Boris Morros

Boris Morros (January 1, 1891 - January 8, 1963) was an American Communist Party member, Paramount Studios producer and Soviet agent.

Morros was born in Saint Petersburg, Russia and emigrated with his family to America. He was recruited as a Soviet spy in 1934, and Vasily Zarubin first became his contact in 1936.

The mysterious "Mr Guver" letter sent to FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover in 1943 from anonymous source now widely believed to be KGB Officer Vassili Mironov, named Morros as an agent working with Soviet intelligence and identified Elizabeth Zarubina as Morros contact.

In December Zarubin drove with Morros to Connecticut, where they met with Alfred Stern and his wife Martha Dodd Stern. Soviet intelligence wanted to use an investment from the Stern's in Morros sheet music company to serve as cover for espionage. The Stern's invested $130,000 in the Boris Morros Music Company.

In 1947 Morros became a counterspy for the FBI. He then reported on Jack Soble and members of the Soble spy ring, while also passing low-level secrets and misinformation back to Moscow. Morros' codename in Soviet intelligence and the Venona files is "FROST."

His credits include the Laurel and Hardy film The Flying Deuces and Second Chorus with Paulette Goddard and Fred Astaire. Morros also worked with Bing Crosby, Ginger Rogers, and Rudy Vallee.

Internet links

• Listing at Internet Movie Database

Source

• Boris Morros, My Ten Years as a Counter-Spy (London: Werner Laurie, 1959).
• The Mocase Case.