Amerikai Magyar Szó, 1979. január-június (33. évfolyam, 1-26. szám)

1979-05-24 / 21. szám

Thursday, May 24. 1979.

AMERIKAI MAGYAR SZÓ ■

9

"Colonel Commandant Michael de Kováts"—a relief in New York

The adventurous Mihály Kováts, who called himself Michael Kováts de Fabriczy when he was abroad, was bom in Karcag, Hungary, in August 1724.

He served as a 20-year-old cornet in the Hungarian hussars of Maria Theresa’s army in the Second Silesian War of 1744-45. After the Treaty of Dresden his regiment was disbanded, but Frederick the Great of Prussia recognized the worth of the fast-moving hussars, and organized the first Prussian light cavalry regiment out of the disbanded Hungarian officers and men, among them Mihály Kováts, who served in the Prussian army for six years. The Seven Years’ War by Frederick against Maria Theresa saw the courageous Kováts promoted in less than a year to the rank of second lieutenant. He served in 15 campaigns and was seriously wounded at Gotha. In 1759, his new commander, General Kleist, appointed Kováts to command a squadron. He later led several independent sorties, rose to the command of the Gersdorf ‘Free Hussars’, and in 1760 was promoted to a captaincy.

Arrest and promotion

Later his task was to hold down occupied territories, and perhaps finding this uncongenial was a factor in his resigning his commission

OF THE AMERICAN WIR

OF INDEPENDENCE

on June 28, 1761. From the Prussian Army he went to Poland, where he made contact with high military and political circles. Austria still considered him a deserter and requested his extradition, but this never took place. Trusting in an amnesty by Maria Theresa, Kováts returned to Hungary, but was arrested in Késmárk on an old warrant, taken to Vienna and detained on treason charges for more than a year. On June 13, 1762, the Empress ordered his relesae and the return of his property, and even, recognizing" his ear-' ly courageous service in her armies, promoted him on January 31, 1763, to the rank of major. And so the road was open to him for a peaceable, trivial life. He married a certain Franciska Szinyei Merse, but after the death of their three-year- old son the marriage broke up.

Letter to Benjamin Franklin

Grave family and financial difficulties, along with political antipathies, may have contributed equally to Kováts’s decision to follow his martial instincts once more when news of the outbreak of" the American War of Independence reached him. A report by the military commander of Buda reads: “Major Kováts quit Buda in August 1776, and I am informed went to the French port of Bordeaux, from which he left for America and joined the army of the united colonies.” The report is confirmed by a letter Kováts sent in Latin Benjamin Franklin, the American ambassador in Paris, which is still preserved in the American Philosophical Society’s library in Philadelphia. In it, he proudly recounted his career and military experiences. Among other matters he wrote: “I am free and a Hungarian!. .. I have come here of my own free will, at the cost of great travelling, suffering and effort. In all my tribulations and perils I am willing to sacrifice myself loyally, as befits an honest soldier...”

He did not even await an answer, but sailed straight for America. The first mention of him overseas is in December 1777, When he was staying in Pennsylvania with the Polish liberation hero Pulaski.

The Battle of Saratoga in the autumn of 1777, in which the British General Burgoyne suffered a serious defeat, may be considered a turning point in the War of Independence, and it also brought a change in the international position of the Americans. On February 6, 1778, , Benjamin Franklin signed a treaty with France that provided well- equipped French forces to supplement the volunteers. But time had to elapse before their arrival, and the Americans still had no light cavalry in the Europran sense. Their mounted regiments were little more than infantry on horseback, not true light cavalry able to play a strategic role. Pulaski and Kováts, whose personalities complemented each other, were the ones to organize this. The first was a great leader, and the second a military organizer of enormous experience.

Master of Exercise

George Washington soon reached a decision. On January 14, 1778, he wrote: “As far as the character and qualities of the so often menThe memory of the first Hungarian who gave his life for the defense of American independence, was honored in appropriate manner in Charleston, S.C. on May 9th, the anniversary of Colonel Kovats’ death on the battlefield near this city in 1779.

Hungarian organizations participating in the event presented a bronze plaque to the mayor of the city, It will be placed on the wall of the local Exchange Building.

One of the most moving moments of the ocassion was the delivery of a decorative bronze urn containing soil from Karcag, Kovats' native city in Hungary.

Reciprocating, the city of Charleston delivered the key of the city to the town of Karcag.

Messages of greetings were read by Dr. Udvarhelyi, chairman of the Bicentennial Committee.

The fall of Kováts at Charleston, portrayed by the Hungarian-born sculptor Pál Takács, who lives in Washington DC

tioned Mr Kováts are concerned,

I have no objection ta make to his engagement for some months as Master of Exercise.”

The job was no easy one. He was surrounded by the jealousies of Washington’s general staff, even the commander himself being averse to the idea of European-style light cavalry, and Kováts had difficulty in translating his European approach into the specific requirements of the American war.

In a worsening military situation, Pulaski was ordered to join General Wayne’s army, which was defeated by the British at Haddon’s Field. Pulaski wearied of his task and resigned as calvary commander-inchief, the resignation being accepted by Congress on March 20. Before doing so, he had made a suggestion to George Washington: “I would recommend an experienced officer as my successor, his name is Ko- vacz...”

Plans for the Pulaski Legion, which had been submitted earlier, received the go-ahead a few day’s after the resignation, and so they could continue. On April 18, Kováts became regimental commander, and could at last fulfil his plans to form light cavalry. The headquarters were set up at Baltimore, Maryland.

Kováts dealt personally with every detail. By July the corps was already assembled, and the legion divided into three cavalry and three infantry units. Training was available under real battle conditions, against Indians in the service of the British.

On the march

The British, after failures in the north, were intent on achieving success in the south, and at the close of 1778 occupied Savannah and penetrated deep into Georgia and South Carolina. Washington sent General Benjamin Lincoln against them. Meanwhile, on February 2, 1779, Kováts marched his legion to Yorktown, from where he was ordered to support Lincoln. The infantry left town on March 18, followed by the cavalry on March 28. They marched through North Carolina, attracting great attention in Salem by their discipline and payments for the provisions they commandeered. But an outbreak of smallpox dealt them a harder blow than the enemy did, and they arrived much reduced in numbers at Charleston, which was being defended by General Moultrie.

The town was besieged by British troops under Prevost, and on Colonel Kováts’s arrival, was about to surrender. The same day, May 11, 1779, he launched a counter-attack and died a hero’s death. He was buried in Charleston, and his adversary Major Skelly wrote in his war diary: “The cavalry officer of Pulaski’s Legion, the most eminent those rebels have ever had, has fallen.”

In October 1781, the regrouped American and French forces succeeded in bringing the British to heel at Yorktown, a victory Kováts did not live to see. But he is remembered in the United States, with particular pride by Hungarian- Americans. Here in Hungary he was recalled by Secretary-of-State Cyrus Vance at the festive handing over of the Hungarian Crown in January 1978.

A Mihály Kováts Society was formed in the United States nearly half a century ago, his figure has been embossed in a relief, and a label issued in his honour. During the Second World War, on September 1944, a warship named the Colonel Michael de Kováts was launched

in Florida' József Antall