Introduction to the Special Issue:
Migration and East Central Europe – a Perennial but Unhappy Relationship

Ulf Brunnbauer

IOS – Regensburg

In March 1929, the ambassador of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes sent a query to the Kingdom’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. His message concerned the repatriation of immigrants who were citizens of the country but were of Magyar or German ethnic background:

Since these people had left our Kingdom dissatisfied with the new conditions, and because they represent an alien ethnic element which is of no use to our national state – on the contrary, according to the embassy’s opinion it should be in our interest that there are as few of these people as possible, especially in the border areas –, the embassy kindly requests instructions from the Ministry as to whether the return of these people is opportune.1

Five months later, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs replied:

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has the honor of informing the Royal Embassy that requests for repatriation to the Kingdom by our citizens of Magyar and German nationality should be dismissed under whichever pretext. The return of these a-national elements to our country must be obstructed to the furthest extent possible.

Obviously, the government of the Kingdom wanted to impede the return of citizens who were not considered part of the South Slavic nation, while “Yugoslav” emigrants were encouraged to return. The same reasoning based on a notion of ethnic selection also applied to applications for permission to leave the country. In 1924, the Ministry for Social Policy, which was responsible for emigration affairs, informed its departments that the emigration of so-called “a-national” families should be encouraged, while “national” families should be denied permission to emigrate. In 1925, the same ministry sent a circular to the Department for State Security with the following declaration:

Regarding the emigration of national minorities the Ministry shares the view that their emigration must be favored. The relevant authorities have agreed and maintain their interest in this issue; from that it follows that this is the official line for implementing emigration policies.

In 1926, the director of the Kingdom’s Emigration Commissariat in Zagreb, Fedor Aranicki, joyfully reported to the Minister for Social Policy that almost half of the emigrants who had left the country over the course of the few years that had passed had been “a-national” elements, and he recommended setting higher goals for the future: “One of the tasks of our emigration policy is to exert influence over the emigration of the a-national minorities in the future as well, in order to return the affected regions to their original national character.”

Fast forward some ninety years and the region appears still to be obsessed with the connection between migration and ethnicity. Control of migration continues to be seen as a tool of nation-building, and officially spread fears of immigrants underpin the legitimacy of increasingly authoritarian governments. Today, though, attention is paid primarily to immigration. The Visegrád governments in particular excel in promoting xenophobic stances in their concerted efforts to prevent the immigration of people seen as innately alien and unassimilable. Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán uses his hardline policies against refugees from the Middle East to portray himself as the defender of Europe against imagined Islamization. Polish strongman Jaroslav Kaczynski claims that refugees and immigrants would spread unknown diseases, and in doing so he ironically employs stereotypes similar to those prevalent (and used) in Germany in the first years of the twentieth century, when the public began to grow increasingly concerned about the millions of Eastern Europeans (among them many Poles) traveling through Germany on their way to North America.

Similar to interwar Yugoslavia, East Central and Southeast European governments pursue a highly selective policy of entry: while they present non-European immigrants as mortal dangers, they invite co-ethnic citizens of neighboring countries to immigrate and generously extend citizenship to them. Hundreds of thousands of citizens of Moldova and Macedonia have enjoyed the privilege of receiving, respectively, Romanian and Bulgarian passports, only to use them to settle in one of the prosperous countries in Europe. Two things seem obvious: conceptualizations of international migration are highly ethnicized or even racialized. People’s alleged cultural or biological properties determine whether they are welcome or not, not for instance economic of humanitarian considerations. Second, public and political attitudes towards migration are closely tied to deep-seated anxieties, including fears of loss, alienation, domination, and marginalization, and these fears can be easily exploited by populist politicians.

One of the factors contributing to these fears is the demographic crisis in which all of the countries of the region find themselves, though to different degrees. What the Hungarian demographer Attila Melegh has pointedly termed “demographic emptying” underpins much of the hysteria about defending the nation and ensuring its survival (right-wing populists would rather see their nation die out than to let migrants in). Similar fears about emigration as a loss to the nation sparked attempts to restrict it a century ago. As Tara Zahra has persuasively shown in her recent book, political debates about international migration in East Central Europe and the Balkans have been closely tied to perceptions of marginalization and peripherality and visions of state development since the late nineteenth century.2

East Central and Southeastern Europe past and present offer textbook examples of what Sebastian Conrad examines in his seminal global history of the (pre-1914) German Empire:3 the globalization of the flow of labor, goods, and ideas breeds its own contradiction in the form of nativist responses, which define belonging not in terms of shared citizenship, but in terms of narrow kinship solidarity, i.e. “blood” vs. cosmopolitan ideas. This contradiction is hardly new. Transnationalism and nationalism flourish not only in tandem but even in a synergetic or parasitic relationship. These ironies, however, are usually lost on nationalists. In the most extreme case, this connection is not ironic but fatal: extreme nationalisms regularly produce waves of refugees, which generate new transnational entanglements, both on the level of everyday social interactions and on the level of high diplomacy.

Here again, the Balkans and East Central Europe offer a great deal of material for comparative research, for example on refugee accommodation strategies after World War One and today, resettlement practices in empires and nation states, and international relief efforts in the interwar period and after 1945. Large-scale refugee movements, such as the flight of almost 1.5 million Greeks from Turkey to Greece in 1923, were met with new patterns of state intervention. The Balkans and Central Europe in the interwar period and again after 1945 were essential laboratories for the development of international refugee protection mechanisms which still exist today and which we now see crumbling in Europe as, one by one, the countries of the region ignore their obligations according to the Geneva Convention. The politics of asylum is, unfortunately, terribly ignorant of its history.

The close link between nationalism, nation-building, and migration is not the only continuity in the rich migration history of the region. East Central European and Balkan societies have also faced an almost constant pressure to emigrate for economic reasons. With the exception of the period of communist rule, when voluntary emigration was banned or highly restricted in all of the states of Eastern Bloc (with the exception of Yugoslavia), significantly more people left the region than immigrated to it. Under communism, these streams were partially redirected to domestic destinations (for example, from rural settlements to larger cities or to areas from which German speakers had been expelled). This points to the structural position of the region in the international division of labor. It is a reservoir of relatively cheap labor from where, most of the time, workers go to places where capital can employ them, and not the opposite way round (though the inflow of foreign direct investment after 1989 has somewhat reversed this relationship). In many ways, the region can therefore be considered a laboratory for the study of the long-term (and also short-term) effects of migration and the ways in which the dynamics of economic migration interrelate with state-building and political change.

As a social process with manifold, complex and often contingent cultural, economic, and political consequences, migration has shaped the societies of East Central and Southeastern Europe in many, often unforeseen ways. It helped connect the region with global currents, but it also regularly was met with nationalistic backslashes which aim to reinforce borders and state control over movement. Yet despite the widely recognized significance of migration for the past and present of the region, the scholarship about it is still very unbalanced, with important lacunae, especially with regard to its history. This was motivation enough for the Hungarian Historical Review to solicit contributions for a special issue on the history of migration and refugee movement in East Central Europe and the Balkans. The editors hope that this initiative will be another step in firmly putting the region on the map of international historiography about migration. The late Holm Sundhaussen’s call to consider the history of Southeastern Europe as a history of migration (and to strengthen research efforts towards that goal) should not have been in vain.4

The articles in this issue explore a wide range of topics, and their geographic and chronological spread is also broad. Taken together, they not only highlight the importance of migration for the history of all the countries of the region, they also make clear that the current hysteria about migration is misplaced: first, because migration has been a fact of life for centuries and second, because societies prove remarkably successful in the integration of newcomers in the long term. Migration is one of the driving forces of cultural innovation, and more often than not, its economic benefits outweigh its costs. The articles also point to one of the many paradoxes of migration: while it is often a result of constraints, despair, or even violence, it also offers a chance for individual agency. Migration is linked not only to fears but also to hopes. Its consequences can never be predicted because each act of migration creates new social interactions, which in turn generate new dynamics which ultimately can change underlying social structures. But this is precisely the business of historians: to reveal the structural determinants of human life on the one hand and highlight the contingent practices enabled (and constrained) by these structures on the other. Hindsight teaches us at least one lesson: history never ends.

Integration Through Confession? Lutheran Migration from Upper Hungary to Sibiu After 1671 – Isaak Zabanius

Sever Cristian Oancea

University of Frankfurt am Main

In Memoriam Prof. Krista Zach
(1939–2016)

This study addresses the Hungarian migration in the Early Modern Era from Upper Hungary to Transylvania, focusing primarily on the biography of the Slovak Lutheran theologian Isaak Zabanius. Beginning with current historiography debates and covering the spectrum of anthropologic social historical views, it follows the exile story of this migrant, beginning with his departure for Toruń and Danzig (today Gdańsk, Poland) until his final settlement in Sibiu (Hermannstadt). I address two main questions in this article: did Zabanius migrate to Transylvania for confessional reasons, or was he motivated by economic considerations? How did he integrate into Transylvanian Saxon society? The contemporary sources indicate that he came to Transylvania because of his social network and only after having been given a position at the gymnasium of Sibiu. His integration was a success: he and his offspring became part of the local elite by ascending into the highest church and occupying political positions. Social integration in this case also represented assimilation and Germanization.

