[This is an excerpt from the autobiography of my father, Ervin Williger-Varnagy), who died in 2003. It was December 1956, and Bela Barsony, my mother Ily’s brother, and his wife Erzsi had just fled Hungary. This is how they went from Hungarian refugees with a dime to getting a job in Canada.]

Now it was our turn. At Ily’s office a small group of people finalized their plans to leave the country. They asked us to go along.

Ilys parents had no qualms. They offered to keep our baby until there was an opportunity to follow us without risking her life. How long would that take? Nobody knew. We did not even know whether such an opportunity would ever exist.

It was obvious that we had to leave before the first snowfall. With snow on the ground the danger of detection and capture was almost inevitable.

There were new rumors about people disappearing from their homes in the middle of the night. The terror had started again. As usual, the arrests were random. Nobody was safe. My colleagues from the Chemical Society had almost all gone to the West. Even the secretary who typed our “declaration of solidarity” to the revolutionary government was gone. That declaration was but one potential reason for my arrest.

I asked my mother to come and talk to me. We did not dare to go to Buda, since there were police checkpoints on the bridges. She volunteered to come and meet me in the Pest side of the city. My brother Karcsi was with her.

We talked on a bench on Andrassy ut, the same road we walked on with Ily on our wedding day. To me it seemed that this was the road of destiny, once more. Mom told me that she had talked with my stepfather. They did not tell me to stay, they did not advise to go. It was up to me. I sat there on the bench, thinking. Inside I heard a voice: “you must go…” I asked Karcsi what he would do in my place.

He said that his position was different. Neither he or his wife had a college degree. And Panni would not leave her aging parents. When Karcsi and I hugged each other, Mom had tears in her eyes. They turned around and walked away quickly, without ever looking back. I suspect they did not want to give me a chance to change my mind.

It was nearly forty years later that Karcsi and Panni visited us in our home in Ohio, and met our children. They stayed with us for two months. When it was time to return to Hungary, he asked me in private: “why did you not insist that we come along with you?”

…Water under the bridge… Besides: how could I?

The agony of separation

I went home and told Ily that we are leaving. Now came the hard decision: Should we take the baby with us or leave her with her grandparents? We both felt that we would go mad from this decision. This is a decision I would not want any parent to face. But we had to decide, and decide soon.

We made one more round of phone calls to people who had relatives already in Austria or had news from the situation on the border. Most people told us that it was extremely risky to travel with a child. We had waited too long, it was already the middle of December. The weather had turned wintery, the roads were dangerous.

We were told about groups of would-be escapees who were arrested and returned because the baby’s cry gave them away to the border patrol. At this point, no one wanted to travel with a family with small children. There were stories of others who had given their infants sleeping pills, but misjudged the dose. The babies never woke up on the other side of the border. They told us about one mother who had a nervous breakdown after she discovered that she had carried a dead child in her arms for hours.

Later, when I served as an interpreter at a red-cross station in Austria I saw one little blue corpse in the arms of the mother.

Back in Budapest, we did not know any of this for sure. We were not even certain that we could make it safely to Austria. We were torn apart. It was my Grandma who made up our minds for us. She swore to us that she would take care of our baby no matter what, and that she would stop at no sacrifice to bring her out safely to us as soon as the situation permitted. I had seen her fight with the AVO, and I knew she would be true to her word.

We spent the last night doting over our baby. We fed her supper, gave her a bath and Ily held her on her knees for a long time, talking to her, reassuring her that we loved her very much, and we would be together again very soon.

We both kissed her and put her to bed. Ily said, “Goodby my little darling…” We both sobbed and Grandma cried with us.

It was time to gather up our few possessions and leave. We would never see our home, our furniture, our mementos again. Being caught with gold, jewelry or papers was proof to the police that we were planning to escape; so we could not take anything like that. We had on two sets of underwear, two suits of clothes and carried a small briefcase with some documents and personal belongings. Our most precious possession was invisible, imprinted on our brains: a degree in chemical engineering and a degree in architecture. It was enough to provide us comfortably with everything we needed in our new life. We had practically no material possessions as we hugged Ily’s parents one last time and under the cover of darkness we stole out of the apartment. It was the l8th of December 1956.

Goodbye to our home

We spent the night at the Juhász’s apartment so we coul have one last planning session for the trip. There were five of us in the group. Two couples: Ily and I, Leslie and Mártha Juhász. The fifth was Joe Hecks, who left his estranged wife and their one child behind. Leslie, Joe and Helen were colleagues from the same office. Leslie’s wife and I were the outsiders. At twenty-nine years of age, I was the oldest of the five.

Our cover story was that we are going to relatives of Mártha Juhász, to attend a wedding in western Hungary, at Zalaegerszeg, a town near to the Austrian border. We chose our route, because it was out of the way of the direct traffic to the border. Mártha’s parents lived there, and since Ily had spent many summer vacations there, she was quite familiar with the Rába river and the border area.

The main railroad stations in Budapest were patrolled by the Soviets, so we decided to use the less popular Kelenföld station, the same one where we arrived from Austria in 1945. I could not help but notice the irony…

There were eight seats in the compartment. Our party plus three other passengers who were already seated there, filled it all. Hungarians are a talkative people. Under normal circumstances, there would have been introductions and exchange of information about who is traveling where and why. That evening we all sat there without saying a single word.

We left the station more or less on time, without any questions from the authorities. But as the conductor came along to check our tickets, he was accompanied by two armed AVO man. Those who had tickets to Györ, a major railroad cross-point, and further west, were questioned by the AVO man. Identities were checked. Since we were going southwest, they left us alone. They accepted the story about the wedding, because Mártha’s parents lived in Zalaegerszeg.

We arrived late at night and walked the short distance to the house. They were expecting us, although they did not know which day we were coming. We had supper and bedded down for the night. The two women and Leslie slept in the parents large bedroom, while Joe and I slept on folding beds in the dining room. Before I fell asleep, I noticed that Joe and Magda whispered together for a long time in low voices so I could not understand. Before she went to bed Mártha kissed Joe goodnight.

The next morning we had a conference with our hosts about the next move. We were a mere twenty-five miles from the border. But we could not use the major roads since they were patrolled by the Russians. Also the roads ran east-west and the border was to the north. Martha’s father arranged with a farmer whom he trusted to drive us on the backroads to a village South of the Rába river, only a few miles from the border. Since it gets dark early in December in Hungary, it was dark when we took of in the wagon. Mártha’s dad came along.

We spent the night with another peasant family. They were friends of Mártha’s father’s. I think the village was called Rábafüzes. They took a considerable risk by sheltering us since those who helped escapees risked being sent to concentration camp or worse. Bless their heart, they did it anyway. This time we slept four to the bed, fully clothed, under a heavy comforter. I did not sleep too well.

After breakfast our host hitched his wagon and we took off for our final leg to the border. After driving through dirt roads for hours, we finally reached the river Rába. It was not too deep, we guessed it would reach just above our knees at that point; it was fordable. But, being December, it was freezing cold.

We said goodbye to Mártha’s dad. Looking back after all these years, I realize he was another Messenger sent to us by God. Then we stripped to our underwear for the river crossing. The old man stood at the riverbank, crying. He kept calling after me: “Take care of my little daughter!” I assured him that I would. Alas that was one promise I could not keep.

Leslie went in the water first and Joe followed. Mártha whispered to Ily that she could not get wet, so I volunteered to carry her over on my back. I handed my briefcase to Ily who was the last in the water.

We were all in a somber mood, but I could not help noticing the way Joe was crossing the river. He was a short person to begin with. He was bare footed and in his boxer shorts, wearing his jacket, white shirt and tie. Joe waded in the water, carrying his briefcase. His strides were that of a businessman going to the office in the morning. And at every step he dunked the briefcase with all his earthly possessions in the water. I found the way he walked, the water soaking his jacket, with an “I don’t give a damn!” expression on his face was hilarious.

On the far side we gathered together, our legs frozen blue, shivering. A young gypsy boy of about nine or ten years old came along and sold to us three sticks of matches for a hundred forints. (In the store an entire box was sold for half a forint.) We gathered some driftwood and made a small fire to dry and warm up a little. After that we got dressed and headed for the small farmhouse and barn that our host with the wagon had pointed out to us. We were told that they were friendly people and frequently guided refugees across the border.

First we entered the house but the farmer told us to go to the barn. We found a dozen people already there, waiting to cross the border. The main rail line to Austria, also a principal highway, ran between the farm and the border. It was frequently patrolled by Soviet armored carriers, which carried a squad of infantry inside. There was nothing to do but to wait until darkness fell to cross these barriers. Again, nobody made small talk. We did not want to know our traveling companions in case we were captured. We just sat in the hay and ate the sandwiches we carried with us.

By seven o’clock it was sufficiently dark to risk crossing. A young man from the house collected all the Hungarian money we carried, about a thousand forints each. That was two week’s wages for a well-paid tradesman. He led us out of the barn, pointed toward the railroad tracks and warned us about the patrols which he said came “about every half an hour.” He also told us to always bear to the left, westward, and remember not to go north, because we might walk right back to Hungary. With that said, he turned around and went back to the house, leaving us on our own. Not much guidance for almost twelve thousand forints… But he had risked a lot just by talking to us.

We walked to the banks of the railroad tracks, and crossed to the other side. The land was flat. About a hundred yards ahead of us was the highway. There was a fairly large well nearby, really a large concrete ring, the only place to take cover. We ducked behind it and waited for the patrol to pass.

After about fifteen minutes we saw the headlights of two oncoming vehicles. They traveled slowly, with the top open to allow one solder to scan the landscape with binoculars. By some miracle they did not notice us. They passed and darkness fell on the countryside.

We crossed the highway in a hurry. On the other side there was a grassy slope, that looked like a cornfield in the darkness. The crop had been harvested. Past the field was a wide, muddy strip that used to be the minefield. The mines had recently been removed because of the elections in Austria. The communists took a terrible beating at the polls, because the opposition transported busloads of people to the border to show them the brutal reality of the Iron Curtain. After their Austrian comrades complained, the Hungarians removed the mines.

We started to walk in the direction we were told. There was not one star in the sky, no light anywhere, not a sound in the darkness. It was hard walking in the mud, so we made slow progress. Others started to fall behind, but the five of us were young, and we continued on at a brisk pace. We did not ask for or offer help to anyone else. It was every man for himself.

After about a half a mile we found a dirt path that led into a small growth of trees. Gradually we entered the forest, but here we found another obstacle. The trees had been cut so that they fell into our path from both directions. We were forced to climb over them. In the darkness that was not easy, and we kept sliding and falling. Although no one had a compass, someone knew that moss grows on the northern side of a tree. Would did not dare risk using our small flashlight, so we groped around in the darkness to feel for the moss on the bark of the trees. All the time we were moving westward – or what we thought was West – to avoid going back into Hungary. The group spread out even more and soon there were only the five of us left together.

It seemed that we had been wandering among the trees forever. We were not even sure the path was still there. Every so often one of us bumped into a tree, and there was a muffled outcry of pain. We would stop and wait, join up together and keep walking in the darkness. Since I had lost my watch in one of my many falls, I did not know what time it was.

Suddenly Leslie cried out. He had walked headfirst into something, almost knocking himself out. As we gathered around him, I noticed that he had bumped into a concrete post. Cautiously we shined our small flashlight on it to se what it was. It was a border marker to Austria. It was December 21, 1956, about ten o’clock at night when I left Hungary for the second time. [The first was in 1944.]

Once more a homeless refugee

We arrived to freedom exhausted, cold, penniless, stateless, but exhilarated.
We were young, healthy and full of hope.

We had another half hour of slipping and sliding ahead of us, but guided by the barking of some dogs we reached the outskirts of the Austrian village of Deutschbilling. I have loved dogs since that night…

I also noticed that by morning we had the first snowfall of the year. We were lucky in that respect too. Those who tried to escape after us left their footprints in the snow, making it easier for the Soviets to track them down. It also showed the routes that volunteer guides had used to help other refugees. The snow made escaping much more dangerous and difficult.

In the dining area, a mountain of sandwiches and more hot chocolate waited for us. I learned that they had all been made by a young Swiss girl, who slept on the top of a table, and had made up to five hundred sandwiches every day for Hungarian refugees for the past four weeks. Her hands were raw. They told us that she was a concert pianist. May God bless her for this labor of love.

Early afternoon the buses arrived and we were transported to Güssing, a larger community nearby. The Franciscan fathers opened their monastery for us. There were several large halls, probably their working area or assembly hall. Men and women were separated and we all slept on the floor on blankets. Christmas was only two days away.

It is hard to recall all of the many acts of kindness we received from the Austrian population. There was one incident however which I will never forget. It was winter and Joe was very lightly dressed, and had no overcoat. When one farmer noticed this, he called Joe to his house, took out his “best” coat from the cabinet and gave it to him. For centuries the Austrians and Hungarians were at war with each other, but from that point, I knew with certainty that we had become brothers.

My fluency in German and familiarity with the local customs came in handy. We had been on the road for many days at that point, without any opportunity to bathe. When I found out there was a small hospital in the town, I walked in and asked them if I could have a bath. They let me use one of their bathrooms and I soaked in the hot water for a long time. I never enjoyed a bath so much.

Christmas was a bittersweet event since we missed our loved ones. They did not know yet whether we had made it successfully to freedom. But the Christmas dinner… I don’t think our hosts really appreciated our hunger for “luxury ” food like oranges. They peeled a large amount of oranges for fruit salad. The smell of oranges was all over the building. We found the mound of orange peels and ate them as if we were starving. During dinner an elderly gentleman, possibly from the Red Cross, amused himself by tossing us snacks, as if we were monkeys in the Zoo. It did not matter. We grabbed them and enjoyed them like never before.

The next day at lunchtime another visitor came by. It was another “messenger,” although I did not realize it. It was the Hungarian Count Szechy, who left Hungary in 1945 and never returned. He had enough land and property in Austria to live on. But he was a patriot and cared for the refugees. He walked around by the tables, and talked to the people. When he came to us, he asked me if we were well looked after. I said yes, but I had a problem. I explained to him that I had friends in Vienna, and wanted to get in touch with them but had no money for bus fare. He said something like “we’ll see what can be done” and moved on.

