During this period, Fascism started to have a strong influence on Hungary. The German brothers were forced to leave, and the Hungarian brothers suffered increased persecution. Many of them were brutally maltreated by the police and then were given long prison sentences.

Meetings Held Cautiously

In the late 1930’s, our meetings were possible only when they were held secretly and in small groups. Available literature usually consisted of just one Watchtower per congregation, and this was circulated among the brothers.

Ferenc Nagy from Tiszavasvári recalls: “The Watchtower Study of that time did not resemble those of today. After everybody whom they expected had arrived, the doors were shut. Sometimes the consideration of an article lasted up to six hours. I was about five years old, my brother a year younger, but we enjoyed sitting in our small chairs and listening to the long studies. It was really a pleasure. I still remember some of the prophetic dramas. The way our parents raised us had good results.”

Etel Kecskemétiné, now in her eighties and still faithfully serving in Budapest, remembers that in Tiszakarád the brothers would hold meetings in their fields during the noon meal breaks. Since they worked together in cultivating the land of first one Witness and then another, the officials could not prevent such meetings. During fall and winter, the sisters would sit together to spin yarn, and the brothers would join them. Although the police inquired about their activity, they were unable to stop them. If such opportunities to meet were not available, they would gather somewhere early in the morning or late at night.

Resourceful Proclaimers

When preaching at the doors was banned, the Witnesses found other means to share Bible truths. The use of portable phonographs was relatively new at that time, and there was no law against playing these. In view of that, the brothers would ask the householder for permission to play a recorded message. If this was granted, a recording of one of Brother Rutherford’s talks was played. In order to do this, the brothers made phonograph records in Hungarian containing the talks given by Brother Rutherford, and they utilized both portable phonographs and transcription machines with large horns.

Regarding those powerful recorded Bible messages, János Lakó, who later married the daughter of Sister Kecskemétiné, recalls: “I had the happy experience of hearing one in Sátoraljaújhely. One of its sentences engraved itself upon my mind: ‘Monarchies, democracies, aristocracies, Fascism, Communism and Nazis, and all suchlike efforts to rule shall pass away at Armageddon and will soon be forgotten.’ We were amazed at the forceful presentation of Bible truths. In 1945 the talk, which had so impressed me, now sounded like a prophecy.”

Hardships Continue

Persecution continued with increased fury. After a Catholic priest visited the Budapest office of the Society and obtained all the information he could, a slanderous campaign was launched in the press. This was accompanied by warnings from the pulpit and on the radio. Throughout the country literature was seized, and the Witnesses were cruelly beaten. In Kisvárda a number of Witnesses were taken to the town hall. One by one they were led into another room and fiendishly beaten and tortured. Reporting on this, the 1938 Year Book of Jehovah’s Witnesses asked: “‘Easter,’ the Sunday of the great procession. What did they celebrate on this resurrection day? The resurrection of the Roman Inquisition?”

When the clergy could not get certain officials to do their bidding, they employed other means. The 1939 Year Book reported: “The friends are often thrashed and abused by reckless fellows who are urged on to do it and often paid for it. We found out that in some places the local clergymen had rewarded each of these fellows with 10 kilograms [22 pounds] of tobacco, for having laid wrong charges against God’s children.”

Outlawed

In 1938, András Bartha, who had worked at the Society’s office in Magdeburg, Germany, for five years and then had served in what was then Czechoslovakia, found himself in Hungarian territory after parts of Czechoslovakia and Carpatho-Ukraine were annexed by Hungary. Brother Bartha was promptly assigned to look after the Society’s work in Hungary. The activity of Jehovah’s Witnesses had already been banned in Germany under the Nazi State. Their meetings were prohibited in Czechoslovakia. Then, on December 13, 1939, their activity was also outlawed in Hungary.

That same year, two internment camps were erected in Hungary, one 20 miles [30 km] from Budapest and the other in the town of Nagykanizsa, in southwest Hungary, 16 miles [26 km] from the Yugoslav border. These camps were soon filled with people they called unreliable​—criminals, Communists, and Jehovah’s Witnesses, who were accused of being a threat to society.

At the same time, a Budapest central police superintendent organized a detective squad to uncover the “leadership” of Jehovah’s Witnesses and to analyze the function of this illegal organization and its foreign connections. Arrests, physical and psychological abuse, and imprisonment followed.