Keywords: Early Modern Transylvania, confessional persecution, Upper-Hungarian exile, confessional migration, Isaak Zabanius

The period after the conspiration of Count Ferenc Wesselényi represents one of the darkest times of Hungarian Protestantism. The Habsburgs endeavored to follow the Bohemian model and forcefully implement the Westphalian (1648) credo, cuius regio eius religio. Hundreds of Lutherans were convoked and some of them were put on trial in Bratislava (Pressburg by its German name and Pozsony in Hungarian). They were arrested and coerced to admit having been part of a conspiracy against the Habsburgs. Protestant churches and schools were confiscated or closed, and Protestant services were forbidden.1 Even radical measures against the Protestants were not unheard of in the high Catholic clerical circles.2 Under these circumstances, protestants from Upper Hungary (the territory which today is the state of Slovakia), i.e. Lutherans and Calvinists, had only two alternatives: either convert to Catholicism or emigrate.3

Confessional (e)migration was a common and mass phenomenon in Europe in the seventeenth century.4 The exiled man [Lat. exul] was a familiar baroque personage, like the nobleman, the burgher, the priest, or the convert.5 This was an enduring phenomenon and was widespread in the Habsburg Monarchy in the Early Modern Era,6 as scholars have clearly demonstrated over the course of the past decade.7 Thomas Winkelbauer refers to hundreds of thousands of confessional émigrés between 1598 and 1660.8 Hungarian migration after 1670, to the extent that it has caught the attention of scholars over the course of the past ten years, was focused mostly on the German Lands. It was perceived as an important part of the confessionalization process9 meant to discipline disobedient subjects.10 Considered more from the social and cultural historical perspectives, it was defined by Eva Kowalská as a mostly elite and confessionally “motivated” movement.11 The lives of migrants in exile, the success or failure of their integration, and their self-perception became focal subjects of study for the reputed Slovak scholar.12 However, the subject of emigration from Upper Hungary and notably the Spiš region (Zips in German, Szepes in Hungarian, and Spiş in Romanian) to the so-called “blessed Land” (Paul Philippi) of Transylvania and especially the city of Sibiu (Hermannstadt in German, Nagyszeben in Hungarian] has been not integrated into the current historiographic debates. This sub-field of the scholarship on migration still suffers an acute “backwardness” compared to the scholarship on other areas of Central Europe.

Studies on Early Modern Spiš Lutheran migration to Sibiu in the seventeenth century are not a historiographic novelty. A list of the exiled pastors and theologues was drawn by Johannes Bureus13 and the phenomenon also captured the interest of Lorenz Sievert, teacher of mathematics and physics at interwar Sibiu. By focusing primarily on the life of the silversmith Sebastian Hann, Sievert reopened a path into this research area. He provides us with the names of some thirty emigrants from the Spiš region, and also their places of origin and professions. Moreover, he assessed their emigration as a phenomenon conditioned by confessional considerations.14 Later studies on this topic focused mostly on notorious craftsmen and artists already mentioned by Sievert, or on what current debates refer to as technology or cultural transfer.15 Reasons for confessional migration were reassessed, together with the policies adopted by the city to attract qualified people.16 The stress was put on the German ethnicity of these subjects, a thesis to which some nuance should be added. The question became a research topic in the frame of the Transylvanian Saxon publication “Siebenbürgische Familienforschung.”17 Still, during my last discussion with the recently deceased German scholar Krista Zach during a friendly meeting in Cluj (Kolozsvár in Hungarian, Klausenburg in German) in 2015, we agreed that there is still much to be done on this research area. The issue of religious mobility and the “real” reasons for emigration demand deeper analysis, as does the mere question of the number of emigrants. The journeys of the common emigrants to Sibiu and their lives there are a blank page in the history books, and the question of the welcomes these migrants were given by the local guilds and churches is still insufficiently researched. The theology and political stances of the emigrants have also been quite neglected.

This study addresses the migration of Lutherans from Upper Hungary to Sibiu from the point of view of a social historian. My approach is not exhaustive, as I intend only to address some of the questions raised above, primarily by relying on the biography of the Lutheran theologue Isaak Zabanius (1632–1707).18 Drawing on a model of analysis used in the field of social-cultural history and anthropology (i.e. motivations for migration and exile evolution, reception, integration, and “cultural transfer”), I assess the peculiar meanings of these terms in the concrete case of the Transylvanian Saxon Lutheran city of Sibiu. The published and unpublished sources (most of which are Church sources) and theology books on which I draw have allowed me to reevaluate the biography of Isaak Zabanius and, to some extent, to correct, revise, and add to our knowledge of this famous Lutheran theologue. My comparison of his life with the lives of other exiled theologues and craftsmen refugees in Sibiu integrates his exile story into the history of migration from Upper Hungary and the history of Slavic migration to Transylvania during the second half of the seventeenth century. As the sources are descriptive and leave generous interpretative space, I will construct my arguments on the issue of identities. In order to do this, first it is important to assess the significance of the fact that Zabanius was both an exile and a theologue. “Exile fellow” is a term of Lutheran origin initially meaning exiled man. The term “Exul Christi” is found in the theological literature and was connected to the abandonment of office or the expulsion of Lutheran clergy around the Augsburg Interim (1548). Later, it also was used to refer to other groups which explained their migration as a decision influenced at least in part by confession.19 According to Eva Kowalská, Hungarian contemporaries used this term to designate “people who were deprived of their offices as a result of governmental regulations and the direct actions of the authorities, and those who were banished from their parishes and from the country as religious outcasts and suffered poverty as a result.”20 The analysis must take into account the importance of the status of “exile,” but it also must not fail to consider the importance of Zabanius’ clerical identity, i.e. a special consciousness or what Luise Schorn-Schütte defined as “Sondernbewustsein.”21 Thus, we must keep in mind that “historical analysis must therefore hold on to both paths of knowledge, which act as mutual constraints, and try to determine, and thus to explain, the typical form of mental disposition, of social activity, and of institutional structures.”22 Applying this to Zabanius, I will answer the following questions: was Isaak Zabanius an exiled Lutheran theologue in Sibiu? Until now, literature has generally assessed his career success, but how easily did he move in an Orthodox Lutheran Transylvanian Saxon society? What was his political and confessional behavior after he had settled in Sibiu? Can we speak of his family’s integration as well?

A Town Sui Generis:
Transylvanian Saxons and Hungarian Lutherans in Sibiu

Sibiu is a city in southern Transylvania. It constituted the capital of the so-called Saxon Land or King’s Land, and it enjoyed a large degree of political and church autonomy since the Middle Ages.23 According to the town constitutions from 1598, only free Germans could be granted citizenship, as they had exclusive rights on the Saxon territory.24 The nobles were not allowed to settle, though the constitutions of 1598 made some exceptions for people from foreign countries and nations. Physicians, surgeons, and “procurators,” for instance, could be granted citizenship under specific conditions.25 Once having become a citizen of the town, one could buy a house, be admitted into the guild and the community of the one-hundred men [Hundertmannschaft], and even serve on the town council. The constitutions did not impose Lutheranism as a sine qua non, but the apology of Albert Huet clearly designates Lutheranism as a main “nation” feature. The Saxons adopted the Wittenberg reforms in the sixteenth century, and the “confessio augustana invariata” became a mandatory norm for all burghers of the Saxon Land, and any apostasy from this faith after 1621 could represent an act of treason against the Saxon nation.26 Whether this signifies a “Volkskirche,” as it is deemed by positivist historians (for instance Georg Daniel Teutsch), remains an open question, as it was years ago, when Krista Zach addressed this issue.27 Certainly, Sibiu represented a homogenous German Lutheran town with a well determined social structure as established by the cloth orders (Kleiderordnungen). The Orthodox Romanians and Greeks lived around Sibiu, but they did not enjoy any right to citizenship, very much like the Hungarian nobility in the seventeenth century. Although the Andreanum (1224) prescribed the theoretical equality of all burghers of this territory, the social stratification of the town became vertical in the Middle Ages and remained vertical well into the Modern Era.28 Beginning in the seventeenth century, the term “elite” designated primarily a member of the town council,29 whereas the Apafi Era brought about the emergence and rise of a new social class, the intelligentsia: town inspectors, outstanding guild masters, clergy and teachers.30 Still, most of the burghers were craftsmen and artisans, as the list of burghers from 1657 clearly shows.31 Did this confessional and social reality appeal to the persecuted and exiled Lutherans from eastern Upper Hungary?

Seventeenth-century migration to Transylvania32 and Sibiu was constant.33 Compared to other Early Modern European migration waves, we can assess only individual or family settlements in Sibiu. Lorenz Sievert refers to some thirty-three Spiš migrants in the time frame 1647–76. About eighteen of them migrated before 1672. Surprisingly, the period after the trials of Bratislava was not characterized by massive migrations. People did not migrate en masse. On average, there were only one or two migrants per year (including the family when it was the case). The accuracy of the data presented by Sievert still needs to be researched, but in the absence of the Lutheran register with the deaths in Sibiu during the second half of the seventeenth century, it would be very difficult to assess what the real number of the Spiš migrants was, or how many of them settled down permanently in Sibiu. In as little as we are informed about their towns of origin, we have on the list the relatively compact region of Spiš and its surroundings: Dobra (Kisdobra in Hungarian), Prešov (Preschau in German, Eperjes in Hungarian), Kremnica (Kremnitz in German, Körmöcbánya in Hungarian), Kežmarok (Käsmark in German, Késmárk in Hungarian), Levoča (Leutschau in German, Lőcse in Hungarian), and Rožňava (Rosenau in German, Rozsnyó in Hungarian). It is not always easy to determine someone’s “ethnic” background, but names like Elias Ladiver, Elias Nicolai, Andreas Rutkai, Jeremias Stranovius, and certainly Isaak Zabanius clearly suggest that, the interpretations found in the historiography up until now notwithstanding, the alleged German ethnicity of the migrants from Upper Hungary should be reassessed. The Slovak component should be taken into consideration, as should their assimilation and quick Germanization in the span of only one generation. Their journeys to Sibiu have only rarely been studied. Instead, the documents used by Sievert (church records, testaments, guilds registers) reveal the professions of most of the migrants. About thirteen of the migrants presented by him were craftsmen and guilds “servants” (Ger. Knechte, Geselle). Others were the two town riders, one carpenter, one book binder, one organ builder, a writer (scriba), a goldsmith, two musicians, a chemist, a pharmacist, and five literati, namely Johann Fabricius, Elias Ladiver, Georg Hirsch, Isaak Zabanius, and his eldest son, Johann Zabanius.34 These literati migrated to Sibiu after the trials of Bratislava. The extent of their acceptance on account of their confession into the Saxon community is little known. The contemporary church annals, chronicles, and diaries show scarcely any interest in these migrants, and in most cases mention only individuals. Thus, in his ecclesiastic annals, David Hermann refers to a letter from the Transylvanian Prince Mihály Apafi, who demanded the intervention of the Lutheran Superintendent with the kings of Denmark, Sweden, and the Saxon Elector in favor of the protestants of Upper Hungary, who were persecuted by the Catholic Clergy.35 There is little evidence of any confessional solidarity with the persecuted brothers from Upper Hungary. Thus, one must ask whether these migrants were really perceived as exiled protestants in Sibiu. Were there other reasons which would demand further investigation? As in the case of the conversion phenomenon in Early Modern Europe, the high number of people involved makes it impossible to identify every single “reason.” A more contextual analysis would be more supportive and might well yield some answers.

