheka from 7 July to 22 August 1918.

Early years

He was born on 3 December 1886 in Brinken

volost Volost (; ; ) was a traditional administrative subdivision in Kievan Rus', the Grand Duchy of Moscow, and the Russian Empire. History The '' Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary'' (1890–1907) states that the origins of the concept is unc ...

of Kreis Hasenpoth,

Courland Governorate Courland Governorate, also known as the Province of Courland or Governorate of Kurland, and known from 1795 to 1796 as the Viceroyalty of Courland, was an administrative-territorial unit (''guberniya'') and one of the Baltic governorates of the ...

(now Nīkrāce parish, Skrunda Municipality), the son of Latvian farmers. He became a member of the

Latvian Social Democratic Workers' Party The Latvian Social Democratic Workers' Party (, LSDSP) is a Social democracy, social-democratic list of political parties in Latvia, political party in Latvia and the second oldest existing Latvian political party after the Latvian Farmers' Uni ...

in 1904. In the aftermath of the

Russian Revolution of 1905 The Russian Revolution of 1905, also known as the First Russian Revolution, was a revolution in the Russian Empire which began on 22 January 1905 and led to the establishment of a constitutional monarchy under the Russian Constitution of 1906, t ...

he was arrested in March 1907 for the attempted murder of a factory director in Libau, but was later acquitted by the Riga military court in 1908. Peterss emigrated to

England England is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is located on the island of Great Britain, of which it covers about 62%, and List of islands of England, more than 100 smaller adjacent islands. It ...

and lived in

London London is the Capital city, capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of both England and the United Kingdom, with a population of in . London metropolitan area, Its wider metropolitan area is the largest in Wester ...

, where he was a member of the London Group of the Social Democracy of Latvia and of the

British Socialist Party The British Socialist Party (BSP) was a Marxist political organisation established in United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland, Great Britain in 1911. Following a protracted period of political faction, factional struggle, in 1916 the party's ...

The Siege of Sidney Street

Peterss was a first cousin of Fritz Svaars, a Latvian anarchist, who was suspected of sabotage, robbery and of the murders of a shopkeeper and a policeman during the 1905 revolution, and was arrested and tortured in Riga, but escaped early in 1906. He moved to London, and was one of a gang who tried to rob a jeweler's shop in Houndsditch, in December 1910. Caught in the act, they killed three unarmed police officers. Svaars and a fellow anarchist were traced to a house in Sidney Street in January 1911, and opened fire on the police, setting off the

Siege of Sidney Street The siege of Sidney Street of January 1911, also known as the Battle of Stepney, was a gunfight in the East End of London between a combined police and army force and two Latvian revolutionaries. The siege was the culmination of a series of ...

which ended with the deaths of both suspects. Peterss was arrested at his home in Turner Street, London, on 22 December. Unlike his cousin, he did not attempt to resist arrest. In May 1911, he and three other Latvian emigres were tried in the

Old Bailey The Central Criminal Court of England and Wales, commonly referred to as the Old Bailey after the street on which it stands, is a criminal court building in central London, one of several that house the Crown Court of England and Wales. The s ...

. The judge ordered the jury to acquit Peterss on the charge of murder, for lack of evidence. After he had given evidence under cross-examination, he was acquitted of the separate charge of conspiring to commit a burglary.

Family

In 1916, he married May Freeman, the daughter of a London banker, by whom he had already fathered a daughter, Maisie Peters-Freeman (born 1914). After the Russian revolution, he invited his wife and daughter to join him there, where they discovered that he had a new family. Maisie was never able to leave Russia and died there in 1971.

October Revolution

Peterss returned to

Russia Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...

in May 1917 after the

February Revolution The February Revolution (), known in Soviet historiography as the February Bourgeois Democratic Revolution and sometimes as the March Revolution or February Coup was the first of Russian Revolution, two revolutions which took place in Russia ...

. In

Riga Riga ( ) is the capital, Primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Latvia, largest city of Latvia. Home to 591,882 inhabitants (as of 2025), the city accounts for a third of Latvia's total population. The population of Riga Planni ...

, Peterss became one of the leaders of the Social Democracy of Latvia working at the front-lines of the Northern Front. During the German advance he moved to

Valmiera Valmiera () is the second largest city of the historical Vidzeme region, Latvia, with a total area of . As of 2002, Valmiera had a population of 27,323, and in 2020, it was at 24,879. It is a Administrative divisions of Latvia, state city, and ...

where he was an editor of the party newspaper ''Cīņa''. Peterss was a peasant representative of the

Governorate of Livonia The Governorate of Livonia, also known as the Livonia Governorate, was a province (''guberniya'') and one of the Baltic governorates of the Russian Empire, Baltic Governorate-General until 1876. Governorate of Livonia bordered Governorate of E ...

to the Democratic discussion initiated by Kerensky. Dzerzhinsky 4-17860

Moving to

Petrograd Saint Petersburg, formerly known as Petrograd and later Leningrad, is the second-largest city in Russia after Moscow. It is situated on the River Neva, at the head of the Gulf of Finland on the Baltic Sea. The city had a population of 5,601, ...