Did all of this bring the activity of Jehovah’s Witnesses in Hungary to a halt? No, but it did require that every publisher heed Jesus’ counsel to be “cautious as serpents and yet innocent as doves.” (Matt. 10:16) The 1940 Yearbook gives an example of how a pioneer sister used caution. She wore a black kerchief on her head and another around her shoulders. After she had worked a part of a community, she saw one of the householders coming toward her with two police-soldiers. The sister took refuge in a side street, changed her black kerchiefs for some of another color, and moved quietly on in the direction of the two police-soldiers. These asked her whether she had seen a woman wearing black kerchiefs, to which the sister replied that she had seen one, evidently in a hurry, running in the other direction. The police-soldiers and their spy went running off to catch her while the Witness quietly went home.

A faithful pioneer sister later recalled how the authorities, under pressure from the clergy, had her arrested. For a time she was under police surveillance and was obligated to report to the police twice a month. But as soon as she left the police station, she would mount her bicycle and go into her territory to preach. For her persistence in witnessing, they locked her up​—first for five days, then for ten, fifteen, and thirty days, for forty days twice, then for sixty, for one hundred days twice, and, finally, for eight years. And why? For teaching people the Bible. Like the apostles of Jesus Christ, she obeyed God as ruler rather than men.​—Acts 5:29.

As Brother Bartha had become fully occupied with translation work, in 1940 the Society entrusted János Konrád, a former zone servant (circuit overseer), with the direction of the work in Hungary.

More Internment Camps

In August 1940 part of Transylvania (Romania) was taken over by Hungary. The following year, persecution in this area intensified. In Cluj, Transylvania, another internment camp was erected, and hundreds of brothers and sisters, young and old, were taken to this camp. Later, the Witnesses there were subjected to much brutality because they would not renounce their faith and return to their former religion. When news of this reached the Witnesses outside the camp, faithful ones throughout the country united in prayer in their behalf. Shortly thereafter, an official investigation at the Cluj camp exposed corruption, so the commanding officer and a majority of the guards were transferred, and some were even imprisoned. This brought some relief to our brothers, and for this they gave thanks to Jehovah.

Meanwhile, in southwestern Hungary, in a camp situated near Nagykanizsa, married couples were interned together, their children being looked after by Witnesses still at home. In all of these camps, pressure was put on Jehovah’s people. They were offered freedom if they would just sign a document renouncing their faith and promising that they would give up all connection with Jehovah’s Witnesses and return to their former State-approved faith.

The situation of Jehovah’s Witnesses became even more perilous on June 27, 1941, when Hungary joined the war against the Soviet Union. This led to many trials in connection with refusal of military service.

Country Servant Arrested

The detective squad dealing with Jehovah’s Witnesses became increasingly active, raiding the homes of many brothers. Brother Konrád received frequent summonses, raids were made on his home, and he was obliged to present himself at the central police department twice a week.

In November 1941 he assembled all zone servants (circuit overseers) and told them that he was sure he would soon be arrested, so he indicated that József Klinyecz, one of the zone servants, should supervise the work in the event of his arrest.

The very next month, on December 15, Brother Konrád was arrested. For several days he was brutalized in an unspeakably barbaric manner in an effort to get him to divulge the names of the zone servants and the pioneers, but his tormentors had no success. Finally he was handed over to the district attorney. After all of that, he was sentenced to just two months in prison. But at the end of his sentence, he was not released. Instead he was transferred to the concentration camp at Kistarcsa on the premise that he was a menace to society.

Two Country Servants

Meanwhile, in 1942 the Central European Office in Switzerland officially assigned Dénes Faluvégi to supervise the work in Hungary. Brother Faluvégi, who was mild-tempered and yielding by nature, was nevertheless capable of inspiring others by his own zeal for the truth. He had been a schoolteacher in Transylvania and had shared significantly in the organization of the work in Romania after World War I.

However, Brother Klinyecz, the zone servant to whom Brother Konrád had entrusted temporary responsibility for the work in the event of his arrest, was not pleased when the assignment was given to Brother Faluvégi. He considered Brother Faluvégi incapable of facing up to the difficult task.

Brother Klinyecz had always been a zealous and courageous brother, firmer by nature than he was mild-tempered. He was zealous in the field service and well known and loved by the brothers throughout the country. The brothers came to be divided into two camps​—one side recognizing the Society’s appointment of Brother Faluvégi, the other side sharing Brother Klinyecz’s opinion that the responsibility for supervision needed to be in firm hands in such difficult times.

Some congregations were simultaneously visited by two zone servants​—one sent by Brother Faluvégi, the other by Brother Klinyecz. Sad to say, in such situations, instead of encouraging the brothers, at times the two zone servants quarreled between themselves. Understandably, this grieved the faithful brothers.