The next morning the Pryor called me to the office. I was told that the Count had left bus fare for us so we could travel to Vienna. It was for all five of us. Before he gave me the money, he asked for our identity cards so he cold make sure that we were really married couples…

We said our thanks and bid goodbye to our hosts, and left Gussing. (About a year later I made it a point to send a hundred dollars to the abbey – quite a bit of money for us – as a gift of gratitude.)

We were eager to move on, as far away as possible. Australia and South America were the popular destinies, but anything overseas was OK. Not that we had much choice. Many western European countries wanted no part of us. Others had stringent health restrictions. An appendectomy scar was enough to be rejected for “medical reasons” Béla was not accepted for Australia because he was too short-sighted. He went to England, which was, as it turned out later, a much better choice.

The U.S., my current adopted country, was the most bureaucratic and hypocritical of all. At first they airlifted a few thousand people from the camps, but after that, they only admitted those who had American citizens or institutions “sponsoring” them. That meant that the sponsor accepted total financial responsibility for the new immigrants until they could support themselves. The only ethnic group that took such responsibility was the Jewish community which meant that for a long period of time, the only people accepted for US immigration were Jews.

It could be that someone remembered that in 1939 America refused to admit Jews seeking refuge from Hitler.

It was most surprising to meet among the refugees some Russian solders who fought alongside the Hungarian freedom fighters against Khrushchev’s Bolsheviks. Nobody knew it at that point, but the end of the “glorious” Soviet Union was near. (During our visit to Budapest some thirty years later we also saw the graves of Russian soldiers who gave their lives fighting for a free Hungary.)

On January 21st, we received five dollars in spending money, boarded the train, and left friendly Austria for Trieste, Italy, to embark for the New World.

A cruise-ship to remember

After the rundown, threadbare communist trains we were used to riding on, the train ride on the plush Austrian express was a dream. We arrived to Trieste on the evening of January 22nd, 1957. We were treated to the best Italian dinner in my memory (including a paid Italian cruise forty years later). We slept in a small but comfortable hotel and in the morning, took buses to the harbor. Time to embark! This was the first time I have seen the good ship SATURNIA.

The Saturnia was a 26,000 ton displacement cruise ship, of Italian registry. Its prime functions were Mediterranean cruises and to transport Italian immigrants to the New World. The immigrants traveled third class. We were booked in the second class. We had a two-bunk cabin with a private bath and a porthole, which was nice. In good weather we could have some fresh air, which we did not appreciate until we discovered that the ship’s ventilation system did not work too well. Below us the third class passengers did some of their own cooking, so our cabin was soon saturated with what we called “Saturnia-stench” – it was a mixture of burned vegetable oil, garlic and human odor. (Third class did not have the luxury of shower stalls in every cabin, like we did.)

When the ship departed, the orchestra played the then very popular song: “Arrivederci Roma”, say goodbye Rome… While the Italians cried their hearts out, we spat in the water and shouted: good riddance Europe! We did not want
to see that place again, full of so many bad memories.

Then we went to Barcelona, Spain. Despite the fact that it was late January, the sea was deep blue, the dolphins were playing around the ship and people were swimming in the pool on the deck. The water was smooth like glass. In Barcelona we were shipbound once more – no shore leave for stateless people… But at least we could see a little of that beautiful city from the ship.

When we crossed into the Atlantic, the color of the water turned grayish black and the waves became noticeable. The ship sailed along the coast to Lisbon, Portugal. Here the local Hungarian colony visited the ship (again, no shore leave for us). These were the families who arrived in 1945 with admiral Horthy, who took political asylum in Portugal from the western Allies. (He was considered to be at the very least a participant in the war, and possibly a war criminal. He could have ended up in Soviet hands which meant either being shipped to Siberia or the rope. Our countrymen were warm and loving but having lived in Portugal so long did not really appreciate our predicament. They asked us about the situation in Hungary, gave us rosaries and religious articles and wished us all the best for our new life. At that time we did not realize that these Hungarians were very poor and had had a tough life in exile.

We left Lisbon at night. The next morning the storm started.

Helen [Ily] must come from a long line of seafaring people since she was never seasick at all. She had an excellent appetite for the entire trip, and ate breakfast with gusto. It never bothered her that some of the waiters were even a little green when they brought the food to our table.

I did not eat at all. I found out the hard way just how sensitive I was to motion sickness. Soon I was on deck, by the rail, feeding the fish. Next to me an Italian sailor stood, in uniform, with a chest full of medals. I asked him, that with his naval service, why he still had motion sickness? He just pointed to the submariner’s dolphin on his chest, the poor devil.

The humor of the situation came the next morning. Helen told me that she had a sore throat which I mentioned it to our cabin steward, who only understood that the signora is “sick,” which at that time could only mean seasickness. At mealtime, he showed up with a glass of milk and a single piece of toast. Helen starved all day. She was probably the only one on the whole ship who had enjoyed a good meal.

We kept setting our clocks backwards as we moved through the western longitudes. One morning we awoke to the sight of the ship’s deck covered with a thick coating of ice. Our new country, Canada extended her frosty welcome to us.

We land on the shores of the New World

Our ship set anchor in the port of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, on the 12th of
February 1957.

Before we left the ship we took advantage of the duty free bar on the Ship one more time. Our already depleted fortunes yielded two more drinks per person. We set foot in Canada with two suitcases, and 10 cents (US) in our pockets. The Canadian dollar was at the time the worlds hardest currency, at 113 U.S. cents. That meant that our fortune was less than 10 Canadian cents.

In contrast to what I have heard of the U.S. Immigration service, the Canadians were friendly, quick and efficient. They had translators on hand and processed approx. 800 Hungarians and I don’t know how many Italians, in just a few hours. We were told that unless we had friends and relatives who could take care of us for a while, that our best bet was to accept the government’s hospitality. They gave us food and lodging for a month, but at a location of their choice. As a policy they channeled new immigrants to the sparsely populated prairie provinces. Our destiny was Winnipeg, Manitoba. Since we had no preference,this was fine with us.

Winnipeg

We arrived to Winnipeg in the middle of winter. Just the week before, we had enjoyed the balmy Mediterranean climate, but now we had to cope with sub-zero weather.

We were billeted in the “immigration hall,” maintained for newcomers like us by the Canadian government. The idea was to keep us alive until we learned enough English to be able to hold down a job and support ourselves. That was more than we expected. Although, to admit it as it was, we were a very cocky bunch, hot from being the “heroes of the uprising,” and we thought that the world owed us one since everyone had let us down against the Russkies.

Soon we learned a few facts of life. First, a large number of “old” Hungarians, who escaped AFTER the 1919 communist revolution lived in Winnipeg. Even after thirty years, hey remained confirmed Marxists. The local office of the “Hungarian Communist Party” still had a picture of the hated Soviet vassal Rákosi in the window. During the Russian occupation he was Stalin’s proconsul, but by that time he was even “out” in Hungary

There were also people who had left Hungary in 1945, but never returned to the country. They spent a rough time in the “Dipi” (displaced persons) camps, where they were treated as suspected war criminals. After they crossed the Ocean,(the lucky ones) they had to repay their transportation costs to the Canadian government. They never received any special favors from anyone and because of this, they were jealous of us and disliked us.

Then we had to cope with the bad reputation that some of our own comrades Had earned for us. There are bad apples in every barrel, and there were those who believed the Hollywood myth that in “America” it is enough to pretend that you are a doctor or engineer and you can get away with it. (Under the years of Soviet rule, lying to the authorities, stealing and cheating became acceptable behavior as long as you did not do it to your own people.) They soon found discovered the consequences of their behavior, but we had already started to see a certain new bias toward us, thanks to those hooligans.

Our future was far from certain, but suddenly a whole string of “messengers” came into our life.

Someone is looking out for us

Even today I cannot recall those first days in Winnipeg without awe. Around us many of our people were swept away to poverty, uncertainty and trouble, but ours followed the straight path.

It all started with the notice that a free English course was available in the dining hall. French language is seldom used in Canada outside Quebec, except where it is required by law (like in writing on toothpaste tubes). Realizing the importance of speaking the main Canadian language, we made an effort to learn English as fast as we could. Our teacher was a volunteer, a nice retired schoolteacher named Mrs. Wilson. We took to each other and became fast friends. After a few weeks we managed to converse with her. She learned of our adventures and how we left our baby behind. She understood our loss and shared our grief.

One day she invited us to their home for dinner. Her husband was a very nice old gentleman of the “British” mold, with Scottish background. He was also a “messenger” to take care of us.

He was very interested in everything we had to say, particularly when he found out about our academic backgrounds. We talked at length about my work at the Plastics Institute at Budapest, and about my knowledge of polymer science. As it turned out he was the owner-manager of a placement firm for technical people. (I never heard that such a thing existed! I had just been looking for a job as a photographer’s apprentice the day before.) He composed a resume for me and sent it out to a number of firms who had previous contact with him.

He was also a member of the local Rotary club and thought that I had enough English to give a presentation at the next monthly dinner. He helped me to write a speech, which included the fact that we had to leave without our baby girl. This had a very great emotional appeal on the good people of Canada.

My speech was a success. I even managed to answer a few questions about Hungary in general and myself in particular. It came out that I was a chemical engineer.

After the meeting a gentleman came to me and gave me a card with his phone number. He was the director of Ogilvie flour mills, a large conglomerate in flour milling and food processing, and also one of my “messengers.”

I showed up for the interview in my “best” outfit (which did not amount to much). The first thing he did was to make me write down the Arabic numerals from one to ten, explaining that in English speaking countries one NEVER crosses the number seven. (With the arrival of computers that is changed by now). Next I was escorted to the lab. It was surprisingly large for what I knew about flour milling, but entirely familiar. I was shown to a rather old analytical balance, just like the one we had in the lab back at the University. He asked me if I could take it apart and calibrate it. Could I ever! I also promptly recognized a battery of Kjeldahl flask which were set up for testing the nitrogen (protein) content in the flour.

They must have been properly impressed with my expertise because I was offered a job on the spot, beginning the next morning. My salary was a princely sum for a freshly arrived refugee: Can $150.00 per month. My benefactor shook hands with me and asked me if we had any place to stay? I told him that we had none.

The next morning a very dignified Canadian lady came into the room smiling. She introduced herself as Mrs. Ella Gibson and invited us to stay with them – as house guests and family members. I did not realize it, but we had just met our Canadian mom.

In less than three weeks in Canada I had a professional job, a home with a well to do Canadian family and a placement agency working for me to get me a permanent job. You may call it luck or coincidence. Knowing what happened to others in Vienna, to me this was no coincidence. Divine Providence was guiding us, every step at the way.

1956 was a very special year.

In the first few days of January, an early morning streetcar derailed and plunged from the Margit Bridge into the Danube.

A few days later, Budapest was shaken awake at daybreak by the earthquake at the suburb Soroksár.

In February, on leap-year-day, I married Dr. Denis Szokolay. Circumstances of the times did not make it possible for us to have an apartment of our own. We lived separately in rented rooms, either one of them too small for two people. As a budding architect I was already working on the plans for subdividing a nook of a studio we could call our own, hoping we could build it in a year or two.

We both worked. But by fall our circumstances hadn’t changed. We grabbed whatever time we could together. Sometimes it meant simply talking to each other from the office phones (we had none at home) or meeting and having dinner together at my parents’ apartment. This was not what you would consider typical married life.

On the 23rd of October the news spread like wildfire: there was going to be a demonstration in front of the Parliament where the 16 Point petition, drawn up by students, for human rights and against the Soviet occupation, would be presented. Denis and I agreed to go to the scene with our respective colleagues, and we’d see what would happen.

Along with all the others, (several hundreds of thousands, as it turned out) we went to the Parliament, listened to the reading of the Petition, partook in the cutting out the communist symbols from the middle of the red-white-green Hungarian flag and sang the National Anthem with torches improvised from rolled-up newspapers. From there we went with the crowds to the Bem Memorial – a symbol of events commemorated and sung about by innumerable bards and historians.

I got home, with the unforgettable memory etched in my head, of having participated in the most civilized Revolution of history. Denis came over since we had no phones. We discussed the events of the evening, then he went home.

The next day we showed up at our respective offices but, of course, nobody worked that day. We exchanged news, weighed the events of the evening before, and shared our hopes for the future, just learning that there were already some shootings citywide. That evening, we got together at my place again. We listened to the Voice of America and the BBC in the bathroom, the only room which did not have walls adjacent to neighboring apartments. In order to share information and hope with others who had no means of getting it elsewhere, Denis, reviving his stenographic skills, took notes from the radio reports, as I muffled the typewriter sounds with pillows and typed as many copies with carbon paper as would fit into the machine. I then typed another batch, and then some more until our paper supply ran out.

By the next morning nobody was going to work anymore. I stashed the freshly typed news under my coat, “hiding them into my bosom.” Every time I saw a child in the street, I pulled out a batch of the news for him to take home and distribute in his neighborhood. Strangers, who typically walked with heads down, now addressed me jubilantly on the Lánc híd: “Have you heard? The UN troops landed at the Dunántúl!”

Denis met with his friends at Pest. The Smallholders’ Party had already started to get organized. They wanted him to run in expected elections on several (city, county, nationwide) tickets. Amidst the shootings and bloodshed the planning of the future had already begun. A Jewish friend of ours started to work on the founding of a new Christian Democratic Party. By the time the Revolution claimed victory, the interim government reported receipt of 120 applications to start new political parties… The longtime one-party-system had boiled down to a festering head.

The Rebirth of the Smallholder’s Party
For the first time in my life, I felt I had a country. The irredentism during my childhood seemed affected, though the re-annexing of parts of historic Hungary, torn away by the post-WW I Trianon pact, brought some genuine hope. But soon that was followed by the German occupation and then, over the ruins, the Soviets took over. Now, in the last days of October, 1956, for the first time, was I a real Hungarian.

During one of the evenings of “victory” Denis brought the news that the Smallholders predicted three possible scenarios for the future:

1. The Soviets withdraw, we’ll hold free elections and establish a coalition government which, by geographic necessity, will be of pinkish hue.

2. The Soviet Union would not accept defeat and Hungary turns into a second Korea.

3. The West intervenes and a third world war starts over us.

At this point, the next step became crystal clear to me:

“There is only one conclusion from all this: we have to leave.”

The next day news of some withdrawal of Soviet troops started to circulate. Soon, however, the reported movement in the East turned out to be deployment of new troops.
Denis and I agreed: we must not stay in the country.

Yes, leave… But how? We had to find transportation.