, he actively participated in the Bolshevik revolution of October 1917 as a member of the

Military-Revolutionary Committee The Military Revolutionary Committee (Milrevcom; , ) was the name for military organs created by the Bolsheviks under Soviet (council), the soviets in preparation for the October Revolution (October 1917 – March 1918).Cheka The All-Russian Extraordinary Commission ( rus, Всероссийская чрезвычайная комиссия, r=Vserossiyskaya chrezvychaynaya komissiya, p=fsʲɪrɐˈsʲijskəjə tɕrʲɪzvɨˈtɕæjnəjə kɐˈmʲisʲɪjə, links=yes), ...

Collegiate, the Deputy Chairman of the

Commission In-Commission or commissioning may refer to: Business and contracting * Commission (remuneration), a form of payment to an agent for services rendered ** Commission (art), the purchase or the creation of a piece of art most often on behalf of anot ...

, and the chairman of the

Revolutionary Tribunal The Revolutionary Tribunal (; unofficially Popular Tribunal) was a court instituted by the National Convention during the French Revolution for the trial of political offenders. In October 1793, it became one of the most powerful engines of ...

. He participated in the disclosure of the alleged Lockhart plot as well as leading the liquidation of the

Left SR The Party of Left Socialist-Revolutionaries-Internationalists () was a revolutionary socialist political party formed during the Russian Revolution. In 1917, the Socialist Revolutionary Party split between those who supported the Russian Provis ...

mutiny of 1918. Following Dzerzhinsky's resignation in the aftermath of the

Left SR Uprising The Left SR uprising, or Left SR revolt, was a rebellion against the Bolsheviks by the Left Socialist Revolutionary Party in Moscow, Soviet Russia, on 6–7 July 1918. It was one of a number of left-wing uprisings against the Bolsheviks that ...

, assassination of Mirbach, and the

Treaty of Brest-Litovsk The Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was a separate peace treaty signed on 3 March 1918 between Soviet Russia and the Central Powers (Germany, Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman Empire, and Bulgaria), by which Russia withdrew from World War I. The treaty, whi ...

, Peterss briefly served as the chief of the

until Dzerzhinsky resumed his duties. As one of the Cheka's leaders, Peterss was responsible for the first major Cheka operations involving killings. These were against alleged anarchists in Petrograd and later in May 1918 against anarchists in Petrograd and Moscow. He also was involved in the investigation of the SR attempt on

Lenin Vladimir Ilyich Ulyanov ( 187021 January 1924), better known as Vladimir Lenin, was a Russian revolutionary, politician and political theorist. He was the first head of government of Soviet Russia from 1917 until Death and state funeral of ...

's life in August 1918 ( Fanni Kaplan case), for the indiscriminate

Red Terror The Red Terror () was a campaign of political repression and Mass killing, executions in Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, Soviet Russia which was carried out by the Bolsheviks, chiefly through the Cheka, the Bolshevik secret police ...

campaigns and reprisals that followed. He called it a "Hysterical Terror" in the newspaper "Utro Moskvy" (#21) of November 4, 1918. During these times appeared a term "room of souls" in numerous prisons such as

Butyrka Butyrskaya prison (), usually known simply as Butyrka ( rus, Бутырка, p=bʊˈtɨrkə), is a prison in the Tverskoy District of central Moscow, Russia. In Imperial Russia it served as the central transit prison. During the Soviet Un ...

. In March 1919, he was appointed as the Chief of internal defense in

, and then the Commandant of the reinforced raion. Following the retreat of the

Yudenich Nikolai Nikolayevich Yudenich (Russian: Николай Николаевич Юденич; – 5 October 1933) was a commander of the Russian Imperial Army during World War I. He was a leader of the anti-communist White movement in northwester ...

forces he was appointed as the Commandant of the reinforced raion in

Kiev Kyiv, also Kiev, is the capital and most populous List of cities in Ukraine, city of Ukraine. Located in the north-central part of the country, it straddles both sides of the Dnieper, Dnieper River. As of 1 January 2022, its population was 2, ...

in August 1919. Upon the sack of Kiev he was a member of the Military Council in Tula. In winter 1919–20 Peters became the deputy chairman of the Special Committee of the STO in providing military preparations on railways.

Post-revolution

In 1920, he represented the

in the

Northern Caucasus The North Caucasus, or Ciscaucasia, is a subregion in Eastern Europe governed by Russia. It constitutes the northern part of the wider Caucasus region, which separates Europe and Asia. The North Caucasus is bordered by the Sea of Azov and the B ...

and served there as the Commissar of the

Railways. There is a story that when workers in

Rostov-on-Don Rostov-on-Don is a port city and the administrative centre of Rostov Oblast and the Southern Federal District of Russia. It lies in the southeastern part of the East European Plain on the Don River, from the Sea of Azov, directly north of t ...

came to him complaining about starvation, Peters told them: "Is this famine, when your Rostov garbage pits are chock-full of various garbage and leftovers? In Moscow, where the garbage pits are completely empty and clean - as if they had been licked clean - there is hunger there!" In 1920–1922, he was the

plenipotentiary in

Turkestan ASSR The Turkestan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic (TASSR; ; ), originally called the Turkestan Socialist Federative Republic, was an autonomous republic of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic located in Soviet Central Asia which e ...

