On October 23rd, Hungarians will commemorate the seventieth anniversary of the outbreak of the Hungarian Revolution—an attempt to overthrow Soviet domination of the nation and restore basic freedoms of press, speech, and other civil liberties. But in my family, October 25—”Bloody Thursday”—resonates deeply.
My father and my sister were in front of Parliament in Kossuth Square, among the thousands who had gathered as the revolution unfolded. They were separated in the panic that ensued when gunfire erupted against the largely unarmed crowd. Who fired, and from precisely where, remains disputed. Members of the ÁVH, Hungary’s hated secret police, Soviet forces, or some combination of the two were responsible for the bloodshed. According to one estimate, 88 were killed and some 200 were injured that day.
Soviet tanks had already rolled into the capital the day before. The demonstrations erupted all over the country, and an armed insurrection broke out. Hungarian Freedom Fighters, some of them carrying weapons from World War I, attacked Soviet tanks with Molotov cocktails. For a brief shining moment, it seemed the fierce resistance had succeeded as Soviet forces withdrew from Budapest. But on November 4, 1956, they rolled back in, crushed the Revolution, and restored Soviet-backed Communist control. 200,000 Hungarians fled. My family among them.
The videoclip below includes the final transmissions of Free Kossuth Radio as Hungary issued an SOS for help to the world. The broadcasts were cut off as Soviet forces overwhelmed Budapest. The clip includes archival film footage from those desperate hours.
One of the enduring controversies surrounding the Hungarian Revolution concerns the role that Radio Free Europe played. RFE did not call for an uprising in the months leading up to October 23. But once the Revolution was underway, some of its broadcasts encouraged continued resistance, and many Hungarians came to believe that help from the West might be forthcoming. Whether Radio Free Europe fostered that expectation—and what responsibility it bears for doing so—has been debated ever since.
My cousins certainly remembered hearing broadcasts that explained how to make a Molotov cocktail. The controversy became the basis for the following scene. Not all of the broadcasts have survived, but I read the transcripts of some that have as I did research for my forthcoming historical novel, No Lever Powerful Enough: The Untold Story of Robert and Lucille Vogeler (Rogue’s Island Press, 2027). Miklós is a composite character, but portions of his broadcast are drawn directly from those transcripts, including his instructions for making a Molotov cocktail.
Munich, October 1956: “Do Not Give Up Your Weapons”
Miklós Kelemen walked along the edge of the Englischer Garten on Oettingenstrasse toward Radio Free Europe’s headquarters. As he walked up the path to the main entrance, he overheard conversations in Czech, Polish, French, German and English. He barely listened, his mind focused on the task at hand.
The time had finally come. He could hardly keep his jubilation in check. The Hungarians—the fierce and mighty Magyars—had risen against the yoke of Soviet tyranny. He cast his eyes upward in a silent prayer. How he wished he could be there to help. But he had his own way of assisting—through the power of the spoken word.
He made his way upstairs to the second floor where the RFE’s Hungarian Service was housed. He took his seat inside the broadcast studio, repositioned the microphone, and scanned the script he had prepared while he waited for the signal to begin his broadcast.
He looked through the studio glass at the engineer, who raised his hand…five fingers, then four, three, two. Then one.
“Do not give up your weapons, people!” he said. His voice filled the small room, steadier than his hands.
“The brave Hungarian partisans have spoken in blood and tears. No more Soviet tyranny!
As we have said since the first moment, and we say it today, take care of the guarantee of our freedom and independence—your weapon. But—”
He paused, his eyes flicking to the second hand on the clock face.
“Do not use it when there is no purpose. Remain honorable that our struggle may remain honorable as well.”
After a brief hesitation, he turned to the second part of the script, picturing old Mr. Szabo from the flat below his family’s on Ráday utca, mustache nearly brushing the radio dial.
“You may be asking yourself: how can we fight against tanks? We have only small arms. But history is on our side, brave Magyars. Remember the Battle of Budapest during the recent war. Recall how our partisans destroyed tank after tank after tank. How did they do it, you ask? They used the petrol bottle, which was jokingly called a Molotov cocktail at the time. All it took was a one-liter wine bottle, filled with petrol, a few pieces of yellow phosphorus and a tight stopper.”
His mouth went dry.
“Equipped with this primitive device, we waited in a doorway for the German tank to pass by, then at that moment we jumped out and threw the bottle from two to three meters into the grille above the engine at the rear of the tank. The petrol in the broken bottle immediately caught fire with the help of the phosphorus, and the engine’s enormous suction fed the rest. The engine caught fire and the tank became immobile. The crew was forced to get out and only then did the small arms come into action.”
Miklós looked up from his script to see the engineer nodding at him encouragingly.
“This is how we defend our noble struggle for freedom, my fellow Hungarians. We must hold out. The eyes of the world are upon Hungary. Foreign governments are already considering what political and material support they can provide.”
Miklós ended the broadcast with, “This is Radio Free Europe, the Voice of Free Hungary.”
He sat back, suddenly exhausted. He glanced down at his script, his eyes catching on the phrase “material support.” He paused. Then he stacked the pages neatly and left the studio.
Somewhere in Budapest, an eighteen-year-old student listened to the broadcast and eyed the empty wine bottles in the cellar.
My father’s voice would tremble whenever he described searching for my sister’s body on Bloody Thursday. Thankfully, neither one was injured. I was still a baby, but the memory belongs to me too.
Thanks for tuning in,
Margaret
Some Useful Links:
“Setting the Record Straight: Radio Free Europe and the 1956 Hungarian Revolution,” the Wilson Center, 24 October 2006.
John Sadovy, “The Hungarian Revolution—in pictures,” The Guardian, 10 November 2006
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