Racehorse Stable in Alag

In August 1942 the authorities decided to put an end to Jehovah’s Witnesses in Hungary. For this purpose they prepared ten collection points where the Witnesses, men and women, young and old alike, were brought together. Even persons who were not yet baptized but were known to have contact with Jehovah’s Witnesses were taken to these places.

The Witnesses from Budapest and its vicinity were taken to a racehorse stable in Alag. On both sides of the stable, along the outer walls, straw was spread out on which the brothers and sisters slept at night. If somebody wanted simply to turn around during the night, he had to get formal permission from the guards. During the day they were forced to sit in a row on wooden benches facing the wall while guards paced up and down the stable with fixed bayonets. No talking was permitted.

Next to the stable, there was a smaller room where the detectives, under the direction of István and Antal Juhász, two fleshly brothers, carried out the “interrogations.” They tortured the brothers, using methods some of which are too degraded to mention.

The sisters were not spared either. The stockings of one sister were forced into her mouth to muffle her outcries. Then she was forced to lie face down on the ground with one of the detectives sitting on her and holding up her feet while another beat her unmercifully on the soles of her feet. The strokes and her cries could be heard clearly in the room where the brothers were.

“Court” in Alag

The “interrogations” were brought to a close by the end of November. In that month a courtroom was improvised in the dance hall of a restaurant in Alag where the court of the general staff of Heinrich Werth handled the case of 64 of Jehovah’s Witnesses. Upon entering this courtroom, they saw literature, Bibles, typewriters, gramophones, and records that had been confiscated during the house searches.

The case was opened without any of the 64 accused having been questioned by the military prosecutor or having been able even to speak with the attorney that the court had commissioned to defend them. The questioning of all the defendants took only a few hours, and the Witnesses were given no real chance to defend themselves. One sister was asked if she was prepared to take up arms. She replied: “I am a woman, and as such I don’t have to take up arms.” At that she was asked: “Would you take up arms if you were a man?” She replied: “I shall answer that question the day I become one!”

Later the sentences were pronounced. Brothers Bartha, Faluvégi, and Konrád were to be hanged. Others were condemned to life imprisonment, and the remainder were sentenced to two to fifteen years in a penitentiary. That same afternoon they were taken to the military prison on Margit Boulevard in Budapest. The three brothers who had been sentenced to death expected to be executed any minute, but precisely one month after their entering prison, their attorney came and informed them that their death sentences had been commuted to life imprisonment.

At the other nine collection places, the questionings were conducted with methods similar to those used at the stable in Alag. The convicted brothers were eventually transferred to the penitentiary at Vác, in the north of the country.

With Nuns as Prison Guards

The sisters were generally interned in Budapest on Conti Street, at the counter-intelligence prison. Those sentenced to terms of three or more years were transferred to the prison for women in Márianosztra (Our Mary), a village near the Slovakian border, where they were guarded by nuns who treated our sisters in a most fearful manner. Witnesses who had previously been in other prisons were also taken there.

Whoever was not prepared to obey the prison rules set by the nuns was put into the dungeon. Among these rules were obligatory church attendance and the Catholic salute, “Praised be Jesus Christ.” If the prisoners were given anything, the expression of thanks was to be, “May God reward you for this.”

Of course, our faithful sisters did not conform to these rules. Every time they refused to go to church, they were put into the dungeon for 24 hours; it was on these occasions that our sisters would say: “May God reward you for this.” The Witnesses were also deprived of all the usual privileges, such as receiving packages, corresponding with relatives, and receiving visitors. Only a few compromised to avoid further hardship. After a time, however, for the faithful ones, there was a letup in the harsh treatment.

Bor Concentration Camp

In the summer of 1943, the brothers under 49 years of age from all the prisons in the country were assembled in one of the provincial towns and ordered to take up military service. The faithful brothers, although they were again brutalized, remained firm and refused, also declining the military clothing they were offered. Nine of the group, however, took the military oath and accepted the uniforms. But their compromise brought them no relief. All the 160 collected there, including the nine defectors, were transferred to a concentration camp at Bor (Serbia). Two years later, one of those defectors, rifle in hand, was pale and shaking as he found himself on a squad delegated to execute, among others, his own fleshly brother, a faithful Witness.

Both en route to the camp and in it, brothers had some harsh experiences. But the camp commander did not generally insist on having the brothers do work contrary to their consciences. On one occasion when some of the soldiers used torture to try to force the Witnesses to violate their consciences, the commander even apologized.