, where he also was the local

party A party is a gathering of people who have been invited by a Hospitality, host for the purposes of socializing, conversation, recreation, or as part of a festival or other commemoration or celebration of a special occasion. A party will oft ...

bureau member. There he led numerous operations against the anti-

Bolshevik The Bolsheviks, led by Vladimir Lenin, were a radical Faction (political), faction of the Marxist Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP) which split with the Mensheviks at the 2nd Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, ...

formations of Dutov, Annenkov,

Enver Pasha İsmâil Enver (; ; 23 November 1881 – 4 August 1922), better known as Enver Pasha, was an Ottoman Empire, Ottoman Turkish people, Turkish military officer, revolutionary, and Istanbul trials of 1919–1920, convicted war criminal who was a p ...

and Dzhanuzakov. He returned to

Moscow Moscow is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Russia by population, largest city of Russia, standing on the Moskva (river), Moskva River in Central Russia. It has a population estimated at over 13 million residents with ...

in 1922 and worked as a high-ranking official in the

OGPU The Joint State Political Directorate ( rus, Объединённое государственное политическое управление, p=ɐbjɪdʲɪˈnʲɵn(ː)əjə ɡəsʊˈdarstvʲɪn(ː)əjə pəlʲɪˈtʲitɕɪskəjə ʊprɐˈv ...

Rabkrin The People's Commissariat of the Workers' and Peasants' Inspection, also known as Rabkrin (; РКИ, RKI; Workers' and Peasants' Inspectorate, WPI), was a governmental establishment in the Soviet Union of ministerial level (people's commissariat) t ...

, and as the chief of the Eastern department of the GPU (created on June 2, 1922). In 1930–34, he was chairman of the Moscow Control Commission. During the

Great Purge The Great Purge, or the Great Terror (), also known as the Year of '37 () and the Yezhovshchina ( , ), was a political purge in the Soviet Union that took place from 1936 to 1938. After the Assassination of Sergei Kirov, assassination of ...

, as a part of the so-called " Latvian Operation", Peterss was arrested and executed by the

NKVD The People's Commissariat for Internal Affairs (, ), abbreviated as NKVD (; ), was the interior ministry and secret police of the Soviet Union from 1934 to 1946. The agency was formed to succeed the Joint State Political Directorate (OGPU) se ...

on April 25, 1938, at the

Kommunarka shooting ground The Kommunarka firing range (), former dacha of secret police chief Genrikh Yagoda, was used as a burial ground from 1937 to 1941. Executions may have been carried out there by the NKVD during the Great Terror and until the war started; altern ...

. He was posthumously rehabilitated in 1956.

Reputation

In 1919, an American diplomat testified to Congress that Peterss was, with another Cheka leader Aleksandr Eiduk, considered the "most blood-thirsty monster in Russia". At that time, Peterss' influence was vastly overstated by English language newspapers, because he was known to the police in the UK, and because he was the only one of the founders of Cheka who spoke English. On 25 January 1919, ''The Times'' in London belatedly learnt that the Bolsheviks had been divided over whether to conduct a revolutionary war with Germany, and claimed that "One party is headed by Lenin, the other by

Trotsky Lev Davidovich Bronstein ( – 21 August 1940), better known as Leon Trotsky,; ; also transliterated ''Lyev'', ''Trotski'', ''Trockij'' and ''Trotzky'' was a Russian revolutionary, Soviet politician, and political theorist. He was a key figure ...

, Peterss,

Radek Radek is a masculine Christian name of Slavic origin. It is often nickname of Radovan, Ctirad and Radoslav. It is used as a surname and given name. Notable people with the name include: Given name * Radek Baborák, Czech conductor and French ...

and Zinovieff...The Trotsky and Peters party believe in heroic measures..." Peterss did not merit a mention in any of Trotsky's extensive writings about the period, and certainly was not in the front ranks of the Bolsheviks leadership. As a Chekist, he undoubtedly had many people killed, yet the portrayal of him as 'the most blood-thirsty monster' contrasts with the opinion of the British diplomat, Robert Bruce Lockhart, who spent a month under arrest in Moscow in 1918 and was interrogated by Peterss. Bruce Lockhart wrote:

References

External links

Biography of Peters
{{DEFAULTSORT:Peters, Yakov 1886 births 1938 deaths People from Courland Governorate People from Kuldīga Municipality Latvian expatriates in the United Kingdom Cheka officers British Socialist Party members Great Purge victims from Latvia Latvian communists Latvian revolutionaries Old Bolsheviks Cheka chairmen People of the Russian Revolution People of the Russian Civil War Executed communists People executed by the Soviet Union by firearm Soviet rehabilitations Perpetrators of the Red Terror (Russia)