Genrikh
Yagoda was born in Lodz, Poland, in 1891. Lodz was part of the Russian
Empire and Yagoda objected to the rule of Nicholas
II.
Yagoda
joined the Bolsheviks in 1907 and
after the successful October Revolution
in 1917 he joined the Communist Secret Police (Cheka).
He took part in the Red Terror and in
1930 was placed in charge of forced-labour camps.
Yagoda
was a close friend of Joseph Stalin and
in 1934 he was put in charge of the Peoples Commissariat for Internal
Affairs (NKVD). Soon afterwards Yagoda
is believed to have been involved in the assassination of Sergy
Kirov, a man Stalin believed to be a threat to his power.
In 1936
Yagoda arrested Lev Kamenev, Gregory
Zinoviev, and fourteen others and accused them of being involved
with Leon Trotsky in a plot to murder
Joseph Stalin and other party leaders.
All of these men were found guilty and were executed on 25th August,
1936.
Joseph
Stalin became angry with Yagoda when he failed to obtain enough
evidence to convict Nickolai Bukharin.
Yagoda was replaced by Nikolai Yezhov
as head of the NKVD.
Genrikh
Yagoda was arrested in 1937 and was accused of being involved in a
plot with Leon Trotsky, Nickolai
Bukharin, Alexei
Rykov,
Nikolai
Krestinsky and
Christian
Rakovsky against
Joseph Stalin. He was found guilty and
was executed in Moscow on 15th March, 1938.
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