That very evening, we visited our friend Tony who had a Jeep. It just so happened that his Austrian wife was on a visit in Vienna. We surmised that he would feel like trying to follow her and we might join him in the Jeep.

He certainly agreed, but only under the condition that both his little daughters could go with Austrian passports. One of the girls had a passport but Tony had to apply for the other daughter’s at the consulate the next morning.

At the crack of dawn we rode with him and the girls to the consulate at Rózsadomb.

Two Austrian vehicles were already lined up in front of the building, a pick-up truck and a VW mini-bus. They had delivered food and medications to Budapest and were now waiting for their return papers as well as some passengers. We expected to ride in the Jeep along with the other two vehicles but, considering the autumn chill and the fact that we were all heading to the same destination, I was allowed in the mini-bus along with the other women and children, while the men were directed to the pick-up truck. With the exception of one family and ourselves, all passengers had valid passports. The three-vehicle convoy was ready to leave, Tony’s two-year old little girl was sitting in my lap but back at the office, her six-year old sister was denied a passport by the consul! Tony accompanied us in the Jeep with his two little ones to the edge of the City, then, in tears, he turned back, not daring to take the risk.

His wife in Vienna cried hysterically hearing our account of the events. She returned to Hungary and it took the family several years to finally get to freedom together.

Encountering mixed fortune during our attempted escape, Denis and I only met up with each other in Vienna a few days later. Camouflaged as luggage in the mini-bus, I escaped safely over the border the same day we left. Denis was not so lucky. His feet were seen sticking out from under a tarp in the back of the truck. He was dragged out of the truck at the border, jailed overnight and released the next morning. No sooner had he been set loose than he took off for the fields running, never stopping until he reached safety in Austria.

On November 3rd, we thought we were among the last ones to cross the border. At the time we couldn’t possibly have dreamt that we were the beginning of the Hungarian mass migration of the twentieth century.

Postscript
Many years later, in the ‘90’s, the then commodore of our yacht club was trying to be friendly, and told me that he was born in Austria but had lived in Budapest in the ‘50’s.

His Father was the Austrian consul in Budapest… I never spoke to him again.


Olga Vallay Szokolay
Olga Vallay Szokolay is an architect and educator. She graduated from both the Polytechnical University of Budapest and the University of Bridgeport, Connecticut, and served as Professor emerita at the Norwalk Community College. Since her retirement in 2003, she has focused solely on her architectural practice. Szokolay escaped from Hungary in 1956 with her husband, Dr. Denis T. Szokolay, who died in 2000. She currently resides in Redding, Connecticut, and has two daughters and two grandchildren.

A burst of gunfire shook the windows. It was midnight in Hungary, December, 1956. “Good God, curfew time lasts till seven in the morning. What am I going to do?”

I shook my husband, John. Startled from his dream, he reached for the phone. We were lucky. It still worked. The doctor’s advice was to try to wait. In case of emergency he would give us directions over the phone. The ambulance refused to come since it was a perfect target for the Soviets stationed right across from us, on the hillside – no cover whatsoever.

We held each other very close. The warmth of my husband comforted me as, with the passing of time, the cramps started coming.

The two children slept quietly in their cribs, not even occasional machine-gun bursts startled them. They were used to it by now. It was ten days after the Revolution was crushed; the fighting still was going on.

I could vividly remember now the morning when I was awakened by cannon fire after our four wonderful days of freedom.

“No, it can’t be. Hungary has a constitutional government, which declared the country neutral. We are out of the Warsaw Pact, and the Soviets must leave the country according to the U.N. decision,” my husband tried to comfort me. But he, too, knew it was cannon fire. He turned on the radio and we heard the message of the government: “The Soviet troops are coming back into the country. Our prime minister asked for help from the U.N. and we are fighting.” The Writers’ Association asked for the help of all people in the world. The message came in German, French, English, Russian and Hungarian. This went on for 90 minutes – and after that – everything was lost.

Now, ten days later, I was going to have my baby. I clung to my husband as the pains drew closer. Finally the first rays of the sun colored the sky pink, and the light gave me new hope as I tried to fight back the arrival of the baby.

At 7 a.m. we started running toward the hospital. Five long blocks of pain, cramps, blood and water, a few staring faces, distant machine-gun fire and more cramps melting into one incessant feeling of rupture.

When I arrived at the hospital, the only midwife there, who had worked alone for 48 hours, had no relief in sight. My doctor was not there yet. Several workmen were repairing the windows of the delivery room, which were shot out during the night. Two women were giving birth.

Then cramps and cramps again, unstopping, merciless cramps till the beautiful, happy cry of my son brought the long awaited relief from the suffering and fear. I saw my doctor lift him and put him on my stomach. He felt so soft, so sweet. And even the windows were repaired.

Remembering it all
Another ten days passed, and by that time we were determined to leave our homeland. Even though my husband was one of the promising young scientists who had every allowable privilege under the Soviet system, it seemed to us that if we wanted to bring up our children according to our beliefs, we had to leave.

All our belongings we hoped to take with us were packed into a small suitcase. Forty of us scrambled into a pickup truck in the freezing rain, and under a canvas held up by a broom.

As we left Budapest, we remembered the many beautiful concerts, operas, balls of former years, the 50-day siege during World War II, the hopes for freedom while trying to rebuild the country, then, the 1948 take-over by the communists with but 17 percent of the popular vote. The desperation, trials and tribulations every individual, every family had to go through. Our glorious Revolution with its four days of freedom – and the 20,000 fresh graves in the city.

The truck was already on the highway making good time, when all of a sudden we stopped with a jerk. An officer waved his arms in the middle of the road.

The driver handed him his documents. He was supposed to go to the border with some help to pick up a truck left there by refugees.

“With some help? Do you call 40 people ‘some help’?” he yelled at our driver. “See that you get back home!”

We turned around and I understood why he had no time to read papers, to check on people. There were so many would-be refugees that he simply sent them home.

On another route we ran at night, our truck came to a halt in front of a Soviet tank.
A Mongolian colonel approached; we were caught. He radioed for the Hungarian police, who arrived in a short time.

The police station was crowded with refugees.

“Everybody with children, here, into this room! The only one we can heat.”

We were shoved into a dark place, lit by a sole lightbulb in one corner of the room. While we settled down, the muffled storytelling went on and on:

“I swam across an icy river three times before I got caught, thinking every time that Austria was just on the other side…”

“We were sinking in the swamp, holding our children above our heads with our last strength…”

“My child is over there… he ran across to Austria when we were captured. We were already so near… so near…”

The usual sentence for illegal border crossing was two to three years of hard labor.

But in the morning they put us all on a bus and sent us to Budapest.

When the bus broke down, our police escort said, “You know your duties. I will be back in an hour and a half… of course, nobody can hold me responsible for whatever you do while I am away.”

We did not feel strong enough to walk to the border 20 miles away, with three small children, Louis being only ten days old. We started home. The train reached Gyõr by curfew and did not go farther. Everybody had to find a place in a hurry.

We saw a Red Cross building across the depot and ran. We found ourselves in the company of 600 people. There were beds, food and even medicine. We felt grateful and happy as we talked to the Red Cross lady, who, in an unguarded moment whispered in my ear:

“We are occupied by the police. We may give you whatever you need, but you cannot move out of this building. You are under arrest.”

The bus on which we were transported to Budapest the next day was supposed to go to another Red Cross building there, but they took us instead to police headquarters.

“Men should go inside the building, women and children can go home!” came the order. We dared not move. We heard of men being captured and taken to Siberia for no reason at all. All the women stayed and waited.

I pretended that I had to go to the bathroom. The stern guard still would not let me go inside, so I ran to an apartment building. I begged to make a phone call, and contacted the chairman of the Revolutionary Committee at the university who understood instantly what happened and what could be done.

“I am right now negotiating with the Justice Department about kidnappings which are taking place in the streets. Why, this is just such a case. From a Red Cross building… to police headquarters…”

Ten minutes later, his imposing figure pushed the machine gun-bearing guards aside and he stepped into police headquarters. Through the glass door we could hear voices: “Yes, it was the Red Cross building…” “They have taken us…” “Kidnapped is the word.”

Once more we felt the beauty of even limited freedom. We were allowed to walk home with our baggage, to come out from behind the bars… We were happy, yet depressed, as we felt that there was absolutely no way out of Hungary.

A passage to freedom
“Translate these papers into Russian for me, please!” my husband waved some documents at me while I was deep in thought about how in the world we could reach the border town of Sopron.

My sister had escaped to Vienna. She sent us word that we, too, could reach freedom, if we could get to friends in Sopron.

I was not much interested in my husband’s papers until I saw what they were. In less than an hour we had our counterfeit documents that would, hopefully, get us out of Hungary. My husband, as deputy chairman of the department at the university assigned himself to go to Sopron to resume teaching because their professor had escaped.

As the early darkness of the winter afternoon crept into our train compartment the next day, we noticed that the lights did not go on in our coach. We considered moving to another part of the train but decided to stay because the children were snoozing comfortably.

At the next station we felt “Providence” at work. The train stopped and Russian soldiers made everybody get off who did not have the No. 2 border-zone permit stamped into his passport. But when our door opened, it was a Hungarian soldier who appeared behind the flashlight. The Russians, it was said, were afraid of being murdered in the dark compartments.

“Where are you going?” he asked us.

“To Sopron.”

He did not know what he should think of us. If we were high officials, he’d better not argue with us, but if not… well, our papers looked official enough, he always had his excuse, and… a twinkle in his eye showed that he was thinking of the other possibility also. He really did not seem to mind if we wanted to escape…

“Thank you, professor, what a nice baby.” He slammed the door shut.

A near-fatal mishap
In Sopron came two days of silent waiting until our friends arranged for reliable guides. The children had to hold their cries, even their breaths, in order not to betray us. The house we stayed in was a house for retired people, and any noise from a child would have been suspicious.

Finally, an old guide led us out into the hills to reach the Austrian border on foot. When he stopped to wave his cane we also stopped! It meant danger. When he wiped the sweat off his bald head, it meant that we could go on. Behind him went our daughter, Helen, with a young couple. We were next with the two boys, the baby in the basket, and our two-year-old walking and looking for mushrooms, as we all pretended to be out only for a walk. After a while his small legs could not carry him any longer. He crawled into his Father’s knapsack and fell asleep.

The stars shone quietly over us after a two-day rain. There was no moon in the sky. A perfect night to escape.

We were on the last leg of our journey. I slipped and started sliding slowly down the hillside, at least this is what it felt like. I wanted to stop, but I could not. Then a small tug on my coat caught me. I stood up and smoothed my coat. There was a small hole. I looked back, and a barbed-wire fence stopped me from falling into a ravine-like terrace with stalks on the bottom of it, put there to hold up the vines.

If it had not caught me I would be dead. But there was no time to stop and reflect. In 45 minutes we would have to run two-and-a-half miles on the muddy lakeshore, after all that rain, to make it across the border.

The baby was whimpering, despite the sleeping pills we had given him. Janos slept in his Father’s knapsack; he too was drugged.

Only Helen, our 4-year-old, walked on her own little feet, looking straight ahead, then at us, with her huge, terrified, blue eyes.

She knew something was happening but could not comprehend it. She was trying to be good.

“Do you see those pear trees?” our guide pointed to some trees not too far way. “Three hundred feet beyond those is the Austrian border!”

How I wished he had not said it! Again, like the first time, when we were stopped by the Soviet tank, we had seen the lights of Austria. What if they would capture us again! I could no longer think. My mind, my legs, my whole body grew numb from fear, from desperation. But I heard a firm voice within:

“This time you are going to make it!”

I ran as fast as I could and pulled myself up from the ground for the fifth time, when all of a sudden I felt the softness of the “no-man’s-land” under my feet.

Then a small flag touched my hand.

As I looked, my husband’s radiant face and outstretched arms were greeting me. I fell into his embrace and started crying. We were in Austria.

This story first appeared in LADY’S CIRCLE magazine in September 1979.


Helen M. Szablya
Honorary Consul of Hungary for Washington, Oregon, and Idaho, Helen M. Szablya is an award-winning author, columnist, translator, and lecturer. Based in Seattle, she has two university degrees, speaks six languages, and many of her more than 700 publications have won awards. Szablya co-authored “Hungary Remembered,” an award-winning oral history drama/lecture series for the 30th anniversary of the Hungarian Revolution. “The Fall of the Red Star,” her award-wining book about an illegal Boy Scout troop during the 1956 uprising, was published for the 40th anniversary. Szablya recently received the Order of Merit of the Republic of Hungary for her consular and cultural work. She and her husband escaped in 1956 with two toddlers and a newborn. They have seven children and 16 grandchildren.

Please also read the story of Helen A. Szablya, the daughter of Helen M. Szablya

EXPECTATIONS
The summer and fall of 1956 were full of excitement and expectations in Hungary. Matyas Rakosi, “Stalin’s Best Disciple” resigned from the Central Committee of the Hungarian Communist Party, euphemistically named the “Hungarian Workers’ Party,” in July .The month of August was hot and sunny ,and it was relatively unproductive of significant news.
During September, on the other hand, we experienced the renewal of exciting political developments. The press began to expose the crimes and atrocities of the Rakosi-regime.
Gyula Hay , a well-known and popular writer, had written a widely circulated article and enumerated the “natural” rights of the literary creator, including the responsibility of telling the truth, the right of criticizing anybody or anything, to be sad or ecstatically in love., to believe in God or to deny God’s existence among others.
The Petõfi Kör (Petofi Circle) initiated a movement of establishing intellectual forums throughout Hungary; with increasing openness; these examined the problems the country and the nation had faced. On the 6th of October, the remains of Laszlo Rajk , Gyorgy Palffy, Tibor Szonyi and Andras Szalai were reinterred ,with military pomp and circumstance. In the middle of October, Imre Nagy’s membership in the Party (MDF) was restored. .On the 16th of October,the demands, voiced during a well-attended meeting of university students of Szeged, included the elimination of the compulsory teaching of the Russian language and significant reforms of university life .The students declared DISZ (Democratic Youth Society) to be irrelevant and re-established MEFESZ (Union of Hungarian University and Academy Students). Within days, the student bodies of Pecs, Miskolc and Sopron followed suit; finally, on October 22nd, the university students of Budapest joined in the movement and voiced their grave dissatisfaction with life in the universities. These were exciting, heady times, indeed, – only an incendiary spark was needed!

