Hungarian Heritage Review, 1987 (16. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1987-07-01 / 7. szám
^0sag-®f-Ct|c-3iíontl| were determined by guerrilla warfare in the Carpathians. An Imperial general of some competence, Rabutin, had managed to retain a foothold in Transylvania. The overall Imperial commander in Hungary, Baron Herbeville, decided to reinforce Rabutin. Herbeville opted to avoid the Slovak highlands — the scene of previous defeats — and strike at Transylvania directly across the Hungarian plain. A strategic error resulted in a Hungarian defeat at Zsibo Pass in November 1705. Here the entire kurucz army was deployed in the pass. In the previous year, by comparison, Bercsényi had worn down an Austrian army in Jablunkov Pass by posting Slovak mountaineers on the heights. As the Habsburgs proceeded to capture much of Transylvania, guerrilla attacks in Upper Hungary were launched with renewed vigor. Rabutin began marching west, but was halted at Kassa, which had been fortified for a siege. While Rabutin waited, Transylvania rose up in his rear. Thus the military activities employed in Upper Hungary and Transylvania complimented each other. No study of the peoples of Hungary during Rakoczi’s war would be complete without two other groups being given honorable mention: the Transylvanian Saxons and the Carpatho-Rusyns of Upper Hungary. As urban dwellers with a tradition of commerce, the Germans of Transylvania provided an element of expertise which the kurucz sorely needed. The Carpatho-Rusyns, by contrast, were a very poor people, but they nonetheless gained the title “the most faithful people” during the war. Carpatho-Rusyn peasants made up the bulk of Rakoczi’s infantry when he faced Field Marshal Heister in the ill-fated battle of Trencsen in August 1708. Outnumbered and outgunned, thousands of the “most faithful people” fell before Heister’s grenadiers. The common people generally and the non-Magyars in particular had cause for dissatisfaction at the conclusion of Rakoczi’s war. Owing to the terms of the compromise peace of Szatmar, the nobles were able to retain many of the rights they had been fighting for — and to regain others when Empress Maria Theresa sought their aid against Fredrick of Prussia in the 1740s. The common people — Magyar and non-Magyar alike — remained enserfed. There remained for a future generation the task of eliminating the last vestiges of feudalism. By the time circumstances favored such a change, new and conflicting interpretations of nationhood assured that the peoples of Hungary would not pursue common goals, as they had done in Rakoczi’s time. A RÁKÓCZI LEGEND: THE HUNTING ADVENTURE It happened in the days when the insurrectionist [kuruc] armies were laying siege to the fortress of Szatmar. Rákóczi encamped his troops under the fortress, but the besiegers seemed to be in no hurry at all to beset it and the civilians kept going in and out of the castle and carrying pieces of information to the insurrectionist army. Prince Rákóczi was extremely fond of hunting. One day, escorted by eight bodyguards and two huntsmen and his hunting dog Leo, he set off to the woods of Csenger and Tatarfalu. The whole afternoon they were beating the woods for boars. They were still a couple of hours walk from their hunting camp when it began to rain. Passing a farmstead on their way the prince stopped and said that they would stay there overnight. But as they had nothing to eat the bodyguards went off in search of some food. Meanwhile the two huntsmen prepared a bed for the prince. They carried into the house a big bundle of straw and spread a horse blanket over it. For a cushion they brought in the prince’s saddle. Rákóczi put it under his head and wrapped himself in his cloak. It became stuffy in the room and the prince opened the window to get some fresh air. His dog then began to growl; it had gotten wind of a stranger approaching through the farmyard. It was not the farmer, because the dog would have recognized him. The prince cocked the trigger of his pistol which he carried in his pocket and stepped to the window. The moon had just come out from behind the clouds, and by its light the prince beheld an Austrian officer in a plumed helmet. The enemy soldier aimed his pistol at the heart of the prince and with an ugly sneer called to him, “Surrender!” This officer had been spying upon the prince for some time and thought that if he captured the prince the Kaiser would, as a reward, raise him to the rank of baron. Rákóczi asked him, “What will happen to me if I surrender?” The officer answered, “Since you’d be a prisoner of war, you’d get decent treatment.” While he was speaking, Rákóczi drew forth the pistol from his pocket and sent a bullet through the officer’s head. But the house had been surrounded by enemy soldiers. They forced the door to the prince’s room, although Rákóczi and his two huntsmen were firing at the intruders. When some of the enemy were hit, their commander ordered a retreat into the farmyard. They decided to set the house on fire because they hoped for a good reward even if they should bring the prince in dead. The roof of the house was all afire when the bodyguards, who had gone in search of food, came riding back at great speed, alarmed by the sound of shooting. Then they dashed at the Austrian soldiers and such was their anger they killed them to a man, including even those who wanted to surrender. And sparing neither trouble nor pains they succeeded in putting out the fire. In the morning they all rode back to their camp, and the prince rewarded his brave soldiers. JULY 1987 HUNGARIAN HERITAGE REVIEW 23
