Pál Teleki
Encyclopedia
Budapest
Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...
, Hungary
Hungary
Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
, 1 November 1879 – Budapest
Budapest
Budapest is the capital of Hungary. As the largest city of Hungary, it is the country's principal political, cultural, commercial, industrial, and transportation centre. In 2011, Budapest had 1,733,685 inhabitants, down from its 1989 peak of 2,113,645 due to suburbanization. The Budapest Commuter...
, Hungary
Hungary
Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
, 3 April 1941) was prime minister of Hungary
Hungary
Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
from 19 July 1920 to 14 April 1921 and from 16 February 1939 to 3 April 1941. He was also a famous expert in geography
Geography
Geography is the science that studies the lands, features, inhabitants, and phenomena of Earth. A literal translation would be "to describe or write about the Earth". The first person to use the word "geography" was Eratosthenes...
, a university professor, a member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences
Hungarian Academy of Sciences
The Hungarian Academy of Sciences is the most important and prestigious learned society of Hungary. Its seat is at the bank of the Danube in Budapest.-History:...
, and Chief Scout of the Hungarian Scout Association
Magyar Cserkészszövetség
Magyar Cserkészszövetség , the primary national Scouting organization of Hungary, was founded in 1912, and became a member of the World Organization of the Scout Movement in 1922 and again after the rebirth of Scouting in the country in 1990...
. He descended from a noble family from Alsótelek
Teliucu Inferior
Teliucu Inferior is a commune in Hunedoara County, Romania. It is composed of four villages: Cinciş-Cerna, Izvoarele, Teliucu Inferior and Teliucu Superior.Iron mining began there in Roman times.-References:...
in Transylvania
Transylvania
Transylvania is a historical region in the central part of Romania. Bounded on the east and south by the Carpathian mountain range, historical Transylvania extended in the west to the Apuseni Mountains; however, the term sometimes encompasses not only Transylvania proper, but also the historical...
.
He is a controversial figure in Hungarian history because while he was Prime Minister a number of anti-Jewish laws were enacted while he also walked a very difficult political tightrope, striving to preserve Hungarian autonomy up to the last moment of his life.
Personal life
Teleki was born to Teleki Géza (1844–1913), a Hungarian politician, and his wife Muráty (Muratisz) Irén (1852–1941), the daughter of a wealthy Greek merchant, in Budapest, Hungary. He attended Budapest Lutheran elementary school from 1885–1889, and Pest Calasanz High School ("gymnazium") from 1889–1897. In 1897 he started upper-division work at Budapest University studying law and political science. The then studied at the Royal Hungarian Academy of Economy (Magyaróvári Magyar Királyi Gazdasági Akadémiára) , and after struggling to complete his studies, graduated with a PhD in 1903. He went on to become a university professor and expert on geography and socio-economic affairs in pre-World War I Hungary and a well-respected educator. (Erik von Kuehnelt-LeddihnErik von Kuehnelt-Leddihn
Erik Maria Ritter von Kuehnelt-Leddihn was an Austrian Catholic nobleman and socio-political theorist...
was one of his students). He fought in the First World War as a volunteer.
Academic life
In 1910, he compiled and published the first map depicting the ethnographic make up of the Hungarian nation. Based on the density of population according to the 1910 census, the so-called Red map was created for the peace talk in Treaty of TrianonTreaty of Trianon
The Treaty of Trianon was the peace agreement signed in 1920, at the end of World War I, between the Allies of World War I and Hungary . The treaty greatly redefined and reduced Hungary's borders. From its borders before World War I, it lost 72% of its territory, which was reduced from to...
. His maps were an excellent composition of social and geographic data, even by today's well-developed Geographic Information System
Geographic Information System
A geographic information system, geographical information science, or geospatial information studies is a system designed to capture, store, manipulate, analyze, manage, and present all types of geographically referenced data...
's point of view. From 1911–1913 he was Director of Scientific Publishing for the Institute of Geography, and from 1910–1923 he was Secretary General of the Geographical Society. He was a delegate to the Versailles Peace Conference in 1919.
Scouting
In the summer of 1927, Teleki's son GézaGéza Teleki
Count Géza Teleki de Szék was a Hungarian politician and field hockey player who competed in the 1936 Summer Olympics. He was born in Budapest, the son of Pál Teleki.-Private life:...