The Exile Story of Isaak Zabanius

The life of Isaak Zabanius offers an interesting case for the study of how a migrant to a new community perceived himself, how he was perceived by his contemporaries, and how he behaved in confessional and ecclesiastical contexts. Zabanius was born to a Lutheran family from Brodzany (Brogyán in Hungarian). His father was the Lutheran nobleman and pastor Johann Zabanius and his mother was Sophia Niecholcz. He attended the university of Wittenberg, where he received the academic title “Magister” under the dean Georg Caspar Kirchmayer (1657–59). After having returned to Upper Hungary, he received the office of gymnasium con-rector (1661) thanks to the intervention of Johann Bayer and the chair for polemical theology and theological worldly wisdom (1669) in Prešov. He lost his office due to the changes of 1670s, and, according to the sources, he ended up in penury. Three years later, his school in Prešov was closed. From this moment on, the choices he made suggest that he perceived himself as a persecuted and exiled Lutheran.36 He first fled to Toruń (Thorn in German), a Pomeranian town with many Lutherans from Upper Hungary. Some of them later left for Transylvania as well.37 From here, Zabanius went to Gdańsk (Danzig in German) in January 1674, a place where he strove to obtain an office, but as had been the case in Toruń, he failed.38 His experience in Gdańsk was typical of the exile, who faces an insecure future, as expressed in the exile exegetes for cases of other refugees.39 From this point on, his experience of exile was to change radically. His mobility was no longer a response to confessional constraints. Rather, he chose a destination where he would be confessionally secure. Unlike most of his fellow exiled fellow, he traveled to Transylvania and never returned home.

The contemporary Johann Burius situates Zabanius and other theologues from his circle as exiled fellows in Transylvania,40 an assessment that requires more profound explanations. Social networks and friendships functioned during the Early Modern Era just as they do today. Sources mention that Zabanius came to Transylvania thanks to the interventions of Georg Femger, a former colleague from Prešov and a pastor in Sebeş (Mühlbach in German, Szászsebes in Hungarian). Femger intervened on Zabanius’ behalf with the Saxon bailiff from Sibiu, Andreas Fleischer, who eventually approved Zabanius’ appointment as an instructor at the Sibiu gymnasium, and public funds were used to finance his voyage to Transylvania.41 Moreover, the sources suggest that his migration to Transylvania was mainly due to promptings by Elias Ladiver and Johann Fabricius, two of his former colleagues in Upper Hungary.42

Indeed, Zabanius presented himself as a persecuted Lutheran “exul,” but only until 1677, the year when he assumed his office at the Sibiu gymnasium: “cum in exilio vixis sum ad annum usque 1677” and “vis exillium passus.”43 Moreover, contemporary sources and the eighteenth-century Transylvanian Saxon historiography acknowledged his status as an exiled Lutheran, who had had to flee due to the persecution and hatred propagated by the Catholic or Pontifical clergy in Hungary.44 These assessments describe his flight to Toruń and Gdańsk, but his decision to come to Transylvania was a consequence of his “penury” in these Pomeranian towns. Had he not been offered the office of teacher, he might well not have come to Sibiu. This question might be worth raising, if not in the case of theologues who fled to Transylvania from the very beginning,45 at least in the cases of craftsmen who were usually described in the literature as persecuted protestants from Upper Hungary. Did they settle in Sibiu as part of a flight from persecution, or did they come to the relatively prosperous city in pursuit of stable livelihoods?

Eighteenth-century sources mention that Zabanius was welcomed in Sibiu and appreciated for his work at the gymnasium.46 There is little mention of his being regarded as a foreigner, a Slav, or a Slovak.47 Apparently, this was not an issue, much as it was not an issue in other cases when Slovaks were granted citizenship, perhaps only because of their profession and confession. Moreover, when he ran for the parish office in Hannersdorf in 1685, he lost to another village priest, as Zabanius was not considered a Slovak, but a German, he was not given the parish under the pretext that the community would not properly understand the sermons.48 He advanced in his career as a pastor only two years later, when he was ordinated pastor in Gârbova (Urwegen in German, Szászorbó in Hungarian) by his old Prešov schoolmate, superintendent Michael Pancratius.49 One can only guess whether his attainment of the parish office was connected to the fact that Pancratius had been elected superintendent only one year earlier and had supported Zabanius, but there is no direct evidence of any such link. Afterwards, Zabanius enjoyed a quick ascension in his career. He received the parish office of Sebeş in 1690, and one year later, he was given the parish office in Sibiu, a city which became the capital of the Habsburg Principality of Transylvania. Moreover, he was elected dean of the Sibiu Lutheran Chapter. He died in 1707.

Undoubtedly his life represents both a success story in exile and a paradox. Unlike Ladiver and many other Hungarian Lutheran theologues from the German Lands who returned to Upper Hungary, Zabanius remained in Transylvania even after the Habsburg occupation in 1687. Under these circumstances, we may assume that he stopped playing the role of an exiled Hungarian and assumed the position (or identity) of a Transylvanian Saxon clergyman with origins in Upper Hungary. Having come from a region where the main rival of the Lutheran Church was Catholicism and not Calvinism (as was the case in Transylvania), Zabanius imported the traditional polemics with the Jesuits from Košice (Kaschau in German, Kassa in Hungarian), and thus we can speak of a transfer of theological culture. He was hardly inclined to make peace with the Catholic fathers, as he had been described negatively in the book by Lucas Kolich.50 Moreover, unlike his colleagues from the other Saxon towns, he was more “experienced” in polemics. He continued his fights against the Catholic Church, including for instance the debates concerning the irenics (theology focusing on the question of reconciliation with the Church of Rome and the creation of Christian unity) and the Holy Spirit. The conflict with the Jesuits became personal. He openly criticized the Sibiu Saxon Count Valentin Frank von Frankenstein for having supported the Jesuits in the town,51 and through his clerical mission to defend what he perceived as religious truth, he ended up in a conflict with his own son, the Saxon mayor of Sibiu, Johann Zabanius.52 Nonetheless, his confessional encounter with the Hungarian Calvinists and Unitarians determined his alignment to the local confessional reality: he published a book on the debates between the Calvinists and Unitarians.53 Furthermore, Zabanius became the most energetic advocate of the Lutheran community of Cluj in debates with the Unitarians and Calvinists (1695). In addition to his apologia for the reestablishment of the Lutheran cult in Cluj, there is a very important mention of how he perceived the interconnection between Lutheranism and Saxons: “compositam esse rem inter Ecclesiam et Saxones Reformatos, dictum est heri; sed ubi est unitas, ibi comparatione opus non est,”54 i.e. the Saxons must be united. This sentence can be interpreted to suggest that he had come to consider himself a “Saxon.”

Unlike Hungarian Lutherans who emigrated to the German Lands, Zabanius did not write an apologia of the exiled clergyman in Transylvania. There is no sign indicating that he aligned himself with the ideology of Georg Lani or other exile theoreticians. There is little sign that the protestants from Upper Hungary remained a segregated theological group or unified minority in Transylvania, as Zabanius ended up in a personal conflict even with his old friend Elias Ladiver. They exchanged blows during a synod on the issue of the existence of atoms. Instead of assessing his membership in the group of persecuted Lutherans, I would rather assess his status as a representative of the Transylvanian Saxon clerical estate and a defender of its privileges. He continued old local disputes with the local potentati politici on behalf of the chapter, and he faced the new issues created by the advent of the House of Austria in Transylvania through the eyes of a Transylvanian Saxon pastor. Very expressive in this sense is his rejection of the demands of the Romanian United (Greek Catholic) clergy on the Saxon tenths, his manifold demands on behalf of the Sibiu Lutheran chapter (well documented in the sources of the Sibiu Chapter), and his constant quarrels with the Saxon count and Lutheran Superintendent concerning the issue of Sibiu ecclesiastic jurisdiction. He integrated into the Transylvanian Saxon Lutheran Church.

