Nikolai Yezhov

Nikolai Ivanovich Yezhov or Ezhov was a Soviet secret police official under Joseph Stalin. He was head of the NKVD from 1936 to 1938, during the most deadly period of Stalins Great Purge. His time in office is known as the Yezhovshchina , a term coined during the deStalinization campaign of the 1950s. After presiding over mass arrests and executions during the Great Purge, Yezhov became a victim of it himself. He was arrested, confessed under torture to a range of antiSoviet activity, and was executed in 1940. By the beginning of World War II, his status within the Soviet Union became that of a political unperson.

Yezhov was born in Saint Petersburg, according to his official Soviet biography. In a form filled out in 1921, Yezhov claimed some ability to speak Polish and Lithuanian.

Source: Wikipedia