, a member of the Hungarian Sea Scouts
Magyar Cserkészszövetség
Magyar Cserkészszövetség , the primary national Scouting organization of Hungary, was founded in 1912, and became a member of the World Organization of the Scout Movement in 1922 and again after the rebirth of Scouting in the country in 1990...
, was attending a Sea Scout
Sea Scout
Sea Scouts are members of the international Scouting movement, with a particular emphasis on water-based activities, such as kayaking, canoeing, sailing, and rowing. Depending on the country and the available water these activities are on lakes, rivers or sea in small or large ships. Sea Scouting...
rally held at Helsingør, Denmark
Denmark
Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...
. On a sailing cruise, he ignored a reprimand from his Scoutmaster, Fritz M. de Molnár, for failure to carry out a small but necessary exercise of seamanship. Molnár tried to drive home his point by threatening to tell the boy's father on their return to Budapest. Géza replied "Oh, Dad's not interested in Scouting
Scouting
Scouting, also known as the Scout Movement, is a worldwide youth movement with the stated aim of supporting young people in their physical, mental and spiritual development, that they may play constructive roles in society....
." This roused Molnár's mettle, and he determined to take up the subject of Scouting with Count Teleki.
Molinar's talk about Scouting intrigued Teleki, and he was instrumental in supporting Scouting within Hungary. He became Hungary's Chief Scout, a member of the International Scout Committee from 1929 until 1939, Camp Chief of the 4th World Scout Jamboree
4th World Scout Jamboree
The 4th World Scout Jamboree, a gathering of Boy Scouts from all over the world, was hosted by Hungary and held from August 2 to August 13, 1933. It was attended by 25,792 Scouts, representing 46 different nations and additional territories...
held at The Royal Forest at Gödöllő
Gödöllo
Gödöllő is a town situated in Pest county, Budapest metropolitan area, Hungary, about northeast from the outskirts of Budapest. Its population is about 31,000 according to the 2001 census. It can be easily reached from Budapest with the suburban railway . Gödöllő is home to the Szent István...
, Hungary, Chief Scout of the Hungarian Scout Association
Magyar Cserkészszövetség
Magyar Cserkészszövetség , the primary national Scouting organization of Hungary, was founded in 1912, and became a member of the World Organization of the Scout Movement in 1922 and again after the rebirth of Scouting in the country in 1990...
, and a close friend and contemporary of Robert Baden-Powell, 1st Baron Baden-Powell
Robert Baden-Powell, 1st Baron Baden-Powell
Robert Stephenson Smyth Baden-Powell, 1st Baron Baden-Powell, Bt, OM, GCMG, GCVO, KCB , also known as B-P or Lord Baden-Powell, was a lieutenant-general in the British Army, writer, and founder of the Scout Movement....
. His influence and inspiration were a major factor in the success of Scouting in Hungary
Magyar Cserkészszövetség
Magyar Cserkészszövetség , the primary national Scouting organization of Hungary, was founded in 1912, and became a member of the World Organization of the Scout Movement in 1922 and again after the rebirth of Scouting in the country in 1990...
, and contributed to its success in other countries as well.
Preserved Hungarian autonomy
Some view Teleki as a moral hero who tried to avoid Hungary's involvement in World War II. He sent Tibor Eckhard, a high ranking Smallholders PartyIndependent Smallholders, Agrarian Workers and Civic Party
The Independent Smallholders, Agrarian Workers and Civic Party is a political party in Hungary...
politician, to the United States with $5 million dollars for the Hungarian Minister in the United States, János Pelenyi, to prepare the Hungarian government in exile, for when he and Regent Horthy
Miklós Horthy
Miklós Horthy de Nagybánya was the Regent of the Kingdom of Hungary during the interwar years and throughout most of World War II, serving from 1 March 1920 to 15 October 1944. Horthy was styled "His Serene Highness the Regent of the Kingdom of Hungary" .Admiral Horthy was an officer of the...
would have to leave the country. According to supporters of this view, his object was to save what could be saved, under political and military pressure from Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
, and like the Polish government in exile
Polish government in Exile
The Polish government-in-exile, formally known as the Government of the Republic of Poland in Exile , was the government in exile of Poland formed in the aftermath of the Invasion of Poland of September 1939, and the subsequent occupation of Poland by Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union, which...
, to try to survive in some fashion during the war years to come.