From a social point of view, his family also succeeded in fully integrating, not only into the Saxon society, but even into the local town elites. Integration was successful in many other cases of migrants from Upper Hungary, as genealogists have pointed out (for instance, the notorious exiled Lutheran Johann Vest managed to integrate, as did Johannes Löw and the aforementioned Elias Nicolai).55 Zabanius’ eldest son Johann, after studying in Tübingen and becoming Magister in theology (1688), married Elisabeth, the daughter of the Saxon bailiff Johann Haupt, in 1690. Instead of following the family tradition and becoming a theologian, he entered into the service of the town, and he ascended the professional ladder very quickly, much as his father had. He was appointed provincial notary in 1690, he represented the interests of the Saxon nation in Vienna in 1691, and he was ennobled by Leopold I and given the title Sachs von Harteneck. He was also elected mayor of Sibiu and later Saxon bailiff. Eventually, he became a martyr of the Transylvanian Saxons, after being executed in 1703 due to a conspiracy.56 His second son Jakob (later Sachs von Harteneck, 1677–1747) married Anna Maria Bakosch, the daughter of Sibiu town councilor Johann Bakosch, and became chair judge. His third son, Daniel Zabanius (later Sachs von Harteneck, 1680–1720), married Katharina Fabritius in 1701 and later Katharina Schirmer, the daughter of a pharmacist. He became a merchant. Zabanius’ daughter Rosina first married the pastor Johann Fleischer and later the pharmacist Michael Ahlfeld. As Harald Roth displayed in the genealogy, this family became part of the Transylvanian Saxon patriciate. They were integrated into the Sibiu political and social elites.57 The title Sachs von Harteneck is very revealing. It very clearly suggests that the family wanted to be “Saxon.” Moreover, eighteenth-century documents reveal that they abandoned the name Zabanius and remained known in collective memory as Sachs von Harteneck. In other words, they became a Saxon family.

The Catholic “seduction” of the eighteenth century also tempted members of Zabanius’ family: although most of the Harteneck family remained faithful to Lutheranism, a few members converted to Catholicism. This phenomenon was not uncommon. Indeed, it affected most of the patrician families of Sibiu, including the offspring of the notorious exiled Lutheran Johann Vest. Sebastian Vest converted to Catholicism in 1705 and thus became part of the Catholic patriciate.58

Final Considerations

Confessional migration to Sibiu during the second half of the seventeenth century differs in its meanings and motivations from the migration waves to the German lands. I am thinking of individual migrants and not large groups of migrants. Since Sibiu was Lutheran, “qualified” Lutheran subjects from Upper Hungary were well received. Their reasons for settling in Sibiu are open to interpretation, but I would suggest that economic considerations were more important than confessional ones. To the extent that it concerns his identity as a theologian, Isaak Zabanius’ status of “exile” applied more to the period before his arrival in Transylvania, i.e. the period when he lived in Toruń and Gdańsk. The insecure life in exile as presented by historians dealing with other European regions essentially matches his personal experience. Nonetheless, when he relocated to Sibiu, he ceased living a life in exile in the widespread understanding of the term, as he clearly pointed out after his arrival in Transylvania. His decision was influenced more by his social network and the help he was given by friends and colleagues from Prešov, as he came to Transylvania only after funds had been provided to cover the cost of his trip and he had been offered an office at the local gymnasium. He had the typical career of a successful Transylvanian Saxon Lutheran pastor, who fought for (what he perceived as) the theological truth. As an experienced polemist, he brought with him his earlier theological disputes with the Jesuits and accommodated to the local political and confessional reality, becoming an assiduous advocate of the Saxon Lutheran Church. His family represents a model of integration success à longue durée: it rose to the top of the Saxon social hierarchy, although the price was assimilation into the Saxon natio and a break with their Hungarian past. Certainly, the confession played an integrative role, as German and Slovak Lutherans were easier to assimilate than Catholic Germans in the eighteenth century. His profession also played a fundamental role. In revealing contrast, the masses of protestant peasants from Austria who were deported in the eighteenth century could not be integrated into the society of the town. His life story raises important questions concerning migration and integration patterns: had the migration of Lutherans from Upper Hungary to Sibiu in the seventeenth century taken place en masse, would it have been similarly successful? Had Catholic subjects migrated to Sibiu in the seventeenth entury, would the city have been so welcoming? These questions lead me to my conclusion: confession played an integrative role in Early Modern society. In this case, it also constituted a form and means of assimilation.

Bibliography

Archival sources

Arhivele Naţionale, Serviciul Judeţean Braşov [Romanian National Archives, County Archives of Braşov], Fond Colecţia de documente Biserica Neagră, Annales Ecclesiastici ab Anno Christi M.D.C.L.VIIII quo Cl. David suos finivit ad finem usque saeculi illius ex Documentis publicis adeoque authenticis et indubut continuata a Luca Graffio Ecclesiarum Augustanae Confessionis per Transilvaniam addictarum Superintendente. Descripti A 1762 diebus martii.

Arhivele Naţionale, Serviciul Judeţean Sibiu [Romanian National Archives, County Archives of Sibiu] (further quoted ANSJS), Fond Colecţia acetelor de stare civilă, 53

ANSJS, Colecţia de documente Brukenthal, B 1-5, no. 48: David Hermannii Annales Politici.

ANSJS, Colecţia de documente Brukenthal, H 1-5, no. 14: I.S.C. T., Von der Glaubens Verbesserung und ihrer Lehrern zu Hermannstadt in Siebenbürgen.

ANSJS, Colecţia de documente Brukenthal, H 1-5, no. 199.

ANSJS, Consistoriul Superior Evanghelic C.A., no. 1.

ANSJS, Episcopia Bissericii Evanghelice, Cutia 4, no. 123, 211.

Evangelisches Pfarramt Hermannstadt: Matricola Parochiae Cibiniensis

Zentralarchiv des evangelischen Kirche in Rumänien, Bestand Wilhelm Bruckner, Löw, 503/331.

Secondary sources

Albrich, Karl. “Die Bewohner Hermannstadts im Jahre 1657.” Archiv des Vereins für siebenbürgische Landeskunde NF 17 (1883): 256–90.

Bahlcke, Joachim. Gegenkräfte: Studien zur politischen Kultur und Gesellschaftsstruktur Ostmitteleuropas in der Frühen Neuzeit. Marburg: Herder Verlag, 2015.

Bahlcke, Joachim. Glaubenflüchtlinge: Ursachen, Formen und Auswirkungen frühneuzeitlicher Konfessionsmigration in Europa. Berlin: LIT Verlag, 2008.

Bobková, Lenka. “Exulant.” In Člověk českého raného novověku, edited by Bůžek Václav, Král Pavel, 297–326. Prague: Argo, 2007.

Ďurovic, Ľubomir. “K životopisu Izáka Cabana.” Slavica Lundensia 8 (1980): 121–37.

Ďurovic, Ľubomir. O slovenčine a Slovensku. Bratislava: VEDA, 2004.

Fata, Márta. “Glaubensflüchtlinge aus Ungarn in Württemberg im 17. und 18. Jahrhundert Forschungsaufriss mit einer Dokumentation der Exulanten.” In Mindennapi választások, tanulmányok Péter Katalin 70. születésnapjára, edited by Gabriella Erdélyi and Péter Tusor, 519–50. Budapest: MTA Történettudományi Intézete, 2007.

Guy Marica, Viorica. Sebastian Hann. Cluj-Napoca: Dacia, 1972.

Gündisch, Gustav. “Die Oberschicht Hermannstadts im Mittelalter.”
Zeitschrift für siebenbürgische Landeskunde, 4 (1981): 3–21.

Gündisch, Gustav. “Soziale Konflikte in Hermannstadt um die Mitte des 17. Jahrhunderts.” Forschungen zur Volks- und Landeskunde 2, no. 3 (1959): 58–78.

Holzem, Andreas. Christentum in Deutschland 1550–1850: Konfessionalisierung – Aufklärung – Pluralisierung. Vol. 1. Paderborn: Schöningh, 2015.

István Juhász. “Az ellenreformáció és az erdélyi prédikátorok az 1671–1681 közötti évtizedben” [The Counter Reformation and the Transylvanian Preachers in 1671–1681]. Theologiai Szemle 17 (1976): 186–92.

Kolich, Lukács. Apologia Pro Domo Dei, Quae est Ecclesia Dei vivi, Columna, & firmamentum Veritatis. Prague: typis Univ. Carolo.-Ferd. In Coll. Soc. JESU ad S. Clementem Anno 1719.

Kowalská, Eva. “Confessional exile from Hungary in 17th century Europe: The problem of mental borders.” In Imagining frontiers, contesting identities, edited by Steven G. Ellis and Lud’a Klusáková, 229–42. Pisa: Pisa University Press, 2007.

Kowalská, Eva. “Exil als Zufluchtsort oder Vermittlungsstelle? Ungarische Exulanten im Alten Reich während des ausgehenden 17. Jahrhunderts.” In Glaubensflüchtlinge: Ursachen und Auswirkungen konfessioneller Migration im frühneuzeitlichen Osteuropa, edited by Joachim Bahlcke, 257–76. Berlin: LIT Verlag, 2008.

Kowalská, Eva. “Georg Lani – Ideolog des ungarischen Exils.” Paper given at the conference in Budapest, December 2013. Accessed October 10, 2017. https://www.academia.edu/6119821/Georg_Lani_Ideolog_des_ungarischen_lutherischen_Exils.

Kowalská, Eva. “Günther, Klesch, Lani und die anderen: Zur Typologie der ungarischen Exulanten des 17. Jahrhunderts.” Acta Comeniana 20 (2001): 49–64.

Kowalská, Eva. “Konfesia ako motivácia migrácie: (vnútro)uhorská migrácia protestantov medzi prinútením a pozvaním.” Acta Historica Neosoliensia 18, no. 1–2 (2015): 64–82.

Kowalská, Eva. “Seelenheil und Staatsmacht: Merkmale der Gegenreformation in (Ober-)Ungarn.” In Staatsmacht und Seelenheil: Gegenreformation und Geheimprotestantismus in der Habsburgermonachie, edited by Rudolf Leeb, Susanne Claudine Pils, and Thomas Winkelbauer, 347–56. Vienna–Munich: R. Oldenbourg Verlag, 2007.

