Magyar News, 1994. szeptember-1995. augusztus (5. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1995-06-01 / 10. szám
THE DAY HUNGARY WAS “CRUCIFIED” The recollections of Viktor Padányi, a noted Hungarian historian. Excerpts from The Spirit of Hungary by Stephen Sisa. . “...But by that time most of the other nations’ ministers had signed the Peace Treaty, and it was no longer possible to endure the virtual blockade imposed on Hungary by the successor states. The bread we ate had become tasteless, because there was no salt; in the villages thousands of homes had remained dark for months for lack of petroleum to light the lamps; the clothes we wore were woven of paper fibers for lack of thread; and those whose very lives depended on medicines available only from abroad, died. Therefore, Hungary was constrained to sign the Peace Treaty, too. After long deliberations marked by the drama of mental agony and shock, the government appointed the Welfare Minister, Ágoston Benard, and former ambassador Alfréd Drasche-Lázár to carry out the disastrous deed, and they left for Paris at the end of May, in a journey that many thought was like Christ’s Calvary. The signing of the Peace Treaty was set for June 4,1920, at ten o’clock in the morning. In Hungary on the day of June 4, all military companies were placed on alert, all national guard units were called to duty, and in the cities police protection was doubled. In those days, radio was not yet in use, but Budapest was able to keep in constant contact with Paris by telephone. That morning large crowds gathered in front of the major newspapers’ offices, straining to see the news updates that were periodically posted in the windows. A strange restlessness had been coursing through the streets of Budapest ever since daybreak, and passing faces told of inward suffering, the expressions tired and often empty, resembling nothing so much as the faces at wakes in the houses of the dead. Even the usual street sounds seemed somehow dulled. One or two minutes after ten o’clock the final confirmation that the Peace Treaty had been signed came echoing through the wires—and then the church bells began to toll, first in Budapest and then, as the news spread with electrifying speed, in every town and village throughout the stricken nation. For two hours, until noon, the bells would continue to toll as the Magyars buried their past—and their future. Within minutes Budapest was dressed in black. Within minutes black flags of mourning waved sadly from every flagpole, the black bunting reserved for funerals hung from the windows. The streets darkened as thousands of people turned out in black— men, women and children moving slowly along, their faces streaming with tears, sometimes sobbing out loud. Fists were raised at the heavens, accompanied by shouts of blasphemy bom of despair. At one comer of the Octagon plaza, a maimed soldier tore off his jacket and, pointing to the stump of his arm which had been severed at the elbow, he cried out" “For this!” Strangers on the street fell into each other’s arms in spontaneous embraces of consolation; small groups gathered to comfort those who could but sit on a bench and weep uncontrollably, and piercing the steady knell of the ringing church bells came the cry “Extra! Extra!” as thousands of newsboys fanned out into the streets to begin handing out the special editions of that day’s news, the pages framed in black. Eagerly the people began to read what they already knew, their souls welling with helpless rage. Editorials were read out loud to groups of hushed listeners. Those assembled in front of the National Museum began singing the National Anthem, and relentlessly the bells tolled on and on. The churches quickly filled with sobbing people, for in the depths of their sorrow they began to cling to their God. Priests went up to their pulpits to pray for the impossible, to offerconsolation where there was none. In the countryside, the scene was the same. Mourning and despair were everywhere, but beyond a few minor fistfights, law and order prevailed. All the security measures had proved effective, and the serving of alcohol was forbidden. And in every village and town for the two hours until noon the church bells tolled and tolled mercilessly. • • • At the time these events took place, I was a boy of fourteen, in my fourth year of secondary school. At ten o’clock that day my class in botany was about to begin, and the tall spare figure of Demjén Kovách, our teacher, appeared at the door, promptly as usual. He walked to the podium, signed the class log, but instead of calling on us to answer our homework assignments, as he usually did, he leaned his whole body forward, his head down, for one very long minute... and then the bells began to toll. Demjén Kovách then straightened, went over to the cabinet which held the maps, removed the map that still bore the legend “Political May of the Countries of the Magyar Holy Crown,” and hung it up—all this without a single word. Then he stood before it, a little to the side so as not to cover it from our view, and as he gazed at it his ever-stem expression softened to an ineffable tenderness such as we had never seen before. In deadly silence we, too, looked at that map and that figure that stood before it, that graying Cistercian priest, as his head sank ever lower onto his chest. And as the tolling of the church bells drifted in from outside in the deepening stillness, he said, more to himself than to any of us, in Latin: “Consummatum est" (“It is done.”) There were fifty-four of us in that class, fifty-four fourteen year-old Magyar boys. After these last words of Christ on Golgotha, we all bowed our heads onto our desks and began to cry. Outside the bells continued to toll. The day of Hungary ’ s “crucifixion” was J une 4, 1920. A Friday... TIDBITS, FACTS AND UNBELIEVABLES Archduke Franz Ferdinand who hated the Magyars and the Jews once remarked about the Magyars: “It was an act of bad taste on the part of these gentlemen ever to have come to Europe.” Whenever he traveled through Hungary he had the curtains in his royal Pullman wagon to be drawn. One might say that this is not nice form somebody who is going to be the king of the Hungarians. In 1895 he expressed his opinion that Hungary should be subjugated by the sword once every century. Franz Ferdinand was quite willing to reward Romania if she joined the Monarchy, at the expense of Hungary. ***** After WWI the United States signed a separate Peace Treaty with Hungary, in Budapest, August 29,1921, not including the borders, and Congress did not ratify the Peace Treaty of Trianon. * * * * * No member of the Hungarian government was willing to go to Versailles to sign the Treaty. They held a lottery and the Minister of Public Welfare, Dr. Ágoston Benard’s name was drawn. He signed the Treaty, his hands were shaking and his eyes were blinded with tears. * * * * * President Wilson returning to the United States complained that everybody at the Peace Treaty lied to him. ***** Masaryk and Benes demanded a 100 kilometer corridor through western Hungary to connect the north and south Slavic countries. They also claimed that it would be beneficial to the French as a staging area against Germany in the next war. ***** The Treaty took away 67% of the banking institutes, her entire gold, silver, copper and salt deposits. She also lost55.7% of industrial plants find 62.2% of her railroads. 5