STUDENTS ON THE 23RD
23rd of October 1956 fell on a Tuesday, with warm, unusually pleasant and mild weather. The excitement was palpable throughout Budapest; students, workers, office employees openly discussed the developments in groups. The assembly at the Polytechnic Faculty (Muegyetem) produced the famous 14 points – these contained significant demands of reforms, related to the establishment a system of human rights, national independence and the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Hungary. The medical students of the Semmelweis University of Budapest (I was in my first year at that time) were definitely not in the forefront of activities and decision-making on that fateful day, but our enthusiasm and willingness to join in the demands for reforms was unquestionable.
A well-organized and enthusiastic demonstration started at the Statue of Petofi; from here the demonstrators marched to the statue of Bem on the Buda side of the capitol; here they listened to a speech by Peter Veres, writer and one-time Minister of Defense, sang the Hungarian anthem, the “Marseilles” and the “Kossuth Song.” One of the students read the “Fourteen Points.”
Imre Nagy spoke to the crowd at the Parliament – his address, recommending calm, restoration of the peace and return to home, was a source of disappointment. When he started to sing the Hungarian anthem, however, the crowd started to disperse. But many of those in the square did not return to their homes immediately. Instead, they walked to Dozsa Gyorgy ut in order to participate in or, at least, witness the toppling of the Statue of Stalin. Others proceeded to the building of the Hungarian Radio at Brody Sandor Street. The demonstrators demanded access to the airwaves, in order to broadcast their demands, including a reading of the “Fourteen Ponts.” A military force of 300-350, members of the ÁVO (the infamous State Security Authority) and soldiers had occupied the building in order to defend it. The standoff soon developed into a siege: the demonstrators hurled pieces of materials from a nearby construction site, while the defenders used teargas canisters or their bayonets. Finally after the use of preliminary warning shots, rounds of live volleys rang out repeatedly, and a number of demonstrators were wounded or died. The Revolution of October 23rd had become a historical fact.
Erno Gero, the newly and hastily appointed Secretary General of MDP, requested the military intervention of the Soviet Army, and the leadership in Moscow promptly complied. Contingents of the Soviet army reached Budapest in the early hours of October 24th – as a result, the Hungarian capitol had become a war zone.

GLORIOUS DAYS
Twelve glorious days followed: Hungarians, students, workers, children,-poorly armed and only occasionally reinforced- participated in a fierce combat in the streets of Budapest; they consistently exhibited remarkable heroism against overwhelming military odds, against a superior military force, and, at the end, miraculously, they were victorious.
In scenes reminiscent of the battle of Budapest during World War II the streets and squares of the capital were littered with derailed and disabled street cars, burned-out tanks and other military vehicles; while the victims of the combat- Hungarian fighters and Russian soldiers- were lying dead and, frequently, unattended for days. The stench at Nagykorut was overwhelming in those days. I saw when Stalin’s metallic head (previously part of the fallen statue in Varosliget) was hacked apart by angrily dedicated Hungarians at the corner of Rakoczi ut and Nagykorut. I also had the pleasure of warming my hands at the bonfire built from Soviet periodicals that had been heaved out of the Russian language bookstore, close to Oktogon.
As a medical student, I was called upon to work in a hospital, administering to the wounded; we were providing care to Hungarians and Russians alike. Using our rudimentary knowledge of Russian, we had repeatedly attempted to obtain information from the wounded soldiers regarding their conceived role in the fighting. The soldiers, most of them merely young boys, were frightened and confused. Some of them believed that they had been in battle at the Suez Canal.
The misery the military conflict had caused in human lives was frequently heart-rending. I shall never forget the sense of devastated horror of a beautiful sixteen-year old girl, upon learning that her left leg had to be amputated above her knee.

Political parties were organized within a few days. As the practical result of the newly instituted freedom of the press, newspapers were printed and widely circulated ; they presented a bewildering variety of opinions. We were overwhelmed,excited,almost intoxicated by the prospects of democratic change, independence and neutrality!
The Central Committee in Moscow appeared to have agreed to the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Hungarian soil – it appeared that the Revolution was victorious and our country was to become free and independent. A completely stunning historical development indeed!

NOVEMBER 4TH
In the early hours of November 4th, five Soviet divisions attacked the Hungarian fighting force, and the cruel reality of a tragically unavoidable defeat became much too apparent. Imre Nagy, Prime Minister of Hungary, informed the nation and the world: Hungary was being attacked by an overwhelming military force. The last message by Free Kossuth Radio was, unfortunately , quite futile in its tragic eloquence: “Help Hungary! Provide help for the Hungarian nation! Help the Hungarian writers, scientists, workers, peasants and intellectuals! Help! Help! Help!”

CONCLUSIONS
If attempting to evaluate the significance of the Revolution and Freedom Fight of 1956, my conclusions are unequivocal. The events and developments of October-November 1956 have proved to be the most significant defining experiences of my lifetime. I am truly grateful to my fate for the gift of witnessing a heroic nation, fighting for liberty and independence. I find it is inescapable to conclude that the Revolution and Freedom Fight of 1956 were triumphant historical events in their true context. They elevated Hungary’s image in the eyes of the civilized world, and the nation had truly “ascended” as the result of those glorious twelve days. The Hungarian Revolution did provide an early and significant impetus for the eventual break-up of the Soviet Empire and it had proved conclusively that the Soviet power was not invincible; as a matter of fact, it had become obvious that the Empire was highly vulnerable. I am convinced that those of us who lived in Hungary and had the opportunity to experience the miracle of 1956, had witnessed a remarkable historical moment during a most auspicious period in the life of 20th century Hungary.

Balázs B.Somogyi, MD
Currently an orthopedic surgeon, Somogyi left Hungary in December of 1956, settling in the United States in 1958. He was co-founder and director of the Hungarian Folk Ensemble of New York, is presently completing his second term as president of the Magyar Baráti Közösség (MBK), and is also president of the Hungarian Cultural Society of Connecticut (HCSC). He is the proud husband of Csilla and father of Zsuzsanna, Ilona and Judit, all three of whom are bilingual.

I was in my senior year at Wesleyan University when the Hungarian Revolution broke out. We students were transfixed by the news, and professors who knew about Hungary were in great demand, with impromptu teaching seminars, years before the “teach-in” became an accepted feature of American academic protest. Feeling powerless to help directly, as we all did, and outraged at the turn taken by events, I organized a Hungarian Relief drive on campus, and sent money to a refugee organization in Vienna. Also, full scholarships and free room and board were arranged for two Hungarian refugee students.

And that began a lifetime’s fascination with Hungary, her people and history. In the Foreign Service, following language training, I was assigned to Budapest as Consul and then Political Officer in 1970-1973, and then served as Hungarian Desk Officer from 1973 to 1975. It was a tumultuous time to live in Budapest. Cardinal Mindszenty was still in residence at the Embassy, and I spoke with him often, accompanying him on his late afternoon walks around the Embassy’s interior courtyard. Later, it was my privilege to offer testimony for his Canonization proceedings. Walking with the Cardinal was an education in Hungarian history and national character. My experiences with the Cardinal are set forth in my memoir Diplomatic Tales.

During that period, of course the Hungarian Revolution was officially viewed as a Counterrevolution, and proper research on the heroic sites was impossible. It as afterwards that I returned to Hungary, and completed the research necessary for my book Murder On The Danube, which is set against the backdrop of the Revolution, following the events as they took place from day to day. I was privileged to meet with experts on the period at the 1956 Historical Institute, and to give a seminar there. Many years later, I felt as privileged to give the annual address on the Hungarian Revolution at the Hungarian Embassy reception in Washington, D.C.

During my research, I discovered some little known facts about 1956. From an officer who served at the then American Legation, I found out that at no time did the Legation ask Washington for permission to give refuge to the Cardinal. Instead, the cable authorizing that refuge came “out of the blue” from Washington. And according to Monsignor Turcsonyi, that morning as security deteriorated, the Cardinal had merely asked where a “Western legation” was located. He did not specifically ask for the American Legation. Monsignor Turcsonyi knew that the American Legation was in nearby Szabadság Tér, and steered them both that way.

I also found some little known background to the massacre in Kossuth Square outside Parliament on October 25, 1956, which began with firing from the roof of the Agriculture Building across the square. There had been an explosion near the Széchenyi Rakpart just before that. According to an American eyewitness (the building contained American diplomatic apartments), it was an ordnance charge dropped from the apartment building roof, onto Russian tanks below. This explosion set in motion a sequence of events, resulting in the Kossuth Square massacre.

Nobody knows who dropped the ordnance. It could have been anyone, for “at that point, everyone wanted the Russians out.” An American Marine, G.J. Bolick, tried to get onto the Széchenyi roof, but it was bolted from above. And so we will never know exactly who set off the explosion. But it does seem possible that the initial firing in response may have been directed towards Szechenyi, setting off in turn uncontrolled firing at the gathered crowds in Kossuth Square. We may never know for certain. But this is why my book refers to “gunfire, or a muffled explosion” before the shooting began at Kossuth Square.

The 1956 Hungarian Revolution was an event of epochal importance, not just as a determining incident of the Cold War, although that was the immediate context. Before 1956, building on its capital as an ally in the fight against Hitler, the Soviet Russian empire could claim some moral legitimacy. After that, such claims were ludicrous. I hope that new generations of those who value freedom will long reflect on the courage shown by ordinary Hungarian citizens during those tumultuous days. My wife and I will be in Budapest for the 50th anniversary, and we look forward to walking the route that began the struggle on October 23rd, 2006.


William S. Shepard
A retired diplomat, he was the Republican nominee for Governor of Maryland in 1990. During his diplomatic career, he served in Singapore, Saigon, Athens, Budapest (as Consul and Political Officer), and retired as Consul General at Bordeaux. A Fulbright grantee and Harvard Law School graduate, he and Mrs. Shepard live in Oxford, Maryland. His novel dealing with the Hungarian Revolution, Murder On The Danube, and his memoir Diplomatic Tales, with personal memories of Cardinal Mindszenty, are available from www.amazon.com.

It was the afternoon of Friday the 26th or Saturday the 27th of October–dates are a little unclear–and a dark, cloudy, almost foggy afternoon. Anton and I left the Legation as dusk was falling, so as to be home before dark, and drove slowly through “Russian” Budapest. That was the defense circle in which the Soviets had dug themselves in most tightly; it included the Parliament, the Defense Ministry, the Ministry of Interior, all the bridgeheads on the Pest side of the river, and the area in which the Legation was situated. This section was relatively clean, as I now remember it, with little rubble on the streets, but no humans either except for the constant patrols of armored cars. We circumnavigated the tightest area, bristling with tanks, and drove down Bajcsy-Zsilinszki út to the West station and then down the “Boulevard” to the Danube. We were practically the only civilian traffic.

Face of the enemy
At the bridge, we eased between the two tanks facing the opposite side of the river, after the Russian and Hungarian army patrols had checked our papers and permitted us, as diplomats, to pass. I suppose it is easy at such a time to describe the face and feel of the enemy–they seem usually to be called “glowering” or “threatening”–and it is true these soldiers certainly did not give any evidence of camaraderie. But who can describe another’s inner feelings at such a time? Some Russians defected during the Revolution. Perhaps our “threatening Mongol” was one. Did he think he was standing on a Nile Bridge, or in Berlin, instead of over the Danube? What did the Hungarian do the day before, or the day after? How did he come, that day, to find himself patrolling the bridge with the hated enemy that his countrymen, with a unity unknown in their entire history, had just risen against? On the other hand, I suppose one has to give his momentary impressions of the enemy, subjective though these be, and not the ultimate truth of his make-up. I never saw a pro-Soviet force during the Revolution–man or tank–which struck me as anything but hostile and threatening.

We left the bridge, unguarded on the Buda side, and drove, always slowly, into Martírok utca, “Street of the Martyrs.” As soon as we turned the corner after leaving the bridge approach, the difference was noticeable: people were moving about in the streets. No armored cars, no tanks. The people were at ease, and friendly, though there were not many of them. We were now in no-man’s-land, where no Russian could come by day with impunity, but neither completely under insurgent control. This was the beginning of free Hungary.

The children
At the small square, Széna-tér, by the subway excavation, there was a road-block, manned by the free Hungarian “army” of the Széna-tér, the “gyermekek” or the “children,” later so damned and hunted by the Soviet puppet regime. The “children,” three teenagers with submachine guns, stopped us. They were tired, dirty and tense. Well might they be, since some of their group had died the night before and more were to die that night when the Soviet tanks left their daytime havens and came over in force. The “children” looked at our identification, and for the only time during the Revolution, examined our overnight bags for weapons. And as always, they and the people who crowded near asked for news, both from the other side of the river and from the world outside.

We passed on through the blockade of paving stones and three overturned railway coaches, pushed up the night before on streetcar tracks, and into the large adjoining square: Szél Kálmán-tér. Who now would have dared to use its Communist name of Moszkva-tér? This was free Hungary in reality. The crowds were thicker, as on a spring Sunday afternoon. But how was one to know then whether it was spring?

Along the Várfok ut leading up to the Vár where Anton lived, people stood by to let us pass and a few waved as we went by. We had an American flag draped over the hood of the car, although whether it was ever of any value as a safety measure I don’t know.

Flag of freedom, hope, and the future
I dropped Anton at his home, later completely destroyed by Soviet mortars, and retraced my way back down the Várfok út. As I did so–it was now almost dark–the crowds stood aside on the steep street, but this time began to clap as I drove by. We were accustomed during these days to getting nods and shouts of friendship from people on the streets, but as days passed these were already beginning to give way to such questions as: “What are you doing?” “When is America going to help?” “What is happening in the UN?” “When is Hammarskjoeld coming?” This was the only time I had seen hundreds of people stand aside and applaud the flag which to them represented freedom and hope and the future. The tears welled up.

People were clustered at the corner near our house, just a few blocks away. Marika, our children’s young nurse-maid, was standing at our door. She said there was a young man there who had been shot in the leg when Soviet tanks had tried a rare daylight foray that afternoon. Just then someone came up and asked if I would drive the wounded boy to the home of a friend a mile away. The crowd helped him into the car. He smelled of brandy; it was our brandy, I later discovered. Marika and her sister had been carrying coffee and sheets for bandages to the Széna-tér “children,” and had been asked to get a shot of something stronger for him.