Károly Áfra, a brother in his seventies who is still serving Jehovah faithfully, relates: “There were some attempts to break our faith, but we remained steadfast. On one occasion we were to make a gun emplacement out of concrete. Two brothers were selected for the work. They refused and said that they were imprisoned for their not doing anything in connection with war. The officer told them that if they did not work, he would have them executed. One of the brothers was taken away by a soldier to the other side of the mountain, and a shot was heard. The officer turned to the other brother: ‘Now your brother is dead, but you can think it over.’

“The answer of the brother was: ‘If my brother could die for his faith, why could not I?’ The officer ordered the other soldier to bring back the ‘shot’ brother and, patting the other one on the back, said: ‘Such brave men deserve to stay alive,’ and he let them go.”

The brothers knew that the reason they were alive was to serve as Jehovah’s Witnesses. There were thousands of other prisoners in the camp at Bor, and the Witnesses gave many of them a thorough witness about Jehovah and his Kingdom. Throughout the country during those difficult years, Jehovah’s Witnesses​—whether in prison, in concentration camps, or elsewhere—​made good use of opportunities to give a witness. They met kindly disposed people everywhere, even among important officials, who admired the courageous endurance of the Witnesses. Some officers even encouraged them: “May you continue to endure in your faith.”

The Witnesses had already been in Bor under dangerous and trying circumstances for 11 months when the rumor started that partisans intended to attack the village. The decision was made to evacuate the camp. When the Witnesses learned, two days before the planned departure, that they would have to undertake the journey on foot, they immediately started constructing two- and four-wheeled carts. By the time of departure, they had so many carts that officers, soldiers, and other prisoners came to look with amazement at what Jehovah’s Witnesses had accomplished.

Before being taken to the road (together with 3,000 Jewish prisoners), each brother was given one and a half pounds [0.7 kg] of bread and five tins of fish, which was not nearly enough for the journey. But Jehovah provided what the officers did not. How? By means of the Serbian and Hungarian inhabitants of the territory through which they passed. These gladly gave them the bread they could spare. The brothers gathered this bread together, and during a pause they would divide it in such a just way that each one received a piece, even if it was a mere morsel. Although hundreds of the prisoners were turned over to German soldiers for execution along the way, Jehovah’s hand of protection was over his Witnesses.

Integrity Tested Again

Near the end of 1944, when the Soviet army was drawing close, the Witnesses were called upon to move toward the Hungarian-Austrian border. Finding that all able-bodied men were at the front, the Witnesses helped the women in the area do the heavy work on their land. Where they were lodged, the brothers seized opportunities to witness.

In January 1945 the commander informed the Witnesses that all men able to work should report to the town hall of Jánosháza. From there a German officer took them outside the village to dig trenches. When the first six who were selected refused, the officer immediately ordered: “Have them executed!” The six brothers were lined up, the Hungarian soldiers stood with their rifles ready to shoot on command, and the remaining 76 brothers were watching. Quietly one of the Hungarian soldiers urged the watching brothers: “Go over and also throw down your tools or they will shoot them.” They immediately followed his advice. The German officer was so perplexed that at first he just stared incredulously. Then he asked: “They don’t want to work either?” Brother Bartha answered in German: “Oh, yes, we do want to work, but we cannot perform tasks contrary to our faith. The sergeant here can confirm that we have done everything with the utmost conscientiousness and efficiency, and we still do, but this job that you have in mind for us we shall not do.”

One of those brothers later recalled: “The officer then declared that we were all under arrest, which was really rather laughable because we were all convicts anyway.”

Other Integrity Keepers

Like those brothers mentioned above, hundreds of other brothers and sisters all over the country fought the same fight for their faith in many other concentration camps and prisons.

In the spring of 1944, when many Jews were transported from the internment camp at Nagykanizsa to camps in Germany, there were two of Jehovah’s Witnesses among them, Éva Bász and Olga Slézinger, Jews by birth, 20 and 45 years of age respectively. They were both zealous, purehearted worshipers of Jehovah God. Sister Bász was a very delicate girl, but she had been serving as a pioneer before her arrest. She was in the field ministry in Dunavecse when the police arrested her and took her along to the town hall.

At the instigation of the mayor of the village, she underwent degrading treatment. Sister Bász recalls: “All my hair was shaved off; I had to stand naked with ten to twelve policemen present. Then they began an interrogation and wanted to know who our leader in Hungary was. I explained that we had no other leader than Jesus Christ.” Their response was ruthless beating with their batons. But Sister Bász was determined not to betray her Christian brothers.