Krasser, Harald. “Sigismund Möss: Bildhauer und Schnitzler in Hermannstadt.” In Sie prägten unsere Kunst: Studien und Aufsätze, edited by Brigitte Stephani, 117–40. Cluj-Napoca: Dacia, 1985.

Micae historico-chronologicae evangelico-pannonicae <...> collectae et adumbratae opera vigilaci diutina Johannis Burii, laureati poetae, tunc pastoris germanici Carponensis, nunc Jesu Christi exulis duodecennis, anno vero Christi MDCLXXXV et insequentibus in ordinem redigi coeptae: Jesu benedicente labori pio. Ex autographo Posoniensi edidit Paulus Lichner. Auf dem Umschlage lautet der Titel: Johannis Burii micae historiae Evangelicorum in Hungaria ab anno 1673. ad 1688. annum.

Mikles, Ján. Izák Caban slovenský atomista v XVII. storoči. Bratislava: Slov. Akad. vied a umeni, 1948.

Oancea, Sever Cristian. “Catholic seduction or Habsburg clientele? Confessional change in eighteenth-century Transylvanian Saxon society.” Colloquia. Journal of Central European History 15 (2008): 5–29.

Oancea, Sever Cristian. “‘Stehe Wanderer und beweine die Siebenbürger, die heute Freiheit und Privilegien verloren haben!’ Die ‘Wahl’ des Sachsengrafen Stefan Waldhütter von Adlershausen.” Zeitschrift für siebenbürgische Landeskunde 38 (2015): 81–103.

Repčák, Jozef. Izák Caban, 1632–1707: personálna bibliografia. Prešov: Štátna vedecká knižnica, 1977.

Roth, Harald. “Einzelzuwanderungen nach Siebenbürgen.” Siebenbürgishe Familienforschung 4, no. 1 (1987): 18–31.

Roth, Harald. Hermannstadt: Keine Geschichte einer Stadt in Siebenbürgen. Cologne–Weimar– Vienna: Böhlau Verlag, 2006.

Roth, Harald. “Von den Hutteren zu den Landlern in Siebenbürgen.” In Glaubensflüchtlinge: Ursachen und Auswirkungen konfessioneller Migration im frühneuzeitlichen Osteuropa, edited by Joachim Bahlcke, 355–44. Berlin: LIT Verlag, 2008.

Roth, Harald. “Zur Geschichte und Genealogie siebenbürgisch-sächsischer Geschlechter. 5. Die Familie Zabanius Sachs von Harteneck.” Siebenbürgische Familienforschung 3, no. 1 (1986): 1–12.

Schilling, Heinz. “Die frühneuzeitliche Konfessionsmigration.” IMIS Beiträge 20 (2002): 439–58.

Schorn-Schütte, Luise. “Prediger an protestantischen Höfen der Frühneuzeit: Zur politischen und sozialen Stellung einer neuen bürgerlichen Führungsgruppe in der höfischen Gesellschaft, dargestellt am Beispiel von Hessen-Kassel, Darmstadt und Braunschweig Wolfenbüttel.” In Bürgerliche Eliten in den Niederlanden und Nordwestdeutschland. Studien zur Sozialgeschichte des europäischen Bürgertums im Mittelalter und in der Neuzeit, edited by Heinz Schilling and Herman Diederiks, 275–36. Cologne–Vienna: Böhlau Verlag, 1985.

Schorn-Schütte, Luise. “Priest, Preacher, Pastor: Research on Clerical Office in Early Modern Europe.” Central European History 33, no. 1 (2000): 1–39.

Schuler von Lobloy, Friedrich. Materialien zur siebenbürgischen Rechtsgeschichte. 1. Merkwürdige Municipal-Constitutionen. Hermannstadt: Steinhausser, 1862.

Schunka, Alexander. “Emigration aus den Habsburgerländern nach Mitteldeutschland: Motive und soziale Konsequenzen.” In Staatsmacht und Seelenheil: Gegenreformation und Geheimprotestantismus in der Habsburgermonachie, edited by Rudolf Leeb, Susanne Claudine Pils, and Thomas Winkelbauer, 333–46. Vienna–Munich: R. Oldenbourg Verlag, 2007.

Schunka, Alexander. “Lutherische Konfessionsmigration.” Europäische Geschichte Online. Accessed January 31, 2017. http://ieg-ego.eu/de/threads/europa-unterwegs/christliche-konfessionsmigration/lutherische-konfessionsmigration.

Seivert, Gustav. Die Stadt Hermannstadt: Eine historische Skizze. Hermannstadt: Steinhaussen, 1859.

Sievert, Johann. “Sebastian Hann. Ein Beitrag zu seiner Lebensgeschichte.“ Mitteilungen aus dem Baron Brukenthalischen Museum N.F. 2 (1932): 5–36.

Steiner, Stephan. Rückkehr unerwünscht: Deportationen in der Habsburgermonarchie der Frühen Neuzeit und ihr europäischer Kontex. Vienna: Böhlau, 2014.

Szegedi, Edit. “Confesionalizarea” [The confessionalization]. In Istoria Transilvaniei Vol II (de la 1541 până la 1711) [History of Transylvania, from 1541 to 1711], edited by Ioan Aurel Pop, Thomas Nägler, and András Magyari. Cluj-Napoca: Centrul de Studii Transilvane, 2005.

Szinnyei, József. Magyar írók élete és munkái XIV [The Lives and Works of Hungarian Writers XIV]. Budapest: n.p., 1908.

Szirtes, Zsofia. “Andreas Gunesch: Fides Saxonum in Transylvania (1697): Történeti apológia az erdélyi Habsburg-uralom kezdetéből” [Andreas Gunesch: Fides Saxonum in Transylvania (1697). Historical apology from the beginning of Habsburg Rule in Transylvania]. Levéltári Közlemények 82 no. 2 (2011): 78–123.

Terpstra, Nicholas. Religious Refugees in the Early Modern World: An alternative history of the Reformation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015.

Trausch, Joseph. Schriftstellerlexicon oder biographisch-literarische Denkblätter der Siebenbürger Deutschen III. Kronstadt: Krafft, 1871.

Van Der Linden, David. Experiencing Exile: Huguenot Refugees in the Dutch Republic, 1680–1700. Fanham: Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2015.

Várkonyi, Ágnes. “Az önálló fejedelemség utolsó évtizedei (1660–1711)” [The last decades of the independent principality (1660–1711)]. In Erdély története [The history of Transylvania] Vol. 2. 1606-tól 1830-ig [From 1606 to 1830], edited by László Makkai and Zoltán Szász. Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1987:

Wagner, Ernst. “Zuwanderer aus der Zips und aus ‘Oberungarn’ nach Siebenbürgen bis zum Ende des 18. Jahrhunderts (I).” Siebenbürgishe Familienforschung 4, no. 1 (1987): 1–17.

Wagner, Ernst. “Zuwanderer aus der Zips und aus ‘Oberungarn’ nach Siebenbürgen bis zum Ende des 18. Jahrhunderts (III): Die Nachkommen des Orgelbauers Johann Vest.” Siebenbürgishe Familienforschung 7, no. 2 (1990): 83–85.

Winkelbauer, Thomas. Ständefreiheit und Fürstenmacht: Länder und Untertaner des Hauses Habsburg im konfessionellen Zeitalter. Vol 2. Vienna: Verlag Karl Ueberreuter, 2003.

Zabanius, Isaak. Amica Consideratio Eorum, quae Fratres Unitarii, in Apologia sua contra Reformatos, paucis ab hinc annis, publicae luci exposuerunt. Hermannstadt: n. p., 1705.

Zach, Krista. “Religiöse Toleranz und Stereotypenbildung in einer multikulturellen Region. Volkskirchen in Siebenbürgen.” In Das Bild der anderen in Siebenbürgen: Stereotype in einer multiethnischen Region, edited by Konrad Gündisch, Wolfgang Höpken, and Michael Markel, 109–54. Cologne–Weimar–Vienna: Böhlau Verlag, 1998.

From Forced Migration to New Patterns of Social Life: Bulgarian Refugees in Teleorman County, Romania, in the Nineteenth Century1

Stelu Şerban

Institute for South East European Studies, Bucharest

The aim of this paper is to discern the insertion strategies of the Bulgarian migrant waves to Wallachia, focusing on Teleorman County as a case study. The largest waves of Bulgarian migrants to Wallachia occurred in the first half of nineteenth century as a consequence of the two Ottoman–Russian wars. Teleorman County is a special case, as with its four urban centers, it had more such settlements than any other county in Wallachia. The Bulgarian migrants to Teleorman settled mainly in these centers. One must draw a distinction between the patterns of the upper social strata (which included city dwellers, merchants, and landowners) and the “common” Bulgarians, who lived in rural areas and worked in the fields and gardens. I focus on the urban strategies of insertion in the first half of the nineteenth century and on the ways in which these strategies persisted in the latter half of the century, with the foundation of the city of Alexandria as a privileged site. I offer sketches of the lives of important Bulgarophone families from Teleorman and contextualize their experiences in the framework of urban and economic development.

