The Forgotten Faces 1961

Izay Entertainment

5/11/2025

Transcript

00:00Michael Daniel Kelly, aged 17, dead in the gutter of the Kalmenjózsef Street, Budapest, Hungary.

00:17The date is Monday, October the 29th, 1956. It is morning, a harsh morning.

00:30Everywhere can be seen the scars of revolution, because for six days Budapest has been agonized

00:40by an armed revolt against its communist government. It was begun, as so many revolutions are begun,

00:52by students. These are their faces. It was their ultimatum to the government on October

01:02the 23rd, which set in motion the gear wheels of revolution. They are the faces of embryo

01:08technicians, lawyers, artists and teachers, all fevered with the social discontent of

01:13their time, a discontent which has spread itself from the most advanced of students to the

01:19most junior of schoolboys.

01:25From their secret and forbidden meeting places, the revolution has brought the students and

01:29the workers out onto the open of the streets of Budapest. Joined by soldiers and other

01:35civilians and armed with a few submachine guns, grenades and ancient rifles, and bearing their

01:40national flags and emblems, they march in procession to defy the Hungarian government and the Russian

01:46tanks it has called in to suppress them.

02:02On this morning, October the 29th, such a procession passes up our Kelmen-Yozhev street.

02:09Their purpose? Demonstration. The objective? Parliament Square in the centre of the city.

02:16But they are never to get there.

02:23For suddenly, the crowd is fired upon by police snipers and machine gunners on the roof of a nearby barracks.

02:29In a few moments, many of the marchers are lying dead on the ground below.

02:33But the crowd finally manage to fight their way into the building. Then, for a brief moment, the oppressed become the oppressors as the crowd take their revenge on the uniformed men in the city.

02:38But the crowd finally manage to fight their way into the building. Then, for a brief moment, the oppressed become the oppressors as the crowd take their revenge on the uniformed men inside.

02:45The dividing line between murder and justifiable execution is difficult to find and in the fury of the moment, no one looks for it.

02:52And in the fury of the moment, no one looks for it.

02:59Those freedom fighters who died have been moved further further.

03:06down the street and lie flag-covered in the dust. Around them, the everyday life of Budapest starts again.

03:13The grocery roundsman, whose van has been smashed by a Russian tank, plods his way from house to house with his bicycle.

03:20his tires slashed to ribbons by the broken glass by the broken glass in the road.

03:32The grocery roundsman, whose van has been smashed by a Russian tank, plods his way from house to house with his bicycle, his tires slashed to ribbons by the broken glass in the road.

03:40Plods his way from house to house with his bicycle, his tyres slashed to ribbons by the broken glass in the road.

03:59Here is one of the dead, the schoolboy.

04:02He will be buried in an improvised plot in the nearby park.

04:06One of the men goes off to find the boy's family to tell them of his death.

04:11They must come and identify the body.

04:15The boy's name was Michael Bella Imredi, aged 18 years and three months.

04:25Eight minutes ago, he had tried to throw a grenade through one of the police barrack windows.

04:32He had missed. Some of his friends had laughed at him.

04:35Then a bullet from a police sniper had hit him in the back and killed him.

04:40Then a bullet from a police sniper had hit him in the back and killed him.

04:52And killed him.

05:22The man on the left is Tamas Varashi, a primary school teacher aged 37, a reserved and quiet

05:35man.

05:36He only openly joined in the revolution the day before this because, as he said, I can

05:41no longer sit still and do nothing when my friends are being killed in the streets outside

05:46my home.

05:48Now he is actively organising a local first aid post.

05:53The Kalman Jozef Street lies in an industrial suburb called Oypest, which like the entire

05:58capital has taken on the appearance of a wartime Hungary.

06:03The one small thing that Tamas can find time to do for the Imredy family is to send one

06:08of the young boys who knew him at school to take them home.

06:13The first aid post is in the cellar at the rear of this ruined house.

06:22It is packed with the wounded from many neighbouring streets.

06:25The conditions down there are not good.

06:27The walls are running with water from the nearby river and there is an acute shortage of dressings.

06:32Only the very seriously wounded can be moved across to the hospital, which is two blocks

06:36away across a road junction still under heavy shell fire.

06:44The name of this girl is Margit Zeke.

06:48Aged 33, she is the fiancée of Tamas, a journalist.

06:53She tries to find time between helping him at the post to finish a series of articles she

06:57is writing for one of the revolutionary newspapers.

07:07These two have both been on their feet all through the night working in the cramped confines

07:11of the cellar dressing the wounded.

07:18This little boy seated in the rubble is called Robert Fodor.

07:23His nickname is Robbie and he is aged 12.

07:27This is his sister Zuzia who is 17.

07:30Their father was killed the day before yesterday in the street fighting.

07:34They both saw it happen.

07:36Zuzia has tried to be practical and put the tragedy out of her mind.

07:41But young Robbie can't and won't let anyone do anything for him, not even his sister.

07:46And that doesn't help her very much.

08:04This very noisy young man's name is Erno Zighetti, a garage hand from Cubania.

08:15He's trying to get everyone to listen as he tries to persuade Margit Zeke to read the latest

08:19article of hers recently published in the Revolutionary Literary Gazette.

