PROSOROVSKI: The President of the Special Commission for investigation and ascertaining of the circumstances of the shootings by the German Fascist aggressors of Polish officers, Academician Nicolai Ilych Burdenko, offered me in the beginning of January 1944 the chairmanship of the Medico-Judicial Commission of experts. Apart from this organizational activity, I participated personally in the exhumations and examination of these corpses.
THE PRESIDENT: Colonel Smirnov, perhaps that would be a good time to break off.
[The Tribunal recessed until 1400 hours.]
Afternoon Session
THE MARSHAL: May it please the Tribunal, the Defendants Hess, Fritzsche, and Von Ribbentrop are absent.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: May I continue the examination of this witness, Mr. President?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes.
MR. COUNSELLOR SMIRNOV: Please tell me, how far from the town of Smolensk were the burial grounds where the corpses were discovered?
PROSOROVSKI: A commission of medico-legal experts, together with members of the special commission, Academician Burdenko, Academician Potemkin, Academician Tolstoy, and other members of this commission, betook themselves on 14 January 1944 to the burial grounds of the Polish officers in the so-called Katyn wood. This spot is located about 15 kilometers from the town of Smolensk. These burial grounds were situated on a slope at a distance of about 200 meters from the Vitebsk high road. One of these graves was about 60 meters long and 60 meters wide; the other one, situated a small distance from this first grave, was about 7 meters long and 6 meters wide.