Ukrainian, like Visti Vtikh or Komunist, and I had to read them while they eating. This was in spring 1933. It was meant to educate them and the topic was always political. How wonderful was the Soviet political system, how lucky we are to have a leader like Joseph Stalin. And I read them. I know it is the wrong thing.

They knew I was a Ukrainian and they hated me. They hated me because they thought I belonged to that corrupt political system. I tell you honestly, I was hungry because I walked two or three miles to that place. I see them eating their beans. I like to eat, but they never asked me. “Maybe you need it.” You understand? I was hungry and reading that Soviet official propaganda to convince them of that tragic life. Never I forget these things. After that, I told the principal, “Don’t send me anymore,” and he didn’t

I remember when I came home, 12/13 miles from that school where I taught, it was evening—because I walked quickly—evening when they came from work. Not my age, but boys and girls. I could recognize how different they looked. They looked like ghosts. Their legs were swollen and they walked slowly.

I knew one thing, that the political system was inhuman. I myself now can’t believe how it existed like that. How it exists. How long will it be like that.

Moscow knows how many millions of Ukrainian villagers—men, women, and children—died. But only Moscow knows. I guess millions, millions. Believe me ladies and gentlemen, millions died.

When I was a six-year-old boy in 1921,1 remember how the United States was in¬volved in famine relief. I remember in my village in the steppes, a small village, about 120 miles from Zaporizhzhia. My father was in good shape, but most of the farmers were poorer. If they had children, they received food from the United States through the A.R.A., the American Relief Administration. Yes, I remember, rice, I remember, soup, because I like this. In 1921, we were poor because there was drought, no har¬vest. But that help come from the United States in 1921. But I remember that. I was a six-year-old boy, but I have imagination, “My goodness, that country, America, far away from Russia. They tried to help people where people suffered.”
Dr. MACE: Excuse me just one moment. Mr.
KONONENKO: Yes, sir. Dr. MACE: Could I interject a question at this point? Mr. KONONENKO: Yes, sir.
Dr. MACE: You were a village school teacher at the time of the famine. Mr. KONONENKO: Yes. Yes.
Dr. MACE: We heard testimony, I believe it was in Warren, Michigan, from a young girl who recalls how her village school teacher was mobilized unwillingly to take part in grain seizures. Were you ever considered a part of the village activists?
Mr. KONONENKO: What you mean-explain? Oh, sure. In 1932, before winter came, they gave an order from the top for the village council to organize a group of people. The leader had to be a Communist who believed in the political system and went to every farmer and took everything, even beans in the pot. They took every¬thing. They said, “Our country needed that for—”

The farmer realized that they tried to destroy him, but they remained quiet. They even
went to where the farmer had a private plot near his home, they had long iron pikes with sharp ends and walk around and pushed through the soil looking for some-