Next, she recalls: “These beasts tied my hands and feet together over my head, and all of them humiliated me by raping me, all except one of the policemen. They tied me so firmly that I still had marks on my wrists when I came to Sweden three years later. I was so maltreated that they hid me in the basement for two weeks, until the most severe injuries were healed. They did not dare to let other people see my condition.” Sister Bász was sent to the Nagykanizsa camp and from there, together with Sister Slézinger, to Auschwitz.

She continues: “I felt safe when with Olga; she could be humorous in trying situations. Doctor Mengele had the task of separating the new arrivals who were not fit for work from the able-bodied. The former were sent to gas chambers. When it was our turn, he said to Olga: ‘How old are you?’ Boldly and with a humorous twinkle in her eyes she answered: ‘Twenty.’ In reality she was twice that age. But Mengele laughed and let her go to the right side and stay alive.”

Yellow stars identifying them as Jews were sewn on their clothing, but they protested, insisting that they were Jehovah’s Witnesses. They tore off the yellow stars and demanded that purple triangles be sewn on to identify them as Jehovah’s Witnesses. Though severely beaten for this, they responded: “Do with us whatever you like, but we shall always remain Jehovah’s Witnesses.”

Later they were brought to the concentration camp in Bergen-Belsen. It was about this time that a typhus epidemic broke out in the camp. Sister Slézinger became so sick that she was removed from the camp along with many others and was never seen again. Shortly afterward, this territory was freed by the British army. Sister Bász was taken to a hospital, after which she moved to Sweden, where she quickly contacted the brothers.

Many of the brothers who were imprisoned in Hungary were later deported to Germany. Most of them returned after the war, but not all. Dénes Faluvégi was one who died while being transported from the concentration camp at Buchenwald to the one at Dachau. He had faithfully served Jehovah for more than 30 years.

Faithful Witnesses Until Death

When the Nagykanizsa camp was dissolved in the autumn of 1944, the Witnesses who had not already been deported to Germany were set free. However, since the battlefront made it impossible for them to return home, they decided to take jobs on the surrounding farms until the situation improved. Then, on October 15, 1944, the Nyilaskeresztes Párt (Arrow Cross party), supported by the German Nazi party, took power and immediately started calling up young men for military service.

Soon the brothers were arrested again because of their neutrality. Five of the young brothers who were arrested were taken to Körmend, about six miles [10 km] from the Austrian border, where a military court was in session in the local schoolhouse. The first to be tried was Bertalan Szabó, who was sentenced to be executed by a firing squad. Before the execution, he wrote a heart-moving farewell letter, which you can read in the book Jehovah’s Witnesses​—Proclaimers of God’s Kingdom, page 662. Afterward, two other brothers, János Zsondor and Antal Hönis, were taken before the court. They too remained firm, and they too were executed.

Sándor Helmeczi was imprisoned at the same place. He recalls: “At a certain hour of the day, we were allowed to use the lavatory in the courtyard. They rearranged the schedule so that we would see what happened. They wanted to say thereby: ‘Now you know what will happen to you too.’ That was a very sad moment for us​—to see our beloved brothers fallen lifeless. Then we were led back to our cells.

“After ten minutes we were called to come out, and we were told to clean away the blood of our brothers. Thus we saw them up close. The face of János Zsondor remained quite normal. His smiling, friendly, and mild face showed no trace of fear.”

At the same time, another brother, 20-year-old Lajos Deli, was publicly hanged in the market square of Sárvár, about 25 miles [40 km] from the Austrian border. In 1954 an ex-officer, an eyewitness, recalled what took place that day:

“There were many of us, civilians as well as military men, who were fleeing westward. Passing through Sárvár we saw the gallows erected in the market square. There was a young boy with a very pleasant, peaceful face standing under the gallows. When I asked one of the onlookers what the boy had done, I was told that he had refused to take up either weapons or spade. There were several recruits of the Arrow Cross party around, carrying machine guns. Everyone heard when one of them said to the young man: ‘This is your last chance, take it or we’ll hang you!’ The youngster did not respond; he was not in the least impressed. Then in a firm voice he said: ‘You can go ahead and hang me, but I would rather obey my God, Jehovah, than mere men.’ He was then hanged.”

According to the 1946 Yearbook, 16 Witnesses were killed between 1940 and 1945 because of their conscientious objection to military service; 26 more died as a consequence of ill treatment. Like their Lord they conquered the world because of their faith.

[Pictures on page 90]

Loyal to Jehovah till death: (top) Bertalan Szabó, by firing squad; (right) Lajos Deli, by hanging