state that I joined the guards as I wanted to earn money. At that time I did not feel well and joined the guards because I thought it an easy job. In this way we kept guard of the Czar Nicholas Alexandrovitch and his family. They all lived in Ipatieff’s house--I mean to say the Czar Nicholas Alexandrovitch, his wife Alexandra Theodorovna, his son Alexis and his daughters, Olga, Tatiana, Maria and Anastasia. Of the others who lived with them there were: Dr. Botkin, Demidova, “Freylina” we used to call her, Haritonoff, the cook, and Troupp, the waiter. The name of the waiter I remember very well because the list of all the people who lived in Ipatieff’s house was hung up in the commandant’s room. Botkin was an aged man, stout, grey-haired and tall. He wore a blue suit: jacket, waistcoat and trousers, stiff shirt and tie; he always wore shoes. Demidova was a tall and stout blonde; she was thirty to thirty-five, dressed herself very cleanly and nicely, not like a servant, wore a corset; and it was seen by her figure that she was very tight-laced. The cook was about fifty. He was small, strong and had brown hair. The waiter was about sixty; he was tall and thin. There also lived with the imperial family a boy about fourteen, whose name I don’t know. He was tall for his age, thin and his face was pale. He wore a dark grey jacket, with a high collar. I can not tell you anything as to how the imperial family lived and spent their time. I never entered the rooms where they lived, and I could not see anything from a distance, as the door from the lobby to their first room was always shut. I don’t know how the imperial family spent their time in the house. Dinner was brought for them by some women from the soviet dining-room that is located at the crossing of Vosnesensky and Glavny Prospects, in the place occupied now by the motion pictures and the Café Lorange. But later, during Avdeieff’s time, permission was given to them to prepare their dinner in the house. For this purpose the provisions were brought to them from the district soviet by some special man. Nuns used to bring them from the monastery milk, eggs and bread. The only thing I personally observed in the life of the imperial family was their singing. I heard sometimes sacred songs which they sang. They sang the “Herouvimskaya” (cherubims) song. But they sang also a secular song. I could not get the words, but the tune was sad. This was the name of a song: “A Man Died in a Soldier’s Hospital.” I never heard men’s voices singing--only women’s.