Teleki holds Hungary to "Non-belligerent" status
Rejoining the government in 1938 as Minister of Education, Teleki supported Germany's take over of Czechoslovakia with the hopes that the dismemberment of Hungary completed in the 1920 Treaty of TrianonTreaty of Trianon
The Treaty of Trianon was the peace agreement signed in 1920, at the end of World War I, between the Allies of World War I and Hungary . The treaty greatly redefined and reduced Hungary's borders. From its borders before World War I, it lost 72% of its territory, which was reduced from to...
would be undone. On 16 February 1939, Hungary's Premier Béla Imrédy
Béla Imrédy
Béla vitéz Imrédy de Ómoravicza was Prime Minister of Hungary from 1938 to 1939....
, who had been known as a pro-fascist, anti-Semitic leader, was forced from office after it was revealed that he was of Jewish descent. Teleki became Prime Minister for the second time on 15 February 1939. While he strove to close down several fascist political parties, he did nothing to end existing anti-Semitic laws.
On 24 August 1939, Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
and the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
signed the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact
The Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, named after the Soviet foreign minister Vyacheslav Molotov and the German foreign minister Joachim von Ribbentrop, was an agreement officially titled the Treaty of Non-Aggression between Germany and the Soviet Union and signed in Moscow in the late hours of 23 August 1939...
which among other things stipulated the Soviet Union's long-standing "interest" in Bessarabia
Bessarabia
Bessarabia is a historical term for the geographic region in Eastern Europe bounded by the Dniester River on the east and the Prut River on the west....
, Romania. One week later, on 1 September 1939, Germany invaded Poland
Invasion of Poland (1939)
The Invasion of Poland, also known as the September Campaign or 1939 Defensive War in Poland and the Poland Campaign in Germany, was an invasion of Poland by Germany, the Soviet Union, and a small Slovak contingent that marked the start of World War II in Europe...
. It demanded use of the Hungarian railway system through Kassa, Hungary, so that German troops could attack Poland from the south. Hungary had traditionally strong ties with Poland, and Teleki refused Germany's demand. Regent Horthy told the German ambassador that "he would sooner blow up the rail lines than to participate in an attack on Poland." Hungary declared that it was a "non-belligerent" nation and refused to allow German forces to travel through or over Hungary. As a result of Teleki's refusal to cooperate with Germany, during the autumn of 1939 and the summer of 1940 more than 100,000 Polish soldiers and hundreds of thousands of civilians, many of them Jewish, escaped from Poland and crossed the border into Hungary. The Hungarian government then permitted the Polish Red Cross and the Polish Catholic Church to operate in the open. The Polish soldiers were formally interned, but most of them managed to flee to France by spring of 1940, thanks to indulgent or friendly attitude of officials.
However, with Germany's seizure of Austria, Czechoslovakia and Poland, the buffer nations between Hungary and the belligerent nations of Germany and Russia had evaporated. Germany made economic demands on Hungary to support the war, and offered to repay with arms deliveries, but because of developments in the Balkans, these were routed to the Romanian Army instead.
In his diaries, Italian Foreign Minister and Mussolini's son-in-law Galeazzo Ciano
Galeazzo Ciano
Gian Galeazzo Ciano, 2nd Count of Cortellazzo and Buccari was an Italian Minister of Foreign Affairs and Benito Mussolini's son-in-law. In early 1944 Count Ciano was shot by firing squad at the behest of his father-in-law, Mussolini under pressure from Nazi Germany.-Early life:Ciano was born in...
wrote that during a visit to Rome by Teleki in March 1940, Teleki "has avoided taking any open position one way or the other but has not hidden his sympathy for the Western Powers and fears an integral German victory like the plague." Ciano reported that Teleki later said that he hoped "for the defeat of Germany, not a complete defeat—that might provoke violent shocks—but a kind of defeat that would blunt her teeth and claws for a long time."
