THE PRESIDENT: Wait a minute, wait a minute. When you see the light on that desk there or here, it means you are going too fast. You understand?
GRIGORIEV: I understand, yes.
THE PRESIDENT: Very well.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: Please speak slowly, Witness. Continue, please.
THE PRESIDENT: You said you were working with your two sons in the field.
GRIGORIEV: Yes; my own two sons.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: Continue.
GRIGORIEV: We were led through the village to the last house at the outskirts. There were 19 of us, all told, in that house. So there we sat in that house. I sat close to the window and looked out of it. I saw German soldiers herd together a great number of people. I noticed my wife and my 9-year-old boy. They were chased right up to the house and then led back again—where to, I did not know.
A little later three German machine gunners came in, accompanied by a fourth carrying a heavy revolver. We were ordered into another room. So we went, all 19 of us, and were lined up against a wall, including my two sons, and they began shooting at us from their machine guns. I stood right up to the wall, bending slightly.
After the first volley I fell to the floor, where I lay, too frightened to move. When they had shot all of us they left the house. When I came to, I looked round and saw my son Nikolai who had been shot and had fallen, face downwards. My second son I could not find anywhere.