By Laszlo Somogyi
On January 16, 1945, the Soviet Army occupied Budapest and I could resume my real identity and come out from hiding using a false Christian identity.
I was 14 years old, and my nine-year-old brother was with me. My parents were deported and held in concentration camps in Austria and Germany, and until the end of WWII in May, I did not know if they survived.
We had to vacate the university dormitory where we were hiding during the Nazi occupation. We were starving in Budapest.
My father’s two siblings survived and lived in Hajdunánás, a small agricultural town in Eastern Hungary where abundant food was available. They invited us to stay with them.
Survival and Return of my Parents: July-September 1945
On May 5, 1945, the Germans surrendered. The horrible war was finally over. About three weeks later, the Red Cross notified us that my father was alive, staying in an American refugee camp until transportation to Hungary was possible. In mid-July, my father finally arrived in Budapest.
Train transportation was still sporadic, with no timetable yet; therefore, we had no information about when he would be able to travel to Hajdunánas.
One morning, as I was returning from the fields, I noticed a man in uniform waving at me. It was my father! He was wearing an American military uniform and he was so skinny that I did not recognize him until I got closer. I will never forget this fantastic day.
We felt increasingly worried as weeks and months passed without any news from my mother.
At last, in mid-September, a miracle happened. Unannounced, my mother arrived in Budapest. Her story is almost unbelievable, considering the present state of communication.
She was liberated at the end of April by the Soviet army. She was held in a camp near Graz, Austria, about 250 miles from Budapest. The camp was run by the Soviet army who did not feel any urgency to repatriate the former German captives. They were fed somewhat better than in German concentration camps, but she could not send or receive news of the family.
Finally, in September, she climbed over the camp’s fence at night and walked all the way to Budapest. When she approached our last residence at the Jewish house where she hoped to find out something regarding the fate of her husband and children, my young friend recognized her from a distance and shouted at her, “Your children and husband are alive.” At this moment, my mother fainted and fell to the ground.
Soon, both my mother and father came to Hajdunánás to reunite with us and take us back to Budapest. After 18 months, the four of us were together again. It was a miracle! As the train approached Budapest from the Eastern direction, my parents were preparing to get off the train. I was astonished and asked, “Why are we getting out here? Aren’t we proceeding to Western Europe to settle in America?”
At that time, I already hated everything in Hungary, especially the omnipresent anti-Semitism. I assumed that my parents who went through all these horrors felt the same. But we stayed in Budapest.
Luckily, 11 years later, I had a chance to flee to the West from communist Hungary; fortunately, at that time, I was accompanied by my wife, Marika.