The trip to his refuge was in silence; what could I say; what would he want to say? It was almost completely dark when we reached there, but a crowd gathered as I helped him out, and carried him into the house.


Letter from abroad
My 8 year old daughter wrote the following unsolicited letter to President Eisenhower: [original spelling maintained. – ed]

Dear Mr. Isenhower:
I am Elinor Rogers, 8. My father is a diplomat and we live in Budapest, Hungary, Europe. On Oct. 31 we were having our hallow’een party in the American Legation (you know, there is a war in Hungary) when suddenly a band of Hungarians gathered in front of the Legation and began crying something. Mr. Clark said they were singing their national anthem and asking us for help, but Daddy said we couldn’t because our army was in America. I am ashamed of you. Europe is our fellow country and you should help her if she is in danger. Even if you came half across the country and then lost, you would at least have glory. I wish America wasn’t so rich. It’s getting badder every year. If I were the President, I would change a lot of things in America. I wish I could give some of America’s richness to Europe, so they would be even. Europe will never be freinds with America, if you don’t help now. Please do. If you don’t, I’ll never like you again.
Elinor


Tom Rogers
Originally from South Carolina, he graduated from the University of North Carolina in 1942 with a degree in physics, hoping to be a meteorologist. He attended M.I.T. as an Air Corps cadet and served as a weather forecaster in the North Atlantic. After the war he worked for the Foreign Service, serving in Germany during the Berlin Blockade. He was in the US Legation in Budapest from 1953 to 1957, serving as its First Secretary. He later served in Argentina, Ecuador, and Pakistan. He has 4 grown daughters and still maintains yearly contact with other former members of the 1956 Budapest US Legation. He currently lives in Mechanicsburg, PA, and hopes to spend the 50th anniversary in Hungary.

His daughter Elinor grew up to be a bilingual English-Spanish reading teacher currently living in Madison, Wisconsin. Even now she vividly remembers the events that moved her to write the letter, and still recalls a Hungarian song from her childhood, “Mennybõl az angyal.” She has not yet received a reply to her letter.

At work operating a drill
How October 23rd started I can’t recall but I imagine it must have been like any other. At the time I was employed by the Small Engine and Machinery Factory (Kismotor és Gépgyár) located in Buda. I must have put in a regular day of work there operating a drill.

Following my daily routine, after finishing work I went on to Móricz Zsigmond High School to attend an evening lecture in pursuit of my high school diploma. As soon as I reached school I became aware of a flurry of excitement. It was there that all of us students were informed that demonstrations were in progress on both sides of the city.

We heard that there were a number of points or demands that had been drafted by the university students and presented to the government. It was upon these points that the demonstrations were based. Among the points was the demand that the Soviet troops leave our country and that Imre Nagy be reinstated as our prime minister.

Classes cancelled
There was an announcement that classes were now cancelled and we were told that a group was being formed to join up with the people who were demonstrating. We students eagerly went to show our solidarity to the cause. We all started to walk across the Margaret Bridge. As we proceeded, our numbers kept growing as more and more people joined up. I most distinctly remember an incident that took place in front of the Parliament. As we stood there our numbers kept swelling and all of a sudden we all started to demand in unison that Imre Nagy present himself and talk to us. We started to chant: “We want Imre Nagy!” “To hell with Gero!”

At first it was an unknown person who came to the balcony and tried to reason with our gathering, but since we didn’t let up on our demand, Imre Nagy finally did appear on the balcony to address us.

As we stood there listening to his speech a rumor broke out about some shooting taking place in front of the Radio building. At this point I felt somewhat drained and decided to start on my long walk home. Of course the streetcars were not running, nor were the buses.

On that day-October 23rd-a bloody Hungarian revolution started and it seemed that we had won our freedom from the Russians. This freedom was regretfully short-lived, however. It lasted only approximately seven days. But during this time even many of the Russian soldiers who were stationed in Hungary sided with the revolutionaries. Imre Nagy became our prime minister as freedom reigned. Unfortunately it did not last long since the Soviets under the leadership of Khrushchev sent over several divisions. Its soldiers were told that they were to crush the bourgeois revolution, when in reality they were killing the workers and students of the country.

While the fighting took place the workers were on strike everywhere. Of course the factory where I worked was also closed. At this time my family lived in Budaõrs. We could not regain our right to live in Budapest even though our 1951 deportation ended in l953 shortly after Imre Nagy became prime minister for the first time. Regretfully he was soon pushed out of office by the Stalinist-oriented group of communists. On November 4th, with the onslaught of a second wave of Russian troops, the fate of the revolution was sealed. On the previous evening General Pál Maléter, the head of the Hungarian Army, was invited to Russian headquarters for a discussion but was arrested during the course of the night.

Stay or go?
Now that everybody realized that we freedom fighters would lose against the tremendous odds, people began to think of leaving the country. My oldest brother Frank was in a forced labor battalion at the time. He was working in a coal mine at Komló. As the revolution was being overturned he too decided to flee the country but not before coming back with a couple of his friends, each of them with the intention of taking others with them. In Frank’s case it was the oldest of his three younger brothers, Peter. When I heard of their escape plans, I too wanted to leave with them. Frank, on the other hand, did not want to take on the responsibility since my sister and I were even younger than Peter and girls. He said we should stay-“Just think what might happen if the Russian soldiers were to catch you at the border.” So there I was, temporarily resigned to my fate, but not for long. About five days later a neighbor’s daughter, nine years old, came over in the morning to tell my sister that by eleven a.m. that morning she was leaving her home with the intent to escape. Her companions were four young men. Now it was my sister Klára’s turn to declare that she was going to join a group and escape, whereupon I said to my mother that of course I must also join them. Now poor mother was beside herself since our father was stuck in Buda in the stable with his horses to look after and could have no say in the matter. She realized that our future would be better served if we were to leave, yet she also realized that should we fail all the blame would rest on her shoulders. She tried to persuade us to stay because of the danger involved, but seeing our determination she was powerless. Thus the saga of our escape began.

At the Budaõrs train station we hopped on the platform of a freight train carrying frozen meat. We were exposed to the rigid winter climate. As the sun set, one stop before the station of Gyõr our train came to a halt. Our companions found out that the carriages wouldn’t go any further but the engine itself would go on to Gyõr. Its engineer agreed to let us ride in the caboose by sharing the space with the coal. During this time the railroad personnel were doing everything they could to help escapees reach the border.

At Gyõr we boarded a regular train. Now we had a different challenge ahead of us. We were afraid to buy tickets since it would give away our intended destination, yet not having them was also risky. Therefore we ended up dodging the conductor by going from one car to the other. In the meantime the men from our group obtained valuable information on how we should proceed in our escape. They befriended a makeshift guide who advised us to get off the train one stop before Hegyeshalom, at Levél, and offered to be our personal guide from there on. He told us that the Russians were especially active at the Hegyeshalom train station. They regularly met the incoming trains looking for would-be escapees to catch.

Onward
Once we left the train station of Levél, our guide led us into a barn filled with cows where we hid for a while since even here the Russians did searches. About a half an hour later our guide returned for us. The first part of our journey took us through some cornfields; as we passed among their dry stalks the crunching noise took an additional heavy toll on our nerves. We also passed through open fields with haystacks, where we kept worrying that tanks might be hiding on the other side. Now and then we would stop by these haystacks for cover. We were always ready to hit the ground at a moment’s notice in case of danger. As we walked on and on in the moonlit night our guide suddenly turned to us and said that he could not go any farther with us. He told us that from now on we should just aim for the huge reflector lights far in the distance. He said that once we got there we would be in Austria! We continued on with our cautious trudging until suddenly we heard a voice. Now we were sure that we had been caught. Luckily one of our companions spoke German and, as it turned out, soon our despair gave way to tremendous joy. We stayed in camps for a couple of months, first near the border and then in Innsbruck. On January 15th we were able to fly over to the United States via a U.S. Army plane under the established special visas that were granted to Hungarian refugees.

Looking back now I cannot help wondering at times if it would not have been better if we could have stayed in Hungary, if the West could only have helped us to achieve our goal then and avoid more bloodshed and all the terror that awaited our compatriots for another thirty three years.


Edit Martha Novak
She arrived in the United States on January 15, 1957, received her high school diploma in Schenectady New York, her B.S. in Pharmacy from Southwestern State University in Oklahoma, and her M.S. in Institutional Pharmacy Practice from St. John’s University in New York. She is married to a fellow 56-er, Charles Farkas. They have four children: Evelyn, Miklos, Elizabeth, and Maria.

It has been 50 years since Russian tanks crushed the dream of a free Hungary. But it has not been long enough to forget.

I was an artist. My job was to paint larger-than-life portraits of Lenin and Stalin. That wasn’t so bad. In fact, I was almost content with my lot. But then the Russians came back, and I had to paint sores on my wife’s face to keep her from being raped by the soldiers.
It was then I decided to leave Hungary.
That decision has haunted me ever since.

It was 1956. On the streets of Budapest, the euphoria had disappeared with the smoke. Now fresh Russian troops — soldiers of the same army that had saved our lives 12 years earlier — were coming house to house, restoring a brutal order. There was little I could do for myself except pray. But for Letty, my wife, prayer was not enough. With flour and water, and oil paint, I was again a serious artist, hurrying to complete my greatest creative work. Heart pounding, I struggled to steady my hand while transforming the smooth, young face of my wife to a visage ugly enough to repulse the most bestial of men.
And it worked. When the Russian troops burst into Letty’s parents house, they fired a burst of machine-gun fire into the ceiling, then stopped short in front of the sickly looking woman who sat in a dark corner, a babushka around her head.
Nagyon beteg, I said. Very sick.
Shuddering in disgust, the Russians quickly left the house.
And the next day, Letty and I left for Austria.
We had no plan. I knew only if anybody asked we would say we were going to visit relatives. We took a packed train to Szombathely, near the border. But there were rumors on the train that the station there was occupied by Russian troops. We jumped off the train when it slowed on the outskirts of the town. It was dark and we did not know what to do. We decided to play out our charade, walk into town and get a hotel room, pretending we were visiting friends. At 2 a. m. I woke up to the sound of boots stomping down the hallway. I heard a fist slamming on doors, and shouted orders. When they came to our room I was cowering under my sheets. I remember the clear, blue eyes under the cap. “ Where do you think you are going?” he said. I quaked. My throat was dry. “ We are visiting relatives.”
For a moment he looked into my eyes. “ It’s amazing how many people are coming here to visit relatives. Have a good time, see you next year.” And he was gone.
In the morning we got on a train going west. I felt the gaze of a man in a railroad uniform from across the aisle. “ I know what you are up to,” he said. “Maybe I can help.”
He told us that the end of the line was crawling with Russians. We followed him off at the station before the end, and through a tiny village. He took us to the edge of the forest and pointed the way. We must have made the wrong turn. For hours we wandered in the dark, looking for the edge of a swampy field that we were told marked the no-man’s land between us and the Austrian border. We grew tired and panicky. Suddenly the sky was floodlit with phosphorescent flares, and machine-gun fire seemed to surround us. I felt the flash and force of an explosion. Next thing I knew I was on my back in icy water.
“ Come on,” Letty shouted. “Crawl!”

We moved along the edge of the water until we reached a farmhouse. There, while on my hands and knees, I came upon a package of Austrian cigarettes. We walked to the house still shivering with cold and terror, so exhausted we didn’t care if it was Austrian or Hungarian. A man came to the door. “ We haven’t seen any of you lately,” he said.
“How did you make it?” The next morning, Austrian border guards told us they had recovered the bodies of six Hungarians in the swale we had crossed.
We had thought we were alone.

Fifty years ago the author fled the Russian invasion of Hungary, braving minefields and Russian tanks. Today he is a successful artist and writer, living in South Florida, dedicated to depicting the beauty and richness of his tropical environment. He knows that in the mind of the eternal exile, there is a fine line between courage and cowardice.
His book, entitled “ Retouching Stalin’s Moustache” is published in paperback and hardcover, with 366 pages, 10 photos and 9 line drawings. The book includes a more detailed version of his experiences during the 1956 revolution and subsequent escape from Hungary. It’s available at Amazon.com and Barnes & Noble bookstores.

On September 1, 1956, I was released from the prison of the communists. As I arrived at the train station in Budapest, my friend, Erwin Baktay, was on hand to meet me. From the station I went home to Szentkirályi Street. In front of our building, I ran into our former cook, who took one look at me and fled, terrified, making the sign of the cross. I ran after her. Though she did her best, her girth and age did not allow her to outrun me. I took hold of her arm and asked why she was afraid of me. “I’m Alfonz Lengyel,” I said, “in the flesh.” The cook’s mouth turned purple; she shook with fear. Finally, she realized that I had not come to take her with me into heaven, where she wasn’t ready to go yet.

She calmed down and learned that I had not died, and I was not a ghostly spirit pursuing her. She told me that my Father had died the previous Christmas, and only my Stepmother lived alone in the apartment. She also told me the reason she had been so frightened at the sight of me: my Father had paid 1500 rubles in exchange for the information that I had been shot dead while trying to escape from prison. As it turned out, my poor Father had to pay for false information.

The next day I had to report to the police. They gave me two letters: one from the prison authorities, stating that I was obligated to pay them for the six years’ worth of housing and food they had provided during my years of imprisonment. The other was from Dr. Laci Kardos, Director of the Hungarian National Museum – he informed me that I had a job as adjunct at the museum’s folk art collection.

As soon as I got myself together, I went to the Museum, where Dr. Kardos, my former boss, greeted me with great affection. He had heard that I had not given in to my prison interrogators, and was happy to hire me in his museum. He assigned me a room full of books and said that I should, for the time being, just read and learn rather than work. While in prison, I had kept up my studies. As a way to keep myself alive, I was constantly reviewing my college and law school studies. But after the years of physical labor in the mines under horrific conditions, the respite at the museum was welcome indeed.

October 23
All of my museum co-workers – though they did not dare say the traditional “Isten hozott” (God be with you) greeting – were very gentle with me, sometimes patting my shoulder. One day, the Director telephoned me from out on the street. He told me not to leave the museum until he personally gives me the okay. The Secret Police and Ministry of the Interior had permitted the students to hold a demonstration at the Petõfi Statue, but he believed it was a trap – he expected the official policy to switch overnight from Stalinist communism to De-Stalinized communism. He reminded me that I had recently been let out of prison, and, as a former officer under Horthy, I was suspect. Even if the communists themselves are organizing their own revolutionary transformation, he said, they might still try to identify scapegoats to blame for the “Revolution.”