Germany demands Hungary's assistance
In 1940, Germany used Russia's imminent movement to take over Bessarabia as an excuse to prepare to occupy the vital Rumanian oil fields. Germany's General Staff approached Hungary's General Staff and sought passage of their troops through Hungary and for Hungary's participation in the takeover. Germany held out Transylvania as Hungary's reward. The Hungarian government resisted, desiring to remain neutral. It held out some hope for assistance from the Italians. They sent a special envoy to Rome with the message that, "For the Hungarians there arises the problem either of letting the Germans pass, or opposing them with force. In either case the Hungarian liberty would come to an end." Mussolini replied, "How could this ever be," he said, "since I am Hitler's ally and intend to remain so?"In March 1941, Teleki strongly objected to Hungarian participation in the invasion of Yugoslavia. Given Hungary's resistance to aiding Germany, it in turn was not trusted by Germany. Hungary was not informed of Hitler's top-secret preparations for invading Russia and Hungary was not initially part of the invasion. "Hungary, in the period of preparation for Barbarossa, is not to be counted as an ally beyond the present status ..." Furthermore, German troops were not to cross Hungarian territories, and Hungarian airfields were not to be used by the Luftwaffe, according to the new directives of the High Command on 22 March 1941. Teleki believed that only a Danubian Federation could help the central and east european states — Austria, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, Romania, Bulgaria —escape Germany's domination.
In the book, Transylvania The Land Beyond the Forest Louis C. Cornish described how Teleki, under constant surveillance by the German Gestapo during 1941, sent a secret communication to contacts in America.
Journalist Dorothy Thompson
Dorothy Thompson
Dorothy Thompson was an American journalist and radio broadcaster, who in 1939 was recognized by Time magazine as the second most influential women in America next to Eleanor Roosevelt...
in 1941 supported the statement of others. "I took from Count Teleki's office a monograph which he had written upon the structure of European nations. A distinguished geographer, he was developing a plan for regional federation, based upon geographical and economic realities." Teleki received no response to his ideas and was left to resolve the situation on his own.
Teleki must choose between Axis and Allies
The event that eventually led to Teleki's suicide began on 25 March 1941 when the Yugoslavian Prime Minister, Dragisa CvetkovicDragiša Cvetkovic
Dragiša Cvetković was a Yugoslav politician.He served as the prime minister of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia from 1939 to 1941. He developed the federalization of Yugoslavia through the creation of the Banovina of Croatia by an agreement with Croatian leader Vladko Maček...
, and Minister for Foreign Affairs, Aleksandar Cincar Marković, traveled to Vienna and signed the Tripartite Pact
Tripartite Pact
The Tripartite Pact, also the Three-Power Pact, Axis Pact, Three-way Pact or Tripartite Treaty was a pact signed in Berlin, Germany on September 27, 1940, which established the Axis Powers of World War II...
. In the late evening on 26/27 March 1941, Air Force Generals Dušan Simović
Dušan Simovic
Dušan T. Simović was a Yugoslav general who served as chief of the air force and commander-in-chief of the Royal Yugoslav Army and as the Prime Minister of Yugoslavia.-Life and career:...
and Borivoje Mirković had executed a bloodless coup d'état and had refuted signatures on the alliance and accepted a British guarantee of security instead. Germany saw its southern flank potentially exposed just as it was preparing Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa was the code name for Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II that began on 22 June 1941. Over 4.5 million troops of the Axis powers invaded the USSR along a front., the largest invasion in the history of warfare...
, the invasion of Russia. Germany planned to invade Yugoslavia
Invasion of Yugoslavia
The Invasion of Yugoslavia , also known as the April War , was the Axis Powers' attack on the Kingdom of Yugoslavia which began on 6 April 1941 during World War II...
(Directive No. 25) and compel it to remain part of the Axis. Hitler used Hungary's membership in the Tripartite Pact
Tripartite Pact
The Tripartite Pact, also the Three-Power Pact, Axis Pact, Three-way Pact or Tripartite Treaty was a pact signed in Berlin, Germany on September 27, 1940, which established the Axis Powers of World War II...
of 1940 to demand that Hungary should also attack. The Hungarian Minister to Berlin was sent home by air with a message for Regent Horthy:
Teleki had signed a non-aggression and "Treaty of Eternal Friendship" with Yugoslavia in 12 December 1940, only five months previously, and would not assent to assisting with the invasion. Teleki's government chose a middle ground, opting to remain out of the German-Yugoslav conflict unless Magyar (Hungarian) minorities were in danger, or if
Yugoslavia collapsed. Teleki relayed his government's position to London, seeking allowance for Hungary’s difficult position.
On 3 April 1941, Teleki received a telegram from the Hungarian minister in London that the British Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Anthony Eden
Anthony Eden
Robert Anthony Eden, 1st Earl of Avon, KG, MC, PC was a British Conservative politician, who was Prime Minister from 1955 to 1957...
