The Hungarian Student, 1957 (1. évfolyam, 2-8. szám)
1957 / 7. szám
14 The Hungarian Student Student Travel Permit Signed By Soviet Commander o£ Budapest ed masses. Demonstrators collapsed by the dozens as they marched up the streets silently with the national flags in their hands and clashed several times with police units and Russian units deployed against them. Later the demonstrators rallied again in front of the Western Terminal and several demonstrators were killed and injured in clashes that occurred there. The news of the bloody demonstrations spread quickly all over the city and more demonstrations and clashes occurred. The demonstrators demanded Kadar’s immediate ouster and the withdrawal of all Russian forces from Hungary. On December 9, 1956, a huge, bloody clash occurred in Miskolc, which was briefly commented upon by the world press. The Communist version of this event was published in the December 14, 1956, issue of Nepszabadsag and reads as follows: “Early in the afternoon smaller groups rallied in the streets. The crowd advanced shouting : ‘Hungarians march with us.’ They stopped the trolley cars and finally succeeded in creating a shuffling around the immobile buses and trolleys at the corner of Szemere Street. Immediately the crowd started agitating; shouting anti-democratic and anti-Soviet slogans. The pedestrians—about 400 of them—immediately converged upon the group. Texts of leaflets appeared immediately: anti-Soviet poems, which the crowd wanted to have printed. Hungarian policemen and Soviet soldiers were posted in front of the printing house. Now the counter-revolutionaries were no longer satisfied with diatribes. A depraved gang opened fire on the Soviet soldiers, the Hungarian police and the crowd from the roof and the basement of the building located opposite the publishing house. One soldier died immediately and two others were injured. Panic gripped the crowd. Many ran in the direction of the Szinva bridge, the bridge broke under them and many fell into the rocky bed of the brook. The counter-revolutionaries upheld their fire. The Soviet soldiers were forced to return the fire. The counter-revolutionaries set fire to the look-out on top of the Avas mountain. A group of about 60 counterrevolutionaries broke into the barracks of the Tenth Infantry Regiment through the back entrance and demanded that the commander of the police forces [Kadar militia] be handed over to them. Instead of complying with the demands of the counterrevolutionaries, the members of the police force pushed the group out of the yard of the barracks with riflebutts. Not a single shot was fired. The policemen inside the barracks closed the entrances and returned to their quarters, when two shots were fired. One of the leaders of the police force, Comrade Alexander Oprendek, collapsed dead, struck by one of the bullets fired by the counter-revolutionaries.” The January 12, 1957, issue of Népakarat, Budapest, had the following to say on the workers’ demonstration in Csepel in which a few workers were killed : “Several workers of the Csepel Steel Works declared that they were unwilling to continue to work under their former leaders. These workers published provocative leaflets. A demonstration started and the state forces ordered the demonstrators to disband. Several groups of demonstrators attacked the armed state forces. The latter withdrew into the building of the central administration and fired some warning shots. The demonstrators sent a delegation consisting of ten persons to negotiate with Director Hegyi and the governmental commissioner. A rebellion broke out and shooting occurred. Later people also shot in self-defense. Bullets ricocheting from the ceiling injured Imre B. Nagy, who died later in the afternoon in the hospital. A woman was also injured. The crowd dispersed after the warning shots had been fired.” Moscow and the puppet Kadar regime did not waste much time before applying stronger methods. They tried the participants of the Miskolc demonstration. In the course of these demonstrations Communist newspapers were burned and revolutionary songs recited. Bela Barta, a 30-year old worker, who initiated the demonstrations with two colleagues of his on December 10, 1956, was mentioned by name by the Kadarist authorities. The court sentenced Bela Barta to 14 years’ imprisonment, (Continued on page 15)