An hour later, Kardos telephoned again. But this time, he was ecstatic: “Come, Alfonz,” he said, “this is now OUR REVOLUTION!” By the time I made it from the Museum on Könyves Kálmán Avenue into the city, the student demonstrators were chanting their slogans in front of the Radio building. Since my Stepmother lived in a building just behind the Radio, I started off in that direction and saw the crowds. The first guns were fired. Those nearest the entrance of the Radio building ran inside, followed by a crowd, including me. I spent that night at my apartment on Szentkirályi Street.

I heard on the Radio that two major areas of conflict were at Corvin Köz and Moszkva tér. I started off in the direction of the communist book store, and there I saw people carrying the books out of the store and burning them in great piles. I recalled the many examples of book-burning throughout history. We had, naturally, always condemned book burning as a crime – yet now, somehow, I felt that these were not books being burnt, but rather instruments that took people’s freedoms away; these books were the ideological instruments for keeping people enslaved. So I joined the crowd in burning the books.

We heard that smaller groups at the above locations clashed with armed security forces, and that political officers in civilian clothes were on the streets to report on developments, as well as to sow confusion among the freedom fighters. But practically the entire population joined the Revolution – even those who were communists, for many had joined the party under duress; others had realized they did not want this kind of communism. Many of these were like the communist I met at the prison hospital who had become a communist out of a belief in its ideals, but found it a dead end.

Of course, there were some workers from the Csepel part of the city who had been adherents of National Socialism, then – in 1945 – switched their allegiance to international communism. These, too, were disappointed, and so on October 23, 1956, they went out onto the streets to drive out the Soviet forces and their treacherous Hungarian communist lackeys.

Freedom
During a lull in the fighting, I joined the Ervin Papp group in founding the Association of Christian Hungarian Political Prisoners. I became the interim president. The Imre Nagy government even approved the founding documents of this organization. (I later took these documents with me to the United States, and when the World Association of Former Hungarian Political Prisoners was formed, I merged our own Christian Association with that one, and became the co-President of the new organization).

Meanwhile, Pál Pálinkás, a former classmate from the Military Academy, freed Cardinal Mindszenty from his prison cell and escorted him to his Residence. (Pálinkás’ real family name was Count Pallavichini, but the communists did not approve of this title and made him change his name to Pálinkás. After the Revolution was crushed, Pálinkás was executed.)

Soon after, in connection with the show trial against Bishop Grosz, I took the Ervin Papp group up to Cardinal Mindszenty’s office. The Cardinal greeted me as an old friend (he had once administered the last rites to me after a serious military injury in Veszprém; later, in 1948, he had helped me get a job at the Ministry of Religious and Educational Affairs). Mindszenty authorized me, together with the chaplain of Budapest’s Rókus Hospital, to reorganize the Actio Catholika movement. We tried to do so over the next few days, but without success, because a collaborator priest, a remnant of the Rákosi era and head of the Actio Catholika, declared that Mindszenty is a nobody, and if we do not leave the premises immediately, he would call the State Security Police and have us removed. I told him he should call anyone he wants, but we would not leave. Then I began the job of going through the archives.

We returned to Mindszenty’s office to report on our progress. Later that afternoon, I went down to the courtyard where, to my surprise, I saw my boss, Dr. Laci Kardos. He, too, was waiting to see Mindszenty. International journalists were coming and going; the Vienna-based Caritas aid organization was also conducting extensive discussions with Mindszenty’s office. Dr. Kardos told me that Imre Nagy had sent him with a message to Mindszenty, asking him to encourage the Hungarian people to support the Imre Nagy government, which had already committed to announcing an election based on a multi-party democracy.

At that moment, I felt like I was a participant in one of Hungary’s great historic turning-points. I rushed into the office and pulled Mindszenty off to one side to give him Imre Nagy’s message. He looked at me with those knowing eyes of his and replied that he had already written his radio address, and it would be just as Imre Nagy asked, for he – Mindszenty – was fully aware of the great responsibility weighing upon him as a spiritual leader of the Hungarian nation. He added – as he did later in his radio address – that his conscience was clear with respect to his activities under both the extreme right-wing regime and the communist regime, and owed no one any apologies. (Many people at the time were making public radio announcements “regretting” their actions that had caused suffering or death to millions of people.)

November 4
The ecclesiastical leader of Actio Catholika at the time asked me to come into his office on the morning of November 4, for he had changed his mind and wanted to hand over leadership of the organization to us. Needless to say, after I heard Imre Nagy’s plea for help on the radio the next morning, I did not go to that office, for the same fate would have befallen me as befell Imre Nagy’s Parliamentarians who were summoned to negotiate with the Soviets. As members of Parliament, they were protected by international law, yet they were killed anyway.

Kádár, who had been imprisoned under Rákosi, nevertheless agreed to take on Hungary’s leadership according to the Soviet model. Initially, he was a minister in the Imre Nagy cabinet. He even announced that Hungary was now – for the first time in its history – truly free. Yet he proceeded to betray our Revolution and had his compatriots hanged.

For a little while after the Revolution was crushed, I continued to go to work at the Museum, but after learning that freedom fighters and the released political prisoners were being rounded up, I asked my boss, Dr. László Kardos, to help me escape to the West. Dr. Kardos did help; apart from his wife, no one knew that Kardos and his friend, Attila Szigeti, helped me get out to Austria.

Kardos’s wife gave me a piece of paper with the name of a man in Vienna who was smuggling Hungarians across the border, and asked me – once I got out to Vienna – to have him bring a thank-you note back to Kardos and to Attila. I tossed the paper away and never made contact with the man. Nevertheless, a “thank you note” in my name arrived – which I had never written. Based on this forged note, Kardos, Attila and many others were arrested, some of them jailed and even hanged.

More than 40 years later, when the Soviet troops left Hungary, I went to Budapest on a visit – that’s when I learned, from one of my former prisonmates, about the existence of this “thank you note.” Upon returning to the United States, I gave a declaration under oath at the Hungarian Embassy that, while in the West, I was never in any personal or written contact with any of the individuals who were arrested in connection with the forged note. I placed a copy of this declaration in the official file on these cases. The declaration included my acknowledgement that while my statement could no longer help any of those who were arrested, it might serve to let future generations know how honest Hungarians were convicted or executed based on false and forged documents.

To the West
I left Budapest on December 13, 1956, and crossed the Hungarian border at Pamhage on December 24. I fell into the water, which then froze over my entire body. Locals found me lying unconscious in the snow; they took me home and called a doctor who beat the life back into me. I went on to Vienna, to the Caritas aid society, and told them that Mindszenty had authorized me to run the Actio Catholika movement in Budapest. They immediately put me to work as long as I was waiting to be assigned my next destination as refugee.

One day, a worker came to me in despair, saying a Hungarian girl had attempted suicide, and that I should talk to her. Naturally, I agreed. The girl told me that her fiance had just arrived in Vienna from the Melbourne Olympics, and the Austrian Government would only permit them to get married if she got written permission from her parents. Her parents, however, were dead. At this, I offered to legally adopt her and give my permission for the marriage. I even organized a very nice wedding for them. The newlywed couple went on to the United States, where, after a short while, they were divorced. So much for love unto death. I never heard from them again.

One day I went to the U.S. Embassy in Vienna, where a long line of Hungarian refugees was waiting for immigration papers. While I was standing there, a tall, skinny Catholic priest called out to me: “Alfonz, don’t you recognize me? I’m Imre Domjan from Miskolc. My Mother taught at the same school as your Aunt.” Imre (now Emerico) had gone to the West in 1933, then to study at the Vatican Gregorian Institute, where he was ordained a priest, then ended up in California. In short, the little kid I remembered had become a very tall, very thin priest. He told me he’d gotten funding from Bing Crosby to help a group of refugees come to the United States, and if I wanted to come, he’d put me on the list. I said yes, then got through my offical immigration interview. The interview occurred in Hungarian, because the Consul, Dr. László Tihanyi, was born in Hungary, became an American diplomat, and was sent to Salzburg to conduct interviews with the Hungarian refugees bound for the United States (Interestingly, 16 years later he retired from the diplomatic service and became my colleague as a professor at Northern Kentucky University).

After Salzburg we were sent to Bremerhaven. From there, we boarded the military ship “General Walker” for a very long ocean journey memorable for diarrhea and vomiting. Finally we arrived, through the Port of New York, to the Promised Land…


Dr. Alfonz Lengyel, RPA
A graduate of the Ludovika Military Academy, Dr. Lengyel also earned a law degree in Hungary. He earned his doctorate at the Sorbonne Institute for Art History and Archeology (Paris). He is a retired American university professor. During the 1956 Revolution, Lengyel founded the the Association of Christian Hungarian Political Prisoners. At present, he is the U.S. Director for the Sino-American Field School of Archaeology.

Precursor to history
For me the Revolution started in 1955, when the members of the choir and the orchestra of the Liszt Academy of Music wanted to perform for the first time Zrinyi’s “Szózat” on the birthday of its composer, Zoltán Kodály. Mr. Révai, the Minister of Culture, did not permit it at first, but at the end of the year permission was granted. Although the tickets were expensive and hard to get, as everybody wanted to hear the concert, Sándor managed to get two tickets from the Agricultural University in Gödöllõ, where Imre Nagy was teaching after being expelled from the party.

When we took our seats, we saw Imre Nagy and his son-in-law, Ferenc Jánosi, sitting in front of us. That night the Zrinyi “Szózat” was so incredibly moving. The choir singing “Don’t hurt the Hungarian!” was shocking! We saw Révai sitting above us in the right balcony, nervously turning the pages of the program. After the dramatic effect, the audience gave a standing ovation to Kodály who was sitting above us in the center balcony. I was deeply touched to see Imre Nagy look up to Kodály with tears in his eyes. Naturally, none of the men gave any sign of knowing each other. But when we were leaving, Jánosi got near Sándor and without looking at him, asked how Sándor was doing. Then, at the end of the concert someone started singing the banned Hungarian National Anthem. When I was talking to Sándor’s friends outside and heard someone say, “Yes, only Kodály could do this,” I immediately said: “YES, AND HE WAS BRAVE ENOUGH TO DO IT!” And I felt like kneeling down in front of him and thanking him for that. To me, that night was already the beginning of the Revolution.

My life in a police state
I was working for the No.1 Structural Engineering Company. We worked with secret war factories, underground construction, Rákosi’s basement, etc. I got there in April, 1952, because Sándor, who was an electrician trainee at the time, became drowsy, and fainted a number of times. He was taken to the hospital in Rosa Square. When his illness was diagnosed as general tuberculosis with only two months left to live, I decided I had to get a job. I was a good shorthand typist, and believed I could get a job somewhere. Through a friend I found out the No. 1 Structural Engineering Company was looking for a shorthand typist. I went there, and filled out an application that asked for the usual information. And then came the question: Have any of your relatives been arrested for conspiracy? I had still not recovered fully from my second delivery, and had difficulty walking. I had two young children – what could I have done? If I had written ‘yes’, then they would not have employed me. If I had written ‘no’, and they found out the truth about my husband and brother, it would have been over for me. This was an example of how all facets of life, including employment, was controlled by the ÁVO. So, I simply crossed out the question. They accepted it and said they would test my typing and shorthand skills.

Two nice colleagues dictated to me and asked me about my husband’s job. I told them he was an electrician. “Oh, then he must be earning a nice sum…” And I was so silly to tell them ‘no’, because he was a re-trainee. Then they asked: “What was his job before?” In complete despair, I told them that I could not tell them. And I knew I would not be employed. But there were two colleagues, a nice old Jewish man, a party leader whose large apartment house had been nationalized, and the other one, a lawyer who was kept in a low position because of his past. They both went to the head of the Personnel Department and said that there was no one as gifted as I as a shorthand typist at the company, and therefore, I should be employed.

Several days after I started working there, I had to go to a Trade Union Seminar. And we had to learn the following lesson from our book: “Sándor Kiss, a ‘narodnik,’ was endangering the workers’ power and the Soviet Union.” Well, I was worried for quite a long time whether they would find out who my husband was. But they did not, and I was working there till I emigrated.

In the meanwhile, after long examinations Sándor was found to have an inflamed liver, probably the result of an infection from his days in prison. There was only one very expensive intravenous Swiss medication for his illness, which the doctor gave him on condition Sándor would replace it for him. A close friend of Sándor, the famous mathematician from Debrecen, Tibor Szele, was able to obtain it from his Swiss mathematician friends. But I stayed on in my job.

October 1956
From our office we had to give explosives to several companies, but a month before October 23 the explosives were restricted. Péter Halász, a good friend of the engineer who was sitting next to me, had already written in the paper that it was easier for Hungarians to go to the moon than to Vienna, a hundred kilometers away. The journalists were becoming braver day by day.

On Sunday night, October 22, we went to a club in Buda with Árpád Göncz and his wife Zsuzsa. (He later became the President of Hungary from 1990-2000). The Budapest Madrigal Choir was giving a concert in honor of the composer Bárdos. It was magnificent! As the four of us were walking home on the riverbank of the Danube, at Margit Bridge a news vendor appeared with the evening papers. The people swamped him. Sándor bought the paper there, and we were so happy to read the courageously outspoken articles in the light of the street lamps!

The next day, István Szabó (Paramus) came to see us, brought us some lemons, and told us that the students had a meeting in Szeged (Sándor had graduated from there), and they formulated their demands in points. (I immediately sent the lemon to one of Sándor’s relatives who asked for it for his son who was very ill that time. Lemons were extremely scarce in the 1950’s Hungary).

October 23rd
The next day at work my colleague, Vendel Borhi, told me excitedly that as an evening student, the previous evening he was there at the Technical University when the 16 points were formulated. And he brought the text of the points.

Immediately I typed it, and we hung it on the wall across from the door of our director who was a colonel in the ÁVÓ. I was really getting very excited! Our office was at 19 Lenin Boulevard, and through the open windows we heard the shouting from the young people on trucks, “We want free elections!” And they were waving their flags. My colleague, Aurél Papp, went into the director’s office, and asked: “Comrade Maczinger, what do you think of this?” In his typical style, he stood up and closed the windows.

