Tag #137915 - Interview #78465 (Egon Lovith)

After that I was transferred to Torokbalint where a soldier picked me to go up to Budapest with him to get a package from the purchasing center. These soldiers used to be simple peasants, workers, and they weren’t as brutal as the Arrow Cross [16] men. We took the train to Budapest. We fulfilled our assignment but for some reason we had to stay overnight and the soldier said to me, ‘I’m going to leave you here and I’ll come for you in the morning and we will go back. Where will you be?’ He addressed me formally, not informally. I went out into the street. I was somewhere around Kiraly Street. I started wandering around, I wanted to see the city and it was then, when the Horthy declaration [17] was announced. I think the radio announced something about Hungary laying down its arms. Within 24 hours the Arrow Cross Party and Szalasi [18] took over the whole country. I was out on the street not having a clue about any of this. I still thought that Miki [Miklos] Horthy was in charge and I was just about to go back to spend the night with the Jewish family, where I was supposed to sleep. Then came a Hungarian who said to me, ‘You are a forced laborer – I was wearing the armband – ‘take that band off! You are Jewish, aren’t you? Get the hell out of here, Szalasi is in power!’ I had never been to Budapest before so I completely got myself lost in the situation.