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Not later than January 5, 1944

TESTAMENT

p I want to leave a brief testament in case I die in battle with the German invaders.

p I am a Communist. This small candidate card No. 5902866 and my devotion will carry me on until the invaders are completely routed.

p The Bolshevik Party is my leader and inspires me to fresh exploits in battle.

p I have been brought up to be a devoted son of my country and the Red Army, a Soviet officer, and everything I gained as’a result of hard work in the Syzran Tank School I have put to full use on the field of battle.

p I shall fight the enemy until my last drop of blood and my last gasp.

p My request to you, my comrades, is to write to my parents after my death and tell them how I fought for my country, how I shot up the nazis and their machines and guns from my tank and how I died.

p Please send on my Party card and other documents you find on me to my dear mother and father. Let them have this testament too. May these simple sheets of paper remind them of their son Georgi and how he died during the war.

p Their address: Ivan Moroz, Bezymyannaya station, Saratov Region.

p Bolshevik greetings to my dear sister Feodosiya-all the best in your studies.

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p Greetings to my dear comrades Nadezhda Riesman and Valentin Savichev.

p Greetings to my college instructors-Captain Zuyev and Sen. Lt. Golyashov and all the others.

Written before the battle,
Jun. Lieutenant G. Moroz

p Junior Lieutenant Moroz’s tank unit received instructions to disrupt an important enemy transport artery. The tank under his command was the first through enemy lines, but then it was hit and came to a halt. The tank crew continued to shoot down the enemy. When ammunition gave out, Georgi Moroz ordered his crew out of the tank and himself covered their retreat.

p Enemy soldiers were creeping up on the tank from all sides. Jun. Lt. Moroz hurled his last grenades. Many nazi soldiers fell but more and more surged on relentlessly towards the lone Soviet tank. Now Moroz had only his pistol. His one thought was to kill as many nazis as he could but to leave one bullet for himself so as not to be taken prisoner.

When his men eventually got through to him they found him dead. In the pocket of his tunic they came across the testament written in ink on a sheet of paper.

Georgi Moroz