In the afternoon we were told that the new party secretary, a nice person, would allow everybody, who asked to go to the demonstration at the Bem statue. Márta Füzesi phoned and told me to tell Sándor about it. I called Sándor and told him, but I certainly did not want or dare ask any favors from the communist party secretary. As we finished work at 4 p.m., we left together with a colleague, Pali Stasznyi, At the Kossuth Bridge we met Zoltán Nyeste, Piros and another Jewish friend from Recsk (who later became the editor of the Menora magazine in Canada), and we marched together arm in arm. I, who had never taken any man’s arm apart from Sándor’s, was happily walking with the three former prisoners whom I hardly knew, because we all felt like brothers! Once we arrived in Buda, we met the members of the Folk Dance Group who were coming from the Bem statue. One of them, Kata Rábay, who used to be my elder sister’s classmate, knew me and shouted for us to go to the Parliament. We turned around and went back to the Kossuth Square. There we saw a student climbing up high and cutting the hammer and sickle from the middle of the huge Flag to great cheers! But it was getting dark, and they turned off the lights. Now the crowd started folding the newspapers like torches, lit them and held them up. It was an unforgettable scene! Zoli Nyeste lifted me up so I could see that wonderful scene above the tall people in front!

But then I felt remorse: What’s happening at home? What are Sándor and the children doing? True, my parents were there with the children, but I knew if I went home late, my Mother would be angry. I wondered what they are going to say now. I rang the doorbell trembling like a child. But the Revolution had reached our family as well! My Mother gave me a slice of buttered bread on a plate to eat and a mug of coffee, and then told me to go back out with my husband. And so we went: Sándor, my older sister Kata, my elder brother Gyuszi, and Sándor’s nephew Bandi Juhász who always ate with us, and learned electrician’s skills from my brother.

Kossuth Square
On the way to the Parliament we passed in front of the central building of ÁVÓ to Kossuth Square where a big crowd had already gathered. They were shouting in unison: “Rákosi into the Danube!” Bandi added: “With a big stone around his neck!” The crowd took it over and started shouting it. Then we all yelled out, “We want Imre Nagy!” Then Imre Nagy appeared. Of course, we did not know and could not see that a Russian soldier was standing behind him. Imre Nagy told everybody to go home. And they turned the lights off on the square.

Next someone shouted that we should all go to the printing press to have the students’ demands printed so they could be taken by trucks to the countryside. In close formation we marched to Szikra, the communist party’s printing press. A delegation of young people went in to negotiate. We absolutely felt then that we were witnessing history! Suddenly the delegation came out, and said that everything is all right, and the demands will be printed. That caused great happiness, until my elder sister Kata, who was closest to the road, spotted a motorcyclist who yelled out that students were being shot at in front of the radio!

Hearing this, the whole crowd lined up and marched all the way along the present-day Bajcsy-Zsilinszky Street towards the radio. At this time we were shouting, “Whoever is a Hungarian will come with us!” and “The ÁVÓ are murderers, down with them!” Windows were opened in the houses we passed. We just kept going, and all the time, there were more and more of us. When we arrived to the radio, my brother Gyuszi went forward. I am not sure if he had a role in not letting an ambulance get near the radio, since Gyuszi might have remembered that when I had been arrested with two others, we were taken in an ambulance from Debrecen to Buda. The ambulance at the radio was searched and it turned out to be full of weapons. Obviously, it was an attempt to re-supply the ÁVO inside. They set the car on fire. Meanwhile, we heard the news about how many students were injured, and where they were taken for treatment. But the numbers of injured varied with each telling. And all we could feel was that they were young, unarmed students who lived for their country, and we were waiting anxiously to see what would happen next.

Suddenly, an army bus or truck came bringing the students from the military academy to suppress the demonstration. But a worker stood up on top of a truck and recited Zseni Várnai’s poem: ‘Don’t shoot my son, because I’ll be there too.’ When the military students jumped down and handed over their guns, they turned out to be unloaded. There were some young workers from Csepel, who said they would get bullets, and they left immediately, perhaps to Csepel. When they came back, they started handing out the guns. I admit that I was in such a state of excitement that I told Sándor I wanted to go and get a gun! But Sándor was very sensible and said we cannot do that because if we were caught, they would say that the “old conspirators” incited the young to rebel. So we mustn’t get guns! And as it turned out, there were not enough guns for everybody.

Meanwhile we heard that a café on Kossuth Lajos Street was serving free coffee. As it was late, we went there and the hot coffee was delicious, and then we returned to the radio. And we heard the shots. We were waiting to see if they would let the students in. What was going to happen? Suddenly we heard the frightening sound of the Russian tanks approaching. It was already dawn by then, and we left for home. On our way we had to jump inside the large front gates of the houses we passed so as not to get shot when the tanks were approaching.

The following days
It was a long walk from the Radio building to Óbuda where we lived, but we were so excited, we did not feel it. At home we told the family all that had happened at the Radio.
The next day Sándor and Gyuszi went out to look around. We only heard the shots in the distance, and spent all day listening to the radio. It reported that “fascists” had attacked our public buildings and armed forces, and that all public assemblage was banned.

Meanwhile, László Kardos, a friend from Eötvös Loránd University who was a communist, but who had been with Sándor in the resistance against the Germans, sent two armed students for Sándor. As he said, he was not asking for help because they did not deserve that, but wanted some advice. Sándor was deeply affected by him, and at the meeting there was also a party secretary present, who joined the revolutionaries wholeheartedly. Sándor was genuinely touched by the bravery of the party secretary.

On Thursday the radio announced that everybody should go to work, and everything was all right. So I started out on foot to the office. At the Pest side of Margit Bridge I saw the first dead body of a young man covered with a flag. It was shocking! At the same time I was moved to see the boxes placed for collections for the relatives of the dead, in jewelry shops with broken windows, but none of the jewels were taken. After checking in at the office, I went to see the city with Vendel Borhi. (Later Vendel was imprisoned in the same cell with my brother.) I can still see the scene of the dead body of another young man covered with a flag in Rákóczi Street. We went on in tears. Vendel was walking in front. At the Ministry of Interior we noticed that in every window there stood a soldier or a policeman with his gun turned to the street.

As we were approaching Kossuth Square, which was closed off by navy soldiers, there was an elegant man in front of us who did not stop when the soldiers told him that he could not go on to the square. And then one of the soldiers shot at his leg. The man’s clothing looked very western; he asked us not to take him to an ambulance because he was afraid of them, but rather somewhere to a doctor. So we looked at the other side of the street, and noticed there was the name of a doctor. Vendel helped the man up to the doctor.

Then we tried to approach Kossuth Square through another way. This was when women dressed in black were demonstrating there, and from the other side, maybe from the top of the building of the Ministry of Agriculture, ÁVÓ soldiers were shooting at them. And we saw from far away how the wounded or dead were put on trucks.

After all this, we went to the American Embassy where a crowd was gathering. And finally, the spokesman – as there was no U.S. ambassador there at that time – came out and much to our surprise, he talked as if he were from the Moon and knew nothing about what was happening in the city. He really saddened us. It was all for nothing: the women’s demonstration, the crowd shouting, it all fell on deaf ears. From there I went back home.

The shooting continued the following day. Meanwhile, János Horváth came to see us, who worked nearby as a stoker after his imprisonment, but as he spoke English, he transmitted radio messages to the West during the Revolution. He asked me to take down in shorthand the U.N. law transmitted by Radio Free Europe, so he could use the language of the law to protest on the radio. Later in the evening we all prayed aloud together with 9-year-old Bori and 6-year-old Ági for Anna Kéthly to be let into America to represent Hungary at the UN, instead of the “Hungarian ambassador,” who was actually a Soviet citizen.

Meanwhile, I went to get some food somewhere at Rózsadomb. We were standing in line when a young student wearing a raincoat appeared, and it was so natural that he should go to the front of the line since he was fighting for our freedom. Someone in the line started to say something about “the Jews,” but the entire crowd shouted at him to stop. The people were so obviously mature and wise.

As we had little food, my Mother said she would cook for everybody and that way we needed fewer ingredients. We were constantly listening to the radio. When Imre Nagy was appointed Chairman of the Council of Ministers, we were very happy; however, Gerõ was strengthened in his position as Secretary General of the party, and that added fuel to the fire. Martial law was announced, and the freedom fighters were called “counter-revolutionary gangs,” and were told if they put down their arms by a certain hour, then they would not have to face martial law. But the deadline kept being extended because the young people kept on fighting. These repeated postponements indicated the communists’ weakness, which made us very glad. At the same time, we were asked to put the radios in the windows so the freedom fighters on the street could also hear the reports.

The next day Gerõ was replaced and Kádár became the Secretary General of the party. We thought that this was good news because Kádár had suffered a lot in Rákosi’s prison, his teeth were broken there, and we hoped that he could only be better than Gerõ.

And when the tone of the radio started to change, when they asked for the national flag, when they played the National Anthem, our hearts were exulting. But we could still hear shots constantly. There was a part of Óbuda, for example, where the young people kept the front line.

Daily life
I went to my workplace. Sándor asked me to go to his office, located across the street from mine, to pick up his salary as well. An employee from his workplace, the Soil-Improvement Company, asked me who Sándor was, because Zoltán Tildy had asked for him by phone. And I got his salary. Then I went to our office that had received a number of shots. The Workers’ Council was established in our company. The former personnel manager who dared to employ a lot of “class-aliens” was kept as an expert tinker. (Even the younger sister of the widow of István Horthy received a job in the warehouse there). The engineers with the most integrity became the members of the Workers’ Council. I got a kilo of rice from one of my colleagues, which I happily took home, because it was a great treasure. Our cafeteria was opposite our workplace. When we went to have lunch there, sitting next to me was someone from the personnel department, who called the young people counter-revolutionaries, and, of course, I immediately defended them. We found out later that the woman’s son was a member of the ÁVÓ. That is also why it was good that I left that place.

At some point Sándor took me to work at the Smallholder Party headquarters on Semmelweis Street. He went off to work early each day and returned very late. I issued lots of letters of appointment for the Smallholder Party leaders coming from the country to start organizing the local party. Once, when János Horváth came, the student guards did not want to let him in, and I stood there shouting that he had been imprisoned for years because of the party, and how dare they not let him in! (I found out later that the leader of the armed student guard was Pál Tar, who in the 1990’s became Hungarian Ambassador, first to the United States, and then, to Vatican City.)

Jóska Adorján, a nice old MP from the Smallholder party, a wine trader from Eger, made me sad when he said that the headquarters of the Communist party should be taken over. I felt that we have to be careful not to practice party politics, because many people who stood by the Revolution might get scared off. I really felt that we have to unite with all those who are willing to fight against the Russians.

Meanwhile, armed students came to see one of our neighbors who was the chief engineer of the underground metro, asking him to see whether there was an underground cellar under the party headquarters, because some people said there were prisoners kept there. But we did not hear anything more about it, so probably there was no prison there at all.

Sándor was often among the freedom fighters in the Parliament, talking with Imre Nagy and Tildy as well, but I did not always know where he was exactly. I went with him in the morning and worked diligently in the headquarters of the Smallholder party. When the banned Peasants’ Association, an interest group, was reorganized and received a building as headquarters, I worked there representing Sándor, as he was its national director until he was arrested. In the evening we walked home together. Once we were stopped by armed student guards, and when Sándor said he was the director of the Peasants’ Association, the students thought he belonged to the Peasant party, which in the eye of the students was just like the communist party. Only when Sándor explained to them what the Peasants’ Association was, and how it was banned in 1947, did they let us go, apologizing for their mistake. As we walked, Sándor always had some chalk in his pockets, and wrote on the trams and other places “Russians Go Home!’ and other similar messages. He regarded this as necessary.

End of October
On the morning of October 27th I told my husband that it was our 10th wedding anniversary, and originally, I had planned to give a dinner for our friends. Then Sándor said something I also certainly felt, that if he had to die at that moment, he would feel his life was worth living, because he lived through the days of this Revolution. It was the greatest possible gift for our wedding anniversary! Often, when my oldest sister and my sister-in-law were hiding in the cellar, I calmly walked among the Russian tanks on the Boulevard, and carried out my tasks. And I was full of happiness! Once János Horváth asked me and Sándor to go to see his wife Erzsike, because she did not want János to become involved in politics again. We were to persuade her to let him do that because János was full of desire to work for the Revolution. I think we managed to persuade her.

Many friends kept coming to visit Sándor, but the days flow together in my memory. Yet. I clearly remember when Géza Bodolay came and brought the detailed plan of the renewal of the Scout Association. I also remember very well when Sándor told me how he met the writer, Péter Veres, in the headquarters of the Peasant party, and Péter Veres admitted to Sándor that his peasant policy was the right one, and that in the future he would work with him. It must have been difficult for him to acknowledge and admit this.

My husband’s radio speech
Wednesday, October 31st, was a very memorable day for me. Sándor gave a speech in the radio at 10:25 a.m. The title of the program was “Let me speak into the free microphone,” and as the director of the Peasants’ Association, Sándor announced the reestablishment of the Association with their impeccable flag.

The studio was in the Parliament. Sándor led me in, and while he gave his marvelous speech, he left me in President Tildy’s office. There was quite a crowd in the big hall, with many familiar faces, and also some who were unknown to me. I took a seat next to József Kõvágó, who was Budapest’s mayor in the 40’s, and we started to talk. To my greatest astonishment, he was still saying that this was about the inner conflict of the communist party. This really saddened me. Then two soldiers entered the hall. All the people went and shook hands with them. One of them was a handsome, tall officer. When I introduced myself, he shook hands with me. My hand became sore because he squeezed it so hard. I can still see his light, piercing blue eyes with an intense look. It was Pál Maléter and his deputy. I suppose, as Sándor told me before, that they were just going to the Russian military headquarters to plan how the Russian troops would be flown home from Hungary.

Just then Sándor came back, and we started leaving through the corridor. Zoltán Tildy came towards us, and upon reaching us gave us a big hug and said, “My children, how I remember your wedding!” (The wedding was ten years before, on the 27th of October on Pozsonyi Road in the Thanksgiving Reformed Church, which he attended together with his bodyguard. The bodyguard, Pál Maléter, had announced him then. Perhaps he squeezed my hand so hard because he remembered that?) Then Zoltán Tildy explained that he was just returning from meeting Mikoyan, who had told Tildy, pointing to his watch, that after 4 o’clock there would be no Russian soldiers in Budapest.