Keywords: Bulgarian migrants, Wallachia, social strategies, urban development

Introduction

Bulgarians came to Romania as migrants over the course of several centuries, especially to the southern part of the country, Wallachia, where they settled on the boyars’ estates, becoming tenant farmers. However, the largest waves of Bulgarian migrants arrived in the first half of the nineteenth century during the two Ottoman–Russian wars.2

In this context, the case of Teleorman County is at first sight significant given the relatively large size of the Bulgarophone population.3 Thus, looking beyond some exaggerations concerning the number of such migrants,4 the statistics for 1838 indicate that, after the two Russo–Turkish wars, the number of Bulgarophone families in Wallachia reached almost 12,000,5 with 1,400 of them settled in Teleorman County.6

What is really significant, however, is the large number of families settled in the county’s four towns or townlets, namely, Ruşii de Vede (today Roşiori de Vede), Zimnicea, Alexandria, and Mavrodin. With its four urban centers, as shown by the 1838 census, Teleorman had more such settlements than any other county in Wallachia. The Bulgarian migrants who came to Romania in the first half of the nineteenth century settled mainly in these centers. Thus, of the 1,400 Bulgarian families that remained in Teleorman, 520 settled in the four towns of the county.7 Teleorman differed from other counties in this respect too, since between 1831 and 1848 it occupied the third place among the counties entitled to organize fairs (83 of them), after Vlaşca and Dâmboviţa Counties.8

The aim of this paper is to discern the insertion strategies of the waves of Bulgarian migrants who arrived in Wallachia in the first half of the nineteenth century, focusing on Teleorman County as a case study. The central contention is that the arrival of waves of Bulgarian migrants and the further consolidation and growth of their communities overlapped with the accelerated economic and urban development of the Wallachian principality. The Bulgarians made use of the incentives and opportunities generated by this wider process, and within two or three generations, they had integrated into Wallachian society. Moreover, though they lost their ethnic identity, they perceived their integration as a success. On the one hand, the Bulgarophone population was not exclusively focused on one type of modern economy linked to capitalism and social modernization. Furthermore, as the geographic dictionary authored by Pandele Georgescu,9 a former Teleorman prefect, shows, the Bulgarophone migrants who settled in villages adapted to the local subsistence economy. However, the migrants adopted these strategies only as means of adapting. On the other hand, there was a current of modernizing ideas, the promoters of which were foreign landowners and traders, like, in Teleorman County, the Serbian prince Miloš Obrenović and the Bulgarian merchants. The coping strategies adopted by Bulgarian migrants were largely based on this newly emerging urban network and of their increasingly significant place in the trading exchanges. A good illustration of this fact (i.e. the importance of the emerging urban network in the coping strategies adopted by the Bulgarian migrants) is the foundation in 1834 of the town of Alexandria, in which Bulgarian traders played significant roles. In the second part of this article, I examine the case of Alexandria in connection with two stories of successful Bulgarophone families.

Settling the Migrants

Apparently, there was a locality with a Bulgarian population in Teleorman County before 1700, but scholars have not reached any consensus on which settlement it actually was.10 It is certain, however, that in this area, as in fact was the case in all of Wallachia, in the first years of the nineteenth century localities with Bulgarophone populations suddenly seemed to emerge. Thus, there is evidence of one locality in Teleorman County before 1739, one between 1769 and 1774, and one between 1793 and 1806, to which 23 were added between 1806 and 1814 and 19 between 1828 and 1834. The total number of settlements with inhabitants originating from the eastern side of the Danube, Bulgarians in their majority, in the counties in Wallachia in the same periods of time was 6, 32, 14, 174, and 198, respectively.11 The aggregate number of 424 spots in all of Wallachia is impressive, even if we take into account the high mobility of the migrant population. This total number, as well as the evolution of the Bulgarophone population over the course of different time periods, proves that its emergence was caused by the Russo–Turkish wars of 1806–12 and 1828/29.

The reaction of the Wallachian administration was positive. With the assistance of the representatives of the Russian army, they attempted to keep the migrants in Wallachia with various fiscal incentives, the most common of which was an exemption for up to 10 years from property taxes.12 Still, these efforts were only partly successful, as only some of the Bulgarians decided to stay. The rest of them either returned to their homeland or was resettled by the Russian administration in southern Bessarabia.13

In addition to the upheavals caused by the wars, the policy of the Wallachian administration also facilitated the creation of this Trans-Danubian economic and social network. At the end of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth, the administration in Wallachia implemented a series of tax exemptions for commercial activities carried out in the capitals of the Ottoman rayas on the left side of the Danube, namely Brăila, Giurgiu, and Turnu, the commercial and social effects of which spread to the neighboring towns and townlets.14 Furthermore, due to the Adrianopole Treaty and the liberalization of trade on the Danube in 1829, these commercial and urban centers spearheaded social and economic change on both sides of the Danube.15 As for Teleorman, pair cities on both sides of the Danube emerged and grew, such as Turnu–Nikopol and Zimnicea–Svištov.

At the same time, the Wallachian administration also took a series of coherent steps in certain specific situations, such as the forced migration of the Bulgarophone population during the Russo–Turkish war of 1828/29 and the detailed regulations aimed at settling the immigrants coming from the right side of the Danube, which were debated and voted on in the Communal Assemblies of Moldova and Wallachia.16 They provided for the appointment of deputies of the immigrant Bulgarophone population who would participate in legislative assemblies and thus be able to present issues pertinent to this population. Later, the Bulgarophone population elected Vasil Nenovič, who was continuously and persistently active.17

The origin of these representatives is not accidental. The conditions favoring the development of trading activities in Wallachia, especially after 1829, enticed traders from the entire region of southeastern Europe.18 The Bulgarian merchants, who were important because of the size of the community they represented and their geographical proximity, played a significant role in the Wallachian economy and in internal and regional political networks. They often tried to change certain geopolitical contexts to their own advantage, for instance through their involvement in the events of the 1848 revolution in Wallachia.19 One might also think of the Georgiev brothers, very successful traders from Bucharest, who supported the unification of the two Romanian principalities after the Crimean War.20

In addition to the upper stratum of immigrants who brought forward evolution strategies, many local landowners hired the majority of the Bulgarophone population to work on their estates, thus integrating them into the local traditional family-type economy. I identified local landowners in 10 villages populated by Bulgarian immigrants in Teleorman County in the 1830s.21 In only two of these villages were the Bulgarians settled on monastery properties. The rest of the properties were owned by higher-ranking or lower-ranking rulers (so-called “dregători”)22 or by their relatives.

Most of these landowners, who were Romanian ethnics, owed their position and wealth to the social shifts which took place at the end of the eighteenth century, brought about by the Phanariote reforms. Their upward move on the social ladder was due to their appointment as “dregători” by the Phanariote rulers. Still, there were among them people who were not Romanian, including Greeks, Serbs, or Bulgarians. They had all come into conflict with the local boyars and members of boyar families before the start of the Phanariote era at the beginning of the eighteenth century. There was an intense and explicit opposition by the boyars to the appointment of newcomers to positions in the administration, which found expression at the end of the eighteenth century in many memoirs and the taking of public stands.23

The competition between these two top groups in Wallachian society was also based on the creation of often fictitious kinship and alliance networks intended to carry forward the surnames and properties. The cases of future Wallachian rulers, such as Gheorghe Bibescu or Barbu Ştirbei, who came to power after the removal in 1821 of the Phanariote rulers, are good examples in this respect. It should be added that the middle boyars used the same strategies.24

The presence of the Bulgarian merchants in these kinds of social networks in Wallachia is significant because it promoted the integration of the two waves of Bulgarophone migrants in the first half of the nineteenth century.25 Representatives like Vasil Nenovič belonged to a category well positioned in Wallachia’s social and economic structure, and they acted as political, social, and economic mediators in the process of integrating the Bulgarian immigrants.26 I will illustrate this in the case of Teleorman County with the examples of the Butculescu family, a native family which received many Bulgarian immigrants on its lands, and the Deşu family from Veliko Tuˇrnovo, according to some sources, or Pleven, according to others. In the early nineteenth century, members of the two families began to marry.

The most prominent member of the Butculescu family was Marin (1760–1830), a resident of Ruşii de Vede. Marin was a descendant of a modest family. His genealogy began with Mihai Butculescu (1505–68), also called Roşioru, an elite cavalry (roşiori) captain.27 Marin was born in Slatina, in the neighboring Olt County. In 1799, he married Maria Mihăescu, from an Olt County family which had never had a prominent place in the ruling hierarchy. In 1800, Marin Butculescu was a middle treasurer (biv treti vistiernic). He then became a grand serdar, an army commander member of the group of Divan boyars. Marin funded the painting of a church in Ruşii de Vede, in the founding of which his family had participated. The church had been erected in 1780 by Marin’s father, Ion Butculescu, and his father’s uncle, Radu Butculescu.28 In 1811, Marin Butculescu moved the entire townlet to the opposite bank of the Vedea River to protect it from frequent flooding.29 In 1829, Marin Butculescu was appointed prefect (ispravnic) of Olt County by the Russian administration, after having served as a tax executor (mumbaşir) in the Russian army in 1828.

Marin Butculescu had large properties in Teleorman and in the neighboring Argeş County as well, but he settled Bulgarophone refugees only on the two properties in Teleorman, in Sârbii Sfinţeşti, today Gratia, and Ţigăneşti Calomfireşti, near the future town of Alexandria.30 The origins of the two Teleorman estates are indicative of the strategies of the Butculescu family: one had been inherited (the one located at Sârbi Sfinţeşti), while the other (Calomfireşti) had been purchased by him in 1808, partly from the common land owned by free peasants (moşneni) and partly from the Bucharest monastery of Cotroceni.31

One of Marin Butculescu’s brothers, Gheorghe, born in 1765, also had a military position, that of şetrar, and was married to Manda Deşu, the daughter of Tudor Deşu, a Bulgarian settled as a postelnic in Ruşii de Vede at the end of the eighteenth century. Manda’s brother was Andrei Deşu, also known as “the Serb from Târnova”.

