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Cut off from investigative data, Congress interviewed witnesses itself. Following up on testimony given by [[Elizabeth Bentley|Bentley]], on August 3, [[Whittaker Chambers]] finally was called upon to testify—not before the grand jury, but before the [[House Committee on Un-American Activities]]. He repeated under oath what he had been telling [[State Department]] security officials and the [[FBI]] about the [[Ware group]] for a decade:

Cut off from investigative data, Congress interviewed witnesses itself. Following up on testimony given by [[Elizabeth Bentley|Bentley]], on August 3, [[Whittaker Chambers]] finally was called upon to testify—not before the grand jury, but before the [[House Committee on Un-American Activities]]. He repeated under oath what he had been telling [[State Department]] security officials and the [[FBI]] about the [[Ware group]] for a decade:

{{cquote|I was a member of the Communist Party and a paid functionary of the party.... the apparatus to which I was attached…. was an underground organization of the United States Communist Party developed, to the best of my knowledge, by [[Harold Ware]]…. The head of the underground group at the time I knew it was [[Nathan Witt]]…. Later, [[John Abt]] became the leader. [[Lee Pressman]] was also a member of this group, as was Alger Hiss….The purpose of this group at that time was not primarily espionage. Its original purpose was the Communist infiltration of the American Government. But espionage was certainly one of its eventual objectives.<ref>[[#refHUAC48|HUAC 1948]]: 564 (PDF 74)</ref>}}

{{cquote|I was a member of the Communist Party and a paid functionary of the party.... the apparatus to which I was attached…. was an underground organization of the United States Communist Party developed, to the best of my knowledge, by [[Harold Ware]]…. The head of the underground group at the time I knew it was [[Nathan Witt]]…. Later, [[John Abt]] became the leader. [[Lee Pressman]] was also a member of this group, as was Alger Hiss….The purpose of this group at that time was not primarily espionage. Its original purpose was the Communist infiltration of the American Government. But espionage was certainly one of its eventual objectives.<ref>[[#refHUAC48|HUAC 1948]]: 564 (PDF 74)</ref>}}

[[Image:HissSig.png|thumb|300px|right|The name “Alger Hiss” in Cyrillic (Элджер Хисс) from Vassiliev's notes on the “[[Gorsky memo]].” ''Source: [[#refVas|Cold War International History Project]], Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars'']]When Chambers testified against Hiss, wrote Sudoplatov, "we considered this to be a setback for [[GRU]] intelligence activities in the United States."<ref>[[#refSudoplatov95|Sudoplatov 1995]]: 228</ref> Four months later, [[Anatoly Gorsky]], chief of Soviet intelligence in the U.S. during World War II, would author an internal [[KI|Soviet secret police]] memorandum, entitled "[[Gorsky memo|Failures in the USA (1938-48)]]," listing 43 Soviet sources and intelligence officers likely to have been identified to U.S. authorities. Included on the list, under the heading, "'Karl’s' group," was "Alger Hiss, former employee of the State Dept."<ref>[[#refVasBlack|Vassiliev Black Notebook]]: Orig. 39; Trans. 77; cf. [[#refBLH05|Bachman, Leich, Haynes 2005]]; [[#refLowCher|Lowenthal, Chervonnaya 2005]]</ref> That same month, Piotr Fedotov and Konstantin Kukin, two other senior Soviet intelligence officials, [[#refTLS09|reported to the chairman of Soviet intelligence]] about “our former agents who were betrayed by Chambers (A. Hiss, [[Donald Hiss|D. Hiss]], [[Julian Wadleigh|Wadleigh]], [[Ward Pigman|Pigman]], [[Vincent Reno|Reno]]).”<ref>[[#refVasBlack|Vassiliev Black Notebook]]: Orig. 37; Trans. 73; cf. [[#refSpies09|Haynes, Klehr, Vassiliev 2009]]: 553, 555</ref>

[[Image:HissSig.png|thumb|300px|right|The name “Alger Hiss” in Cyrillic (Элджер Хисс) from Vassiliev's notes on the “[[Gorsky memo]].” ''Source: [[#refVas|Cold War International History Project]], Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars'']]When Chambers testified against Hiss, wrote Sudoplatov, "we considered this to be a setback for [[GRU]] intelligence activities in the United States."<ref>[[#refSudoplatov95|Sudoplatov 1995]]: 228</ref> Four months later, [[Anatoly Gorsky]], chief of Soviet intelligence in the U.S. during World War II, would author an internal [[KI|Soviet secret police]] memorandum, entitled "[[Gorsky memo|Failures in the USA (1938-48)]]," listing 43 Soviet sources and intelligence officers likely to have been identified to U.S. authorities. Included on the list, under the heading, "'Karl’s' group," was "Alger Hiss, former employee of the State Dept."<ref>[[#refVasBlack|Vassiliev Black Notebook]]: Orig. 39; Trans. 77; cf. [[#refBLH05|Bachman, Leich, Haynes 2005]]; [[#refLowCher|Lowenthal, Chervonnaya 2005]]</ref> That same month, Piotr Fedotov and Konstantin Kukin, two other senior Soviet intelligence officials, [[#refTLS09|reported to the chairman of Soviet intelligence]] about “our former agents who were betrayed by Chambers ('''A. Hiss''', [[Donald Hiss|D. Hiss]], [[Julian Wadleigh|Wadleigh]], [[Ward Pigman|Pigman]], [[Vincent Reno|Reno]]).”<ref>[[#refVasBlack|Vassiliev Black Notebook]]: Orig. 37; Trans. 73; cf. [[#refSpies09|Haynes, Klehr, Vassiliev 2009]]: 553, 555</ref>

Two days after Chambers, Hiss testified, denying that he ever even knew Chambers, in a statement Secretary of State [[Dean Acheson]] helped write.<ref>[[#refWeinstein78|Weinstein 1978]]: 17</ref> Hiss "asked the committee to [http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/ftinterface~content=a789433344~fulltext=713240930 disregard the evidence] and follow its emotions":

Two days after Chambers, Hiss testified, denying that he ever even knew Chambers, in a statement Secretary of State [[Dean Acheson]] helped write.<ref>[[#refWeinstein78|Weinstein 1978]]: 17</ref> Hiss "asked the committee to [http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/ftinterface~content=a789433344~fulltext=713240930 disregard the evidence] and follow its emotions":