Tito, Khrushchev, and Eisenhower
Since then I have read two books: Daniel Schorr’s book, and also the memoir of the Yugoslav ambassador to Moscow. I presume that it must have been at this time when Eisenhower sent Tito the telegram to notify him that he regarded the Hungarian issue as a domestic affair. With this telegram, Tito, who was afraid that the Hungarian Revolution might extend to his country, called Khrushchev immediately to discuss the future of Hungary. Kádár was Tito’s choice. After Stalin’s death in 1953, Khrushchev made certain gestures of reform, such as releasing one million political prisoners from Siberia, and created an atmosphere like Imre Nagy did in 1953, when he abolished the political prisoners’ camp in Recsk.

However, in 1956, there were two opposing factions in the Kremlin: that of the hard-line Stalinists, and those who followed Khrushchev, who after Stalin’s death had dared deliver his famous speech in which he enumerated Stalin’s crimes. Unfortunately, Eisenhower’s telegram reinforced the Stalinist leadership. (After Stalin’s death, we in Hungary received Khrushchev’s speech on leaflets printed on Bible paper, dropped from balloons, which caused us great pleasure. Later, in the U.S. I learned that this fantastic idea of dropping leaflets from balloons had come from István Deák, a professor at New York City’s Columbia University).

Revolutionary days
For me it was really touching to see the former members of the Peasants’ Association come to visit the new headquarters. For example, Lajos Bokros’s Mother came, whose wedding dinner was held in 1946 in that very place. All of them definitely had a lot of trouble and much suffering after the dissolution of the Association in January, 1947.

My brother took over the garages that belonged to members of the ÁVÓ and provided the leaders with cars. One time, a request came in from István Füzesi, who needed to be driven home from Albania. A driver had already offered to get him, but he needed an official letter that only Sándor could have granted, but no one had the slightest idea where Sándor was at that moment. So, for the one and only time in my life, I forged Sándor’s signature to allow the car to go to pick up Füzesi. Later I learned that he might not have come with this car after all.

Of course, I also spent time with our children. Bori was informed by her Grandfather about what was happening. There was a sermon broadcast on Radio Free Europe that had been written much earlier. It turned out to be harmful, because it encouraged people to fight. Although the priest only spoke of the battle against Satan, at that time it disturbed us, because it appeared to be incitement.

Uneasiness
When Cardinal Mindszenty was set free, we listened to his speech, and together with Árpád Göncz, we had the feeling that he was not wise, since instead of speaking of the need for unity against the Russians, he was already speaking of punishing the leaders of the past. We felt that only the ÁVÓ and the Russians were our enemies. With those who changed sides and sided with the Revolution, we felt we needed to work together. There were even Russian soldiers who came over to our side and hung the Hungarian national flag on their tanks. Therefore, mentioning punishment then was very much out of place.

When Imre Nagy asked on the radio that Hungary’s declared neutrality be recognized, we felt great joy and happiness. This is what we wanted also. His speech was so wise; it expressed fully the desire of the whole Hungarian nation! However, when Imre Nagy asked for neutrality – as we later learned – Sándor Taraszovics had already informed him that the Russian troops had turned back and were again heading into our country. This is the way that Imre Nagy tried to prevent what happened on the 4th of November. At the same time, Imre Nagy sent a telegram to the U.N. asking for recognition of Hungary as a neutral state. We also learned later, that Imre Nagy’s telegram had not even been read by the Swedish U.N. Secretary General, Hammerskjöld, because Nagy lacked the necessary “credentials!” We received this information from László Varga’s first wife, Nike, who had very good contacts at the U.N. Perhaps, this too, contributed to her subsequent suicide.

By that time I was working every day, full of hope. It was only the possible return of the Soviet troops that made us feel uneasy. We were waiting to see what the Western world will do. We believed that they would intervene, and we were desperately looking forward to the U.N. taking up the issue of Hungary. Hammerskjöld behaved deplorably! At the discussion of the Hungarian question, it was a Soviet citizen, who was allowed to speak on behalf of Hungary! (Thus, I shed no tears for Hammerskjöld when I heard that he was killed in an airplane accident).

I lived in such a state of excitement during the days of the Revolution, and felt so devastated afterwards, that I was not able to write of daily events. All I remember particularly clearly is that Sándor came home on Saturday, on November 3rd around 10 o’clock, and told us sadly that he feared a betrayal. The Hungarian military leaders were negotiating in the Russian military headquarters allegedly about evacuation of the Russian troops. Thus, if something happened in the next few hours, no Hungarian military leader would be available to react. We went to bed full of the worst fears. And at dawn we woke to tanks rumbling under our windows. Soviet tanks! And Imre Nagy’s dramatic cry for help on the radio, the Hungarian writers’ plea … We were all sobbing! My Father was listening to the sounds from outside, and kept on saying and crying for the West: “Go on, shoot! Shoot!” Even then, we were still hoping that help would arrive if we just held out. And we just sat by the radio and kept praying! Oh God, how we were praying!

The ending
Nearby we heard shots fired from Óbuda. And all we could do was wait. I cannot remember the days that followed; all I know is that I went back to work. Two students came by the office to tell me that Sándor was already being sought by the ÁVO; he should disappear right away. He spent the last night at Árpád Göncz’s place, and the next day he left for the West with my brother Gyuszi, János Horváth, Erzsike, their daughter, Erzsike, and Lajos Nagy. I was also to go with the two children. But in the foyer I overheard my sister-in law telling Gyuszi, ‘No problem, Gyuszi, you just go. I know for sure that you are going to leave me just as Bandi Hamza left his wife Ica.” In that moment I made the decision that I would not go either. I could not let Gyuszi say that my sister came along, but my wife had to stay behind. And Gyuszi promised to come back for us in a car. My sister Kata also promised that she would help us both leave the country with our children to join our husbands. Deep in my heart I was hoping that Sándor would fight for me, just like János did, saying he was not going to leave unless Erzsike and the family went with him as well. Unfortunately, this did not happen. Sándor acknowledged the decision, opened a Bible, read from it, said his prayers and left.

Afterwards Bálint Arany called me on the phone, and he was glad to hear that Sándor had already left. Then Márta Füzesi came along with her children, and as soon as she entered and heard that Sándor had left the country, she hurried out. My Mother and the family said afterwards, “Look at your friend, she was interested only in Sándor.” That was painful for me.

Since our office in Pest had been damaged by bombing, we received other office space in Buda. When the leaders of the workers council were arrested, and the workers still declared a strike, the chief engineer asked me to prepare our room for them, but I answered I would not be a strikebreaker! I stood by the Revolution even on my own. At that time, the “Úttörõ Áruház” (Pioneers’ Department Store) opened up, and I had to buy the children some shoes and clothes. There were long lines.

Decision to leave
I started to become really worried and sad, and felt that my children needed to have their Father. And I already knew that I might get in trouble if I stayed at home. As my sister-in-law’s Father heard Sándor and his friends’ message on the radio, we knew that they had arrived in Vienna safely. I decided that I would go alone with my two children. I went to my office on the last day. I spoke with my colleague, Sztrapkovics, a building engineer and a devout Catholic, and told him I was going to try to defect. I asked him, though, to tell the others for two days that I had left for the countryside to buy food. And he was to tell only on the third day that I was trying to defect to the West.

I felt hat I needed to keep my job in case of any trouble. I met Sándor Kelemen, the head of a department of the Peasants’ Association, who told me the president of the Writers Association, Áron Tamási’s message, that Sándor should go to the U.N. and be the spokesperson for the Revolution.

I planned to leave on Sunday morning. But then the radio announced that there would be no food transport on Sunday. As I lived by the Bécsi Road, my plan was to stand there with my two children, and some truck driver would take pity on us for sure and pick us up. On Sunday I went to church. The minister was preaching that everybody should stay at home in Hungary. While it was difficult to hear this, I also met a friend of Sándor’s in the church who gave me a false official certificate that my apartment had been bombed and I was going to live with relatives in the countryside.

In the evening Árpád Göncz brought me his cousin’s address in Vienna to whom we could go once we arrived there. He left around 8 pm, and afterwards someone rang the door-bell. I thought it must be Árpád coming back, but it was a railwayman coming back from Vienna. He brought a letter from Sándor. He wrote that though Gyuszi had left by car to come back for us, he suggested we go this other way. The railwayman spent the night at my Mother’s, and we left the next day. My Mother refused to say good-bye to me, because she said I was going to kill my children. Sándor asked me to bring the children’s schoolbooks, so I packed them together with a fresh set of underwear in the knapsack. My Father, my sister Kata, and the three of us left from Óbuda to the Kelenföldi Railway Station. Bori was 9 years old, and Ági was 6, but small for her age.

We were the railwayman’s family on the train. When Bori loudly said that this was not our usual way to go to Grandmother’s I told her in despair not to talk or ask anything. A representative of the Smallholder party put us up in Gyõr for one night. Later he was imprisoned for many years.

Crossing the border
There we went to the railway station where my railwayman brought a taxi, since I had enough money to pay. We went by taxi, and I asked about the towns’ names before entering each town “to know where my relative was, where I am fleeing.” We arrived to a cornfield. There my taxi driver showed me three trees in front of us, saying they were already in Austria. So I told my two daughters that we were on the border and we were going to Vienna, to see their Father. No complaints, we are on an excursion, and it depends on them whether we would meet their Father. Bori was trembling, she understood what it meant. Just as we started, another taxi stopped with an elderly couple who were also going with us. I do not know who they were. And we went toward those three trees. But there was no sign of the border. We walked on in despair, and saw a farmer. We asked him to take us to the border, and offered to pay him. And off we went together. My daughter, Ági, was complaining how tired she was and wanted to sit down. But I told my poor darling that we cannot rest now, we had to go on. The dry corn husks also hurt her little hand. And then suddenly two border guards from ÁVÓ stood in front of us. Bori also heard a shot, and I was so frightened, all I could do was to pray. The soldiers told us that the Russians could see us, so they would have to take us to them. When I am in danger, and I pray desperately, I hear an inner voice telling me what to do. And that’s how it was then. I heard from above, “be strong and shout!” So I started shouting: “What kind of Hungarians are you? What would you say if your wife and children were given over to the Russians by another Hungarian? The Father of these two children is in Vienna. It depends on you whether they will have a Father!” Then one of them said: “We are Hungarians as well!” And they took my two daughters by the hand, and the three of us and the older couple walked on together. And my soldiers told us not to kneel down at the border, because the Russians can shoot over the border. Just run up to the first Austrian farmer, and tell him that the soldiers might also have to come over later.

In a distance we saw a tractor with wooden seats. We sat on it, and went this way to Andau, I think. There they wanted to take us immediately to a camp, but I had an address and phone number from Gyõr, and I knew German. Thus I could speak with the mayor, and he called the guesthouse where Sándor, János Horváth and the others stayed, together with a former member of Parliament of the Smallholder Party who had been in the West for a long while, waiting for his wife and two children from Hungary. Erzsike Horváth answered the phone and told me that Sándor was coming to get us.

He arrived that night with Aurél Ábrányi who brought him in a car. His joy was so great, and he could not believe I was there. We woke up the two children who were sleeping on straw bags in a classroom, and left for Vienna. Compared to the dark city of Budapest, Vienna seemed like a beautiful dream to all of us. When we got to the guesthouse where Sándor and the Horváths were staying, the owner came to the door and said that children were not allowed. Somehow the Virgin Mary came to my mind who could not find a place for the birth of Jesus. It was very painful to me to see my poor tired children who had been walking for so long. Then one of the MP-s started calling the hotels, and eventually we received a room in the elegant Hotel Regina. I cannot describe how the children enjoyed their bath and bed. And in the morning we had breakfast at the table spread with silver cutlery, but later, of course, we moved to a cheap hotel.

Austria
Years later, we received the painful news of what happened to Aurél Ábrányi, the lawyer son of the poet Emil Ábrányi, who drove us that night to Vienna. He worked as a lawyer for the Shell Oil Company, and was abducted by unknown people from a meeting he was called to attend. His wife, an Austrian woman, first called the police, and then went with someone to the site of the meeting to try to find out what happened. They found signs of scuffling and blood stains, and learned from a neighbor he had seen people carrying “something” rolled up in a carpet. The police informed all the border crossings right away, but the car had already crossed into Czechoslovakia. The case became a huge scandal in the Austrian Parliament. I have not learned anything more about Aurél Ábrányi since then. All I can do is remember him as one victim of the Revolution.

And this is how our life as immigrants started.


Ilona Éva Ibrányi Kiss
I was born in 1927, and after spending my early years in Tiszacsege, I lived mainly in Budapest until 1956. In 1946, after starting my university studies, I got married to Dr. Sándor Kiss. My husband was imprisoned by the communists for almost three years. My first daughter Borbála, was born on August 29th, 1947, on the day of Sándor’s sentencing. I lived with my parents in Hajdunánás, because as a wife of a political prisoner I was unable to work. I was also imprisoned from October 28th, 1948, by the Ministry of War and by the ÁVO in their cellars.
My husband was released from prison on October 15th, 1949, and my second daughter, Ágnes, was born nine months later on July 15th, 1950. During the communist years, from 1952 till my emigration I worked in Budapest at the No. 1 Structural Engineering Company. In the U.S. I worked for the Swiss Bank Corporation and the Hungarian Department of Columbia University in New York. Later, in Washington, D.C., I was employed at the American Hungarian Reformed Federation. My third daughter, Erzsébet, was born on July 12th, 1961, in New York City. I was widowed in September, 1982.


Dr. Sándor Kiss
My husband was born in 1918 in Vásárosnamény. He graduated from Sárospatak and the University of Szeged. He taught at the Oszkár Feri Teachers College and did research at the Geographic and Ethnographic Research Institute.
Because of his leadership in the underground, he was sentenced to death by the Gestapo, but was able to escape miraculously.
From 1945 he was elected the national president of MADISZ and a member of the Parliament from the Smallholder party. Afterwards he reorganized the banned Peasants’ Association and became its national director. From 1947 to 1949 he was imprisoned by the communists. After his release, he could only work as a hard laborer and later as an electrician trainee.
He played a key role in the events of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution. After arriving as an immigrant to the U.S. on December 13, 1956, he became a member of The Hungarian Committee, and the Hungarian editor of the “East Europe Journal,” published by the Free Europe Committee in New York City. When the journal ceased publication, he worked at the Voice of America in Washington, D.C. from February, 1971, until his death in September, 1982.