Andrei Deşu (1786–1882) offers the best example of the insertion strategies of the Bulgarian ethnics in the Wallachian social hierarchy in the first half of the nineteenth century. The son of a Bulgarian ethnic settled in Ruşii de Vede at the end of the the eighteenth century, Deşu extended its network of influence over the entire territory of the Wallachian principality. Deşu was appointed vice-treasurer (vtori vistier) by Grigore Ghica in 1827,32 against the backdrop of a large campaign aimed at “cleansing” the Wallachian administration of the Phanariote cadres.33 Grigore Ghica the IVth became in 1822 the first native ruler after the end of Phanariote period, which had begun in Wallachia more than one century before (1716). Holding the position of vice-treasurer, in the 1830s, Deşu acted as a mediator between the immigrant Bulgarian traders and the local landowners by purchasing portions of the Brânceni and Smârdioasa estates. The Bulgarian traders who immigrated in 1830 together with those who had immigrated two decades earlier were aiming to found the town of Alexandria. Nevertheless, although they expressed a strong interest in the estates purchased by Deşu, they feared that Deşu would attempt to swindle them. The traders rejected the offer, and Deşu was left with the estates.34 But he sold them later to Miša Anastasiević, an important figure of Serbian immigration to Wallachia.35

At the same time, Andrei Deşu became active in Wallachian politics in the first half of the nineteenth century. People said of him that he would have been a Wallachian or Serbian candidate for rule,36 but that seems an exaggeration. However, there is a lot of data suggesting that he organized the revolts against Ottoman rule in Brăila in 1841–43. He would have been the main provider of funds, along with the Serbian envoys of Miloš Obrenović.37 For these acts he was put in prison until 1848 at the Telega salt mine. This is why he did not participate in the 1848 revolution in Wallachia, but of his sons, Ionuţ, a land leaseholder himself in Teleorman and holder of a minor administrative position (that of pitar), fired his weapon in 1848 at the Organic Regulations (hanging on a wall) in the main square in Ruşii de Vede.38

Still, in terms of family alliance strategies, Deşu preferred local connections, first with the Butculescu family, which, as mentioned above, was highly influential in Teleorman and, moreover, was important in the settlement of the Bulgarian immigrants. Also, Andrei Deşu became related through his wife, Bălaşa, to another highly influential Teleorman family, the Depărăţeanus. The three related families, Butculescu, Depărăţeanu and Deşu, funded the construction of the main Ruşii de Vede parish churches,39 a very telling sign of their social position.

The case of Andrei Deşu illustrates the subsequent evolution of the Bulgarian ethnics against both the precise backdrop of the waves of Bulgarian immigrants and the larger backdrop of their adaptation to Wallachian society. They used the emerging urban network, the importance of trading exchanges, and new networks of power and influence. As we will see in the next sections, the opportunities these latter frames offered were used by the next generation of Bulgarian immigrants, though the social, political, and economic context changed. In this sense, the foundation of the town of Alexandria constitutes a telling example.

In Search of an Urban Life

In the second half of the nineteenth century there were no longer large waves of Bulgarian immigration across the Danube, in spite of the outbreak of two new Russo–Turkish wars between 1853 and 1856, the Crimean War, and the 1877/78 war. Having participated in these two wars, even indirectly, or in the preceding events, the Bulgarophone people already had important social and economic positions. Moreover, the powerful Bulgarian intellectual and economic diaspora in Wallachia ended up making a bridgehead for the Bulgarian movement for empowerment in the face of the domination of the Ottoman Empire, including through shadow governments capable of leading the new Bulgarian state.40

Bulgarian immigrants held such important positions because they had adopted successful economic and social strategies, as shown in the previous section of this essay. After 1850, the second generation of immigrants would continue the same strategies, adapting them to new social contexts. One of the most efficient ways in which these strategies were used was through the settlement of the Bulgarian population in the Wallachian urban area. As I argued at the beginning of this paper, the case of Teleorman County is relevant in this respect.

Still, after 1850, the Bulgarian immigrants had to cope with two questions linked to the more general context of social change in the entire Wallachian principality. The first concerned the removal of the bureaucratic system of ranks and functions (dregătorii) of the Phanariote era. This measure, which was mentioned in the political program of the 1848 revolution in Wallachia, was achieved in the following decade in spite of the revolution’s failure. A string of reforms implemented by Barbu Ştirbei, the new Wallachian ruler, and the express introduction of these measures in the peace treaty signed after the Crimean War in 1856 led to the replacement of the Phanariote bureaucratic system by a model inspired by the modern bureaucracies of West European countries.41 The Bulgarian community of immigrants, which used (as exemplified by the case of Andrei Deşu) the Phanariote system of appointment in administrative positions, had to adapt its social strategies accordingly. And it did so successfully, engaging in local competitions for politic and bureaucratic positions. The cases mentioned below of the Repanovici and the Noica families are good examples of this.

The second aspect stems from the economic modernization of the Wallachian principality triggered by the post-1829 liberalization, which continued throughout the nineteenth century. The mushrooming of the trading network (a process in which Teleorman County occupied a leading place), the circulation of goods (including real estate properties), and the demand for monetary capital to fund such activities was exploited successfully by immigrants from southeastern European countries, including Bulgaria. One could mention, for instance, Serbian immigrants active in Teleorman County, such as the aforementioned Miša Anastasiević or the former Serbian ruler Miloš Obrenović, or even members of the other Serbian ruling family, Karageorgević. They all owned large estates purchased with funds obtained from various commercial activities, while another portion of the funds was lent, including the Wallachian government.42 Since the eighteenth century, loans had also been given to the boyars and the government by Bulgarian traders, a practice which continued into the next century.43

The founding of the town of Alexandria illustrates and embodies the link between the migration of the Bulgarian population into Teleorman County and the shift of the region’s political economy towards relative urbanization and the adoption of market economy relationships. The town was founded in 1834 with the active involvement of Bulgarian traders and craftsmen. The town’s administration was made up from the outset of a group of 52 individuals, who pooled together the amount of money necessary to purchase the land on which the town was founded. Half of the founders originated from the townlet of Mavrodin, which itself had been founded in 1810 in part by traders who had immigrated from Svištov after the destruction of Svištov by fire. The other half originated from Zimnicea, where traders who had immigrated in 1810, also from Svištov, lived. The ethnicity of the town’s founders is not mentioned. Some of the Alexandria monographers argue that they were Bulgarian,44 although one finds among them people whose names sound Romanian and even Aromanian.45 They had the official permission of the ruler Alexandru Ghica, who in 1840 issued a deed in which he acknowledged the privileges of the new town. As a matter of fact, the town’s name was given in the honor of and as an act of gratitude for the ruler. The initial group was organized as a council with preferential rights in favor of the founding members, such as the preemptive right, and collective decision-making procedures.

Another urban project, this time a failed one which nevertheless merits mention, since in a way it mirrors the foundation of Alexandria, was the aforementioned attempt to establish a town on a portion of the Mavrodin estate by the Serbian prince Miloš Obrenović.46 Mavrodin was established as a townlet in 1810, when the şetrar Constantin Mavrodin won, after a long lasting and extremely controversial trial, portions of the surrounding estates. By establishing the townlet, he thought, as Constantin Gane puts it in his work dedicated to the Mavrodin family (a family with many branches), of helping “the poor Shishtovians,” but he had in mind the idea of profiting from tax cuts for goods sold there.47 In 1825, Constantin Mavrodin died suddenly, and the estate was taken over in exchange for a debt by a man named Hristofor Sachelarie, who was married to a member of the Bălăceanu family, to whom the Mavrodin family was related. The two families also owned neighboring estates in the northern part of Teleorman County. Sachelarie sold the estate in 1835 to prince Miloš Obrenović. The prince had a cadastral survey made in 1850 for his share of the Mavrodin estate with the intention of building a new urban settlement. He submitted an application to the Romanian government in 1860, but the spot he had requested was not given governmental approval. Instead, a nearby place on the right bank of the Vedea river was offered as the new site. Land sale announcements in the Official Gazette followed. The name of the new town should have been Cuza, after the name of the ruler of the two Romanian principalities, which had just been unified. But the ruler disagreed. Miloš died in 1860, and his son Mihail carried on with the project, which was continued under the name town Buzescu. But Mihail was assassinated in 1868, and the project failed. In 1885, Mavrodin was a village inhabited by only 320 families.48

Having as the town of Alexandria as a center, the Bulgarians succeeded in gaining top positions in the social and economic life of local society. The town enjoyed considerable local autonomy until the administrative reform of 1864.49 Instruction in most of the schools was in Bulgarian, and this reflected the predominance of the Bulgarian population in the town.50 On the one hand, the Bulgarian population was cosmopolitan, with connections throughout southeastern Europe. This explains why education here was organized by figures like Hristo Zlatovič.51 On the other hand, there was an internal conflict with regard to attitudes towards Ottoman power between the radical Bulgarian groups, represented by Hristo Botev (who taught in the school) and some traders on the one hand and the descendants of the čiorbadzia, traders themselves as well, but mostly landowners, on the other.52

After 1875, the majority of the population became Romanian and Romanian cultural institutions developed.53 Subsequent demands by the Bulgarian population to reinstate education in Bulgarian were turned down.54 Under these circumstances and after the declaration of the Bulgarian autonomous state, which polarized a segment of the Bulgarian local elite, the Bulgarophone population, descendants of the immigrants who came in the first half of the nineteenth century from Alexandria and all of Teleorman County, preferred to declare themselves Romanians. This decision seems to have been strictly pragmatic, motivated by the political strategies of property capitalization and social development.55 Whatever the case, they proved successful once again. Two cases of Alexandria families support this argument: the Repanovici family and the Noica/Noikov family, both of which contributed to the town’s foundation in 1834.

