Known as the “Night of the Murdered Poets,” thirteen prominent Jews were executed in Moscow on orders from the violently anti-Semitic Stalin. The victims included beloved poets, among them Peretz Markish, David Beergelson and Itzik Fefer. They had been arrested in 1949 and tortured for three years before their execution. Stalin died on the following year, and in 1955 the charges against the dead Jews were dismissed for lack of evidence.
