Magyar News, 1997. szeptember-1998. augusztus (8. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
1998-02-01 / 6. szám
It I If* The opening of the first Hungarian railway in 1846 average speed of thirty-nine kilometres an hour. The newspapers reassured those about to travel that nineteenth century man could well endure this speed and even get used to the monotonous rattle of the wheels. The four-axled carriage held thirty-eight to sixty-four passengers, depending on the class. The saloon-cars were equipped with easy chairs, the first and second-class carriages with upholstered seats, the third class with wooden benches. In other respects the carriages were fairly primitive. There was no question of heating for many years to come; and later on it was no more than the provision of cauldrons filled with hot water in the carriages, as had been done for centuries in the coaches of distinguished travellers. There was, however, no criticism of the trains: the passengers sat on the upholstered seats or benches with a sense of awe and were very happy with everything. The newspapers rivalled one another in encouraging the inhabitants of the two towns to travel. No longer journeys could, however, as yet be made. Although the Pest-Szolnok railway was opened on September 1, 1847, the total length of the lines amounted to only 176 kilometres at the outbreak of the 1848 War of Independence against the Habsburgs. The inauguration of the Szolnok railway took place with the same sort of celebration as seen in Vac. On its first trip to Szolnok the train, consisting of sixteen carriages, left Pest station at 8.15 a.m., and covered the round trip one hundred kilometres in two hours and thirtyseven minutes. The railway, however, ended at Vac and Szolnok, and those wanting to travel further had to change to a carriage or coach. But once a person had experienced the bliss of speed he found travelling by road more unpleasant than before. Although the building of railways continued during the despotic Austrian regime instituted after the failure of the 1848-1849 War of Independence, the carriage nevertheless remained the main means of passenger transport for a long time, and the trains had to be adapted to suit road traffic. In some cases the train transported the carriage which was to be used from the railway terminus. For a long time the mail-coach service ignored the railway. From June, 1851 there was a train from Budapest to Vienna via Pozsony, but the fast diligence continued to run via Gyor, and one could also travel to Vienna by mail-coach via Szekesfehervar. Indeed in the beginning the spread of the railway network even contributed to the development of the mailsoach: the services were speeded up and new lines were introduced. On the more popular routes lighter and more modem vehicles were put into use by the Post in order thats in so far as was possible, they should not lag too far behind the speed of the trains. It is difficult to draw a sharp line between the use of coaches and carriages and the railway, for even in 1867, by which time the main railway lines had been developed in every direction, the Post still transported 51,000 persons. There was a strong sense of nostalgia in the Flungarians, a sort of more patrio for travelling according to the ancient custom of the country, without dashing past the finest landscapes and towns, as was done by train. "Travelling is easier by railway, but a richer experience by carriage," said Jókai in the middle of the century. Hostility to the railway was kept alive for a long time by shippers and carters, whom the enginedriven train was gradually mining. The transport of both passengers and goods was cheaper, faster and more comfortable by rail. The spread of the new means of transport throughout the country killed off many trades and occupations. The shepherds of the Great Plain were also hostile to the “smoking steed”, it invaded the pastures, and scared horses, cattle and sheep. In the eyes of the peasants of the Great Plain the armed attack by the famous Szeged outlaw, Sándor Rozsa, against a train symbolized the resistance of an independent people. It was a dark November night in 1868 when Sándor Rozsa and six of his friends derailed the Pest train bound for Szeged. The outlaws removed the rails over ten metres distance, and then watched from the reeds along the line for the approaching train. The engine crashed from the railway embankment, the passenger carriages piled up one on top of the other. The outlaws attacked the mailvan, from which they hoped to carry off rich spoils. They had, however, no time for break it open, as on the alarm signal of the locomotive a patrol of soldiers nearby galloped to the scene and put the outlaws to flight. It was the last rebellion of the "free men of the puszta" against the railway, and even though the horseherds and shepherds talked of the train-raid with admiration around their camp-fires, as did the carters, deprived of their earnings, nothing could stop the railway. After 1867, the year when the "Compromise" between Hungary and the mling House of Habsburg was reached, one railway line after another came into existence, and by the beginning of the 1870's the first Pest railwaystation, built in 1846, could not cope with the traffic. Instead of extending it, the present Western Railway Station was built by constructing a huge glass-roofed hall over the original building by modem methods, and the pulling down the old station under it. The new station, worthy in every respect of the new metropolis of Budapest formed in 1873 by uniting the formerly separate towns of Buda and Pest into one, was designed by the Paris architect Gustave Eiffel. Its steel framework, a forty-four metres span with no central bracing shut, was considered one of Europe's most daring structures at the time. Five years later the building of the Budapest Eastern Station was also completed. Its huge front was embellished with the statues of George Stephenson, the inventor of the steam-driven railway, and James Watt, the inventor of the steam engine. In the same year the first European luxury train, the Orient Express, passed through Budapest. The high-wheeled locomotive of this international express, which later achieved legendary fame, pulled five carriages in all: two sleeping cars, a dining-car, a luggage van and a van for the food. It ran from Paris via Vienna and Budapest to Giurgiu in Rumania; from there the passengers reached the Turkish capital by changing trains several times. Between 1880 and 1900 the railway network developed with speed. By 1896, the year which saw the celebrations of the thousand-year-old Hungarian kingdom, there were seventeen thousand kilometres of line in operation. But nothing that has occurred since that date has yet been relegated to past history. International electric trains tear along at full speed, airplanes glide past at supersonic speed, but these are not for the chroniclers of times past; they are still with us. The story of the old modes of travel came to an end when the last easy going vehicle, the superannuated diligence, found its final home in the Museum of Transport. Excerpt from the book Gyula Antalffy: A Thousand Years of Travel in Old Hungary, by Corvina Books Publishing Company. Page 7