Apparently, Avram Repanovici was the most enthusiastic of Alexandria’s founders, since he was the first person to erect his house on the territory of the future town. He also immigrated after the destruction of Svištov in 1810, and along with Genku Noikov/Noica and a few other representatives, in 1832 he negotiated the purchase of the land on which the town was built. Thus, he was one of the town’s founders.56 His son Anghel Repanovici took over his father’s business, by the mid-1860s he had become the most important merchant in Alexandria.57 His commercial connections included business with the Georgiev brothers in Bucharest.58 Still, he did not go beyond strictly commercial relations, as he did not extend his economic activities with agricultural land purchases. Anghel Repanovici got involved politically, developing connections with the Bulgarian radical militant Giorgi S. Rakovski, whom he supported in his work as editor of the newspaper Budušnost (“The Future”). He did not espouse radical options, however, and between 1870 and 1873 he was the town’s mayor.59

After 1880, Repanovici was a member of the Conservative Party, on behalf of which he ran several times in the local elections. As someone who held an important position in the party’s local branch, he was elected municipal council chair between 1889 and 1891, and he wrote a series of articles on the town’s Bulgarian past for the local party gazette, Vedea. The local liberal opponents often stigmatized him, referring to his ethnic origin and the links he maintained with Bulgarians from across the Danube.60

Much like Andrei Deşu in Ruşii de Vede, Anghel Repanovici remained a notable of the town in which he lived, Alexandria. Although the socio-political contexts are profoundly different in the two cases, they are examples of the plasticity and adaptability of the strategies espoused by the members of the two waves of Bulgarian immigrants in the first half of the nineteenth century to the north of the Danube. I conclude this paper with the case of the Noica family, descendants of Genku Noikov/Noica, himself a founder of the town of Alexandria. This case also constitutes an example of the various adaptation strategies adopted by the Bulgarian immigrants, from family alliances to competition for political positions and the accumulation of land.

From Merchant to Landowner

The Noica family became famous because of Constantin Noica (1909–87), a philosopher and prominent personality in Romanian public life. He and his family’s biography deserve consideration, even if Constantin Noica himself ignored this subject. Genku, his great grandfather, was among the participants in the foundation of the town of Alexandria, as Constantin Noica himself confessed.61 In truth, Genku Ilie Noica (1790–1858)62 is at the top of the list of the 52 traders and craftsmen who founded the town. Genku Noica came from the aforementioned Mavrodin, a townlet at the time, where he settled after immigrating along with a significant group of merchants after the destruction of Svištov in 1810.63

Seemingly, Genku Noica’s ethnicity was more a matter of trajectory than inheritance. Some of the authors of local monographs contend that he was of purely Bulgarian origins (though they offer no persuasive arguments in support of this contention), i.e. part of the significant group of Bulgarians who founded the town of Alexandria.64 What really matters, however, is that Genku Noica was strongly attached to the Bulgarian national cause, since his name was on the list of those who in 1842 ordered the book authored by I.N.Velinin, Zaradi vŭzrozhdenie novoi bolgarskoi slovenosti ili nauki (“For the rebirth of the new Bulgarian literature and sciences”).65 The book had been translated from Russian into Bulgarian, and it was intended to mobilize the Bulgarian intelligentsia which had emigrated to Wallachia. At the same time, Genku Noica knew Bulgarian, and he drew up the town’s administrative deeds.66

It was also argued that Genku Noica was an Aromanian,67and that he had been adopted by a Romanian family from Svištov, Ilie and Anica Dogaru. Genku was the biological son of Anghel Gigantu, a brother-in-law of Anica. The Gigantu family was Aromanian, according to an oral statement made by Emanuel Văcăreanu (1884–1916), the first person to draw up the Noica family tree. Ilie Dogaru acknowledged the adoption through a testament clause dated February 10, 1825.68 The Dogaru family emigrated from Svištov to Zimnicea and then to Mavrodin, where Genku came into conflict with his adoptive father. He subsequently left for Alexandria.

Genku Noica had two wives, Niculina,69 with whom he had three daughters, and Maria Constantinescu. Neither of Genku’s wives had prestigious social backgrounds. Iacovache, born in 1828 in Mavrodin, was Genku Noica’s son from his second marriage.70 In the testament concluded on February 1, 1857, the three daughters from his first marriage are mentioned, namely, Paraschiva, Teodosia, and Chiriaca. According to the will, he “[bequeathed] them movable assets and money, as much as I wish, and I agree with my sons-in-law according to the customs, by means of marriage contracts... as per my sons-in-law’s desire, and no other movable or immovable asset can be taken.” At the same time, he left Iacovache, his only son from his second marriage, “all the movable and immovable assets... and he will have to pay to whomever I owe something and receive from whomever owes me... and must organize and pay for my funeral and memorial services up to three years from my death.”71 The bequeathed assets are not mentioned, but as I discuss below, when Iacovache died in 1890, a hotel that his father had left him in 1857 still existed.72

If Genku Noica’s ethnic origin is uncertain or simply multiple, since he belonged to a southeastern European culture in which multiethnic identities were not rare, especially with regard to elites, his son Iovache Noica nonetheless came to be one of the Teleorman liberal leaders in the 1880s. The notice of his death published in the local liberal journal Jos reacţiunea on October 14, 1890 (Iacovache died on October 5) says almost everything about the “adoption” of the Noica family: “He (Iacovache Noica) was a significant landowner with many town assets as well, he served twice as a deputy in the Parliament, a knight of the Royal House of Romania, and vice-chair of our local committee.” Unlike cases such as that of the conservative deputy Anghel Dumitrescu, who was censured in the local liberal press for having Bulgarian origins,73 Iacovache Noica’s ethnic origin was not questioned. Iacovache Noica was married twice,74 fathered 17 children, had daughters-in law, sons-in-law, etc. about whom one finds many references in the local press, including the conservative press. We can infer that he was a highly reputed local figure and had extended family connections.

In addition to being a political personality, he was also a real estate investor. The division of his inheritance in 1892, two years after death, reveals that Iacovache had accumulated significant and large land acreage, two estates—Frăsinetu and Schitu/Poienari, the first of 1,700 ha, the second of 570—a hotel in Alexandria (as it so happens, the only one in town), a residential house also in Alexandria, and granaries in the city of Giurgiu. This inheritance would be split in 12 equal portions, 9 corresponding to the two estates and three to the other three properties, and would be divided up by lots by the legal heirs.75 The resolve to invest in land seems to have been one of Iacovache’s later decisions. The first plots of the Frăsinetu estate were bought in 1881,76 through the purchase was only completed in 1888, when Iacovache acquired the debts that the previous owners had to the Rural Credit House.77

Among Iacovache Noica’s sons, three continued their father’s strategy, following both a political career and making investments meant to capitalize their wealth. Two of these sons, Andrei and Paraschiv, were initially members of the liberal party, though they switched sides and went over to the conservatives. Andrei Noica became conservative in 1897.78 He then served twice as the mayor of Alexandria,79 while Paraschiv Noica was already a member of the conservative party. Grigore Noica, Constantin’s father, opted for the conservatives from the very beginning. But he was not as dedicated to politics as his other two brothers. He authored articles on agriculture in the conservative newspaper Alexandria, which was published for a short period of time in 1903, and he also edited an independent agronomical journal intended for the large landowners of Teleorman County.

All three brothers were interested in capitalist investments in agriculture. In order to settle their father’s bequest and also to avoid having to fragment the estates, Andrei and Paraschiv Noica purchased half of the Vităneşti estate, which they ceded to their elder brother Grigore in 1904 in exchange for 280 ha as inheritance rights from their father.80 One year after having acquired the Vităneşti estate, Grigore Noica married Clemenţa Casassovici, who would later give birth to Constantin Noica.81 Whether intentionally or not, here too family affiliation was decisive. Clemenţa’s paternal grandfather was Ivanciu Casassovici, an Aromanian trader, according to the family history, and also a founder of the town of Alexandria after his 1810 emigration from Svištov to Zimnicea.82 The Vităneşti property was enlarged by Grigore Noica up to almost 2,000 ha, and it proved sufficient to sustain the family, which would live partly in the countryside and partly in Bucharest.83

The exchange with Grigore was for the estates from the Frăsinet village. These estates were first purchased by Iacovache Noica in 1881. Andrei and Paraschiv owned this property jointly, as they did in the case of other properties as well, until 1917. The division was forced by the arrest of the two brothers, who chose to remain at their estates after the government retreated to Iaşi as Romania became involved in World War I.84 As it so happens, Andrei Noica died a year later. The division deed included, along with the Frăsinet estate (which had been reunited by means of agreements like the ones concluded with Grigore), other land properties acquired together by the two brothers: two estates in the neighboring Vlaşca County with an aggregate area of 4,250 ha, two other estates in Teleorman County with an aggregate area of 1,420 ha, a mill and the Alexandria residence and hotel inherited from Iacovache, which had been overhauled and extended.85

The difference between the properties owned by the grandfather, Genku, the father, Iacovache, and the three brothers, Andrei, Paraschiv, and Grigore, illustrates the success of the Noica family’s economic strategies. Moreover, Iacovache’s sons engaged in local matrimonial alliances meant to strengthen and stabilize their growth. Grigore married a descendant of the Cassasovici family (a founding family of Alexandria which enjoyed similar success in climbing the social ladder), and Andrei Noica and Dimitrie Noica (the latter also a son of Iacovache) married either members of former local boyar families, such as Depărăţeanu and Burcă of Roşiori de Vede, or members of economically successful families, such as the Capră family, a former land leaseholder family members of which in 1900 worked large properties in Teleorman County.86 The Noica family case is also significant as an example of the traditional pattern of Bulgarian migration across the Danube as workers on agricultural holdings. Paraschiv Noica, for instance, often hired Bulgarian workers skilled in handling water extraction hydraulic equipment to work on his estates.87