08:24At first she doesn't want to, but soon she realizes that she has no choice.

08:30Everyone wants to hear the words of freedom she's written and for the moment all else is

08:35forgotten as they listen to them.

08:42Here we go.

08:56I'm his first response.

09:01The End

09:31On these faces, as each tragedy is relived and talked about,

09:54can be seen a vivid cross-section of the shifting moods of a revolution.

09:58Gentleness and hatred, fervour and grief.

10:03And in these varying expressions, and on the faces that reflect them,

10:07can thus be seen the whole enigma of the Hungarian people.

10:11A highly strung and volatile nation, romantic, tempestuous, proud and arrogant of their heritage,

10:18capable both of cruelty and generous kindness.

10:22The Hungarians possess a complex national makeup not easily understood.

10:28This is Ezebeth Shuyok, aged 44.

10:34Her only son was killed yesterday.

10:38Istvan Beric, aged 19.

10:42Parents deported five years ago and not heard of since.

10:45Eva Rokos, aged 17, has a common sympathy with Istvan, her mother being killed three months ago by security police.

10:59Diogban, aged 37, foreman at a machine factory in Oipest, and Macias Vida, 40, a charge hand at the same factory, makes strange co-patriots.

11:16For one, Vida is a social democrat, and the other, Ban, a staunch communist, and consequently, they are both forever arguing.

11:30This is Katalin Vardas, aged 18, art student.

11:37For her young years, an advanced cynic and anti-communist.

11:41Laszlo Dondossi, 24, librarian, and before the revolution, the organiser of a discussion circle forbidden by the security police.

11:49Each of these people, highly individual, each with conflicting ideals.

11:56Is it therefore too naive to conclude that the one common belief strong enough to bring these people together

12:02must be their genuine love of their country and their desire for its freedom?

12:08A desire for which they are obviously prepared to die.

12:11This is an old truck disguised as a military ambulance.

12:19In it, five members of the AVH security police are trying to escape from the siege of their party headquarters down in the city centre.

12:26But they don't get far.

12:31Called the AVO, these are the men who have held down the country with an iron grip of terror.

12:41What are these men?

12:44Are they traitors and bullying opportunists of the worst kind?

12:48Or are they unwitting dukes?

12:50And if the freedom fighters had actually won the revolution,

12:54would any of them have donned similar uniforms to hold these men in check?

12:57Who are they?

13:18Who are they?

13:21Who are they?

13:23Oh, my God.

13:53By the 30th of October, the Soviet forces had withdrawn to the outskirts of the capital

14:00and Imre Noj, the premier, had set up his provisional government.

14:05The revolutionaries were now in complete control of the city.

14:10For four days, the people of Budapest lived under the illusion of freedom, until the morning

14:19of Sunday, November the 4th, when Imre Noj broadcast the following message to the Hungarian people.

14:35This is Imre Noj speaking, chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Hungarian People's Republic.

14:42In the early hours of this morning, Soviet troops launched an attack against our capital city

14:48with the obvious intention of overthrowing the lawful democratic government.

14:53Our troops are fighting. The government is in its place.

14:57I hereby inform the people of Hungary and the entire world of this situation.

15:09Searchlights pick out the grim chaos in the rubble, as on the evening of the 4th of November,

15:14Russian tanks pour into the city, and lining the squares and street junctions,

15:18fire shell after shell into the buildings held by the freedom fighters.

15:22Office blocks, apartment buildings and hospitals are fired on indiscriminately.

15:27Parts of many buildings collapse on their defenders, and scores are buried alive.

15:32The noise of gunfire is deafening, and everywhere is smoke, brick dust and rubble.

15:37Time and time again, students and young children are dragged out from beneath the rubble.

15:42It is terrible to watch.

15:44There is no time to bury the dead. There is not even time to grieve for them.

16:07There has to be a right and wrong in any human conflict.

16:30This most tragic of revolutions can be no exception.

16:35But in any conflict between two major creeds, one of which you believe in,

16:40there has to be a final taking of sides.

16:43And if those who happen to believe, as these Hungarian freedom fighters believed,

16:48had taken a strong moral stand on their behalf at the time when it most mattered,

16:53then it is more than likely that twenty thousand of these people

16:58need not have given their lives or their liberty for this belief.

17:02The

17:08Tamash Faresi,

17:09dead.

17:11Magid Csake,

17:12refugee.

17:13Istvan Berek,

17:16executed.

17:18Ivo R'rokos,

17:19executed.

17:21Raslo Horvath,

17:23dead.

17:26Diog Ban,

17:27killed.

17:29Anton Kuhlman,

17:30dead.

17:32Nihai Kish executed. Janos Zigsai deported. Refugee executed. Deported. Missing. Killed.

18:02Nagy Imre, a Magyar Némköztársaság minisztertalására.

18:21Nagy Imre, a Magyar Némköztársaság minisztertalásának jelölteketett.

18:25Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the Hungarian People's Republic.

18:29In the early hours of this morning, Soviet troops launched an attack against our capital city

18:35with the obvious intention of overthrowing the lawful democratic Hungarian government.

18:40Our troops are fighting. The government is in its place.

18:44I hereby involve the people of heart.

18:53Thank you so much.

18:54Good morning, everyone.

18:57Thank you very much.

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