, had threatened to break diplomatic relations with Hungary if she did not actively resist the passage of German troops across her territory, and to declare war if she attacked Yugoslavia.
Teleki's enduring desire was to keep Hungary non-aligned, yet it could not ignore Nazi Germany's dominant influence. Prime Minister Teleki had two choices. He could continue to resist Germany's demands for their help in the invasion of Yugoslavia, although he knew this would likely mean the immediate invasion of Hungary and overthrow of its government by Germany, just as they had taken over the Sudentenland, Poland, Austria, and as they were threatening to do to Yugoslavia. Or he could allow passage of German military across Hungary, betraying Yugoslavia, openly defying the Allies, moving them to declare war on Hungary.
The Hungarian Regent, Admiral Horthy, who until this time had resisted Germany's pressure, agreed to Germany's demands. Teleki met with the cabinet council that evening. He complained that the Regent had "told me thirty-four times that he would never make war for foreign interests, and now he has changed his mind."
Before Teleki could chart a course through the political thicket, the decision was torn from him by General Werth, chief of the Hungarian General Staff. Without the sanction of the Hungarian government, Werth, of German origin, made private arrangements with the German High Command for the transport of the German troops across Hungary. Teleki denounced Werth's action as treason.
Germany enters Hungary, Teleki commits suicide
Shortly after 9:00 p.m., he left the Hungarian Ministry of Foreign Affairs for his apartment in the Sandor Palace. At around midnight he received a call that is thought to have advised him that the German army had just started its march into Hungary. Prime Minister Pál Teleki committed suicide with a pistol during the night of 3 April 1941 and was found the next morning. His suicide note said in part:Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, was a predominantly Conservative British politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century and served as Prime Minister twice...
later wrote, "His suicide was a sacrifice to absolve himself and his people from guilt in the German attack on Yugoslavia." On 6 April 1941, Germany launched Operation Punishment (Unternehmen Strafgericht), the bombing of Belgrade
Belgrade
Belgrade is the capital and largest city of Serbia. It is located at the confluence of the Sava and Danube rivers, where the Pannonian Plain meets the Balkans. According to official results of Census 2011, the city has a population of 1,639,121. It is one of the 15 largest cities in Europe...
, Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia
Yugoslavia refers to three political entities that existed successively on the western part of the Balkans during most of the 20th century....
. "He is viewed by some Hungarians as a patriot who chose to die rather than collaborate with the Nazis." Britain shortly broke diplomatic relations but did not declare war until December that year.
Anti-Jewish actions
Regent Horthy appointed Teleki prime minister on 19 July 1920. While he was Prime Minister, the Hungarian parliament passed anti-Jewish legislation that banned non-Christians from attending universities. He and his government resigned less than a year later on 14 April 1921 when the former emperor, Karl IVKarl I of Austria
Charles I of Austria or Charles IV of Hungary was the last ruler of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. He was the last Emperor of Austria, the last King of Hungary, the last King of Bohemia and Croatia and the last King of Galicia and Lodomeria and the last monarch of the House of Habsburg-Lorraine...
, attempted to retake Hungary's throne.
From 1921 until 1938, Teleki was a professor at Budapest University. While there, journalists asked him what he thought about the anti-Jewish violence that had occurred on the university campus. He replied: "This din does not bother me. In any case, the students take examinations that test their knowledge of the sea and this din is aptly suited to that of the sea."
During the 1930s, the percentage of Jews in the general population was far smaller than the percentage whose work included business, finance, and the professions. In the 1930 census, Jews comprised only 5.1% of the population, but among physicians, 54.5 percent were Jewish, journalists 31.7%, and lawyers 49.2%. Persons of Jewish faith controlled four of the five major banks, from 19.5 to 33% of the national income, and around 80 percent of the country's industry. When the worldwide depression struck in the late 1920s and early 1930s, the Jews were made scapegoats by anti-Semites for Hungary's economic plight.
In 1938, after a period of considerable economic turbulence and a general political turn to the far right, Teleki became Prime Minister once again on 16 February 1939. Hungary passed anti-Jewish law restricting the role played by Jews in the Hungarian economy to 20%. In 1939, after he became Prime Minister once again, Hungary required all young Jewish men of arms-bearing age to join forced-labor service. In 1940, this compulsory service was extended to all able-bodied male Jews. As a result of the laws established during Teleki's tenure, after his death in July 1941, the Hungarian government transferred responsibility for 18,000 Jews from Carpato-Ruthenian Hungary to the German armed forces. These Jews, without Hungarian citizenship, were sent to a location near Kamenets-Podolski, where in one of the first acts of mass killing during World War II, all but two thousand of these individuals were executed by the Nazi Einsatzgruppe (mobile killing unit).
