Paul Alvre
Paul Alvre (born Paul Simenson; 3 January 1921 – 18 November 2008) was an Estonian linguist. Early life and career Paul Alvre was born in Tartu to parents Juhan (Simenson) Alvre, a shoemaker, and Emilie Kottart. He studied at Hugo Treffner Gymnasium from 1933 until 1940. From 1940 until 1943, he studied at the University of Tartu in the field of Estonian and related languages, and in 1943 at the Faculty of Philosophy of the University of Turku, for a short time also at the Suomenlinna Naval School. In 1941, during the Soviet occupation of Estonia, Alvre was part of the Forest Brothers (Metsavennad), a group of resistance fighters who hid in the forests of Estonia and engaged in partisan activities in the struggle against Soviet authority. From 1942 until 1943, he was conscripted into the German military during the German occupation of Estonia. In 1943, he fled to Finland and served as a volunteer in the Finnish Navy for a year during the Finnish-Soviet Continuation War, obtaining the rank of lieutenant. In 1944, he returned to Estonia with other Estonian soldiers of the Finnish Infantry Regiment 200, where he fought the Soviet occupation, but returned to Finland later the