Including the recently annexed territories, in 1941 Hungary's Jewish population totaled about 825,000. The Hungarian racial laws defined "Jews" in racial, not religious, terms, forbade marriage between Jews and non-Jews. Teleki wrote the preamble to the Second Anti-Jewish Law (1939) and prepared the Third Anti-Jewish Law in 1940. He also signed 52 anti-Jewish decrees during his rule, and members of his government issued 56 further decrees against Jews.
Later he denied writing the preamble to the Second Anti-Jewish Law, and said that if he had had the chance to word it, he would have presented a stricter one. During Teleki's second term in 1940, Hungarian Arrow Cross
Arrow Cross
A cross whose arms end in arrowheads is called a "cross barby" or "cross barbee" in the traditional terminology of heraldry. In Christian use, the ends of this cross resemble the barbs of fish hooks, or fish spears...
leader Ferenc Szálasi
Ferenc Szálasi
Ferenc Szálasi was the leader of the National Socialist Arrow Cross Party – Hungarist Movement, the "Leader of the Nation" , being both Head of State and Prime Minister of the Kingdom of Hungary's "Government of National Unity" for the final three months of Hungary's participation in World War II...
was given amnesty, and the Nazi movement became stronger.
During the same period tens of thousands of young Hungarians were involuntarily conscripted into military service and prepared to fight on the Eastern Front against Russia. They were subjected to brutal treatment, extreme cold and given inadequate food, shelter, medical care and equipment. Many thousands of young adults died in the first few weeks of their forced integration into the severely depleted units of the German Army in Russia.
Controversial figure
To many Hungarians, Teleki was a flawed hero and he remained a controversial person long after his death. This was reflected in a public dispute covered in the Hungarian media during early 2004 over a statue of him, marking the 63rd anniversary of his death, to be displayed in Budapest. The statue by Sculptor Tibor Rieger was originally to be installed opposite the President's official residence in Budapest. However, the Minister of Culture Istvan Hiller, following pressure from the Wiesenthal Center, canceled these plans. On 5 April 2004, the statue was finally placed in the courtyard of the Catholic Church in the town of BalatonboglárBalatonboglár
Balatonboglár, in Hungary, is a resort town situated on the south shore of Lake Balaton. It is the professional centre of the Balatonboglár Wine Region, and is often called the "town of grapes and wine."-History:...
on the shore of Lake Balaton
Lake Balaton
Lake Balaton is a freshwater lake in the Transdanubian region of Hungary. It is the largest lake in Central Europe, and one of its foremost tourist destinations. As Hungary is landlocked , Lake Balaton is often affectionately called the "Hungarian Sea"...
. Balatonboglar had during World War II been host to thousands of Polish refugees who opened in that town one of only two secondary schools for Poles in Europe during 1939–1944. They credited Teleki with opening Hungary's borders to them and named a street in Warsaw
Warsaw
Warsaw is the capital and largest city of Poland. It is located on the Vistula River, roughly from the Baltic Sea and from the Carpathian Mountains. Its population in 2010 was estimated at 1,716,855 residents with a greater metropolitan area of 2,631,902 residents, making Warsaw the 10th most...
for him after the war ended. In 2001 he was posthumously awarded Commander's Cross with Star of the Order of Merit of the Republic of Poland.
Befitting his commitment to Scouting and to Hungary, he was buried at Gödöllő
Gödöllo
Gödöllő is a town situated in Pest county, Budapest metropolitan area, Hungary, about northeast from the outskirts of Budapest. Its population is about 31,000 according to the 2001 census. It can be easily reached from Budapest with the suburban railway . Gödöllő is home to the Szent István...
, the location of the Royal Palace.
External links
- Karsai László: Érvek a Teleki-szobor mellett or here (in Hungarian) (source: Élet és Irodalom, 48. évfolyam, 11. szám)
- About him in Magyar Életrajzi lexikon (in Hungarian)
- Time Magazine, 14 April 1941: End of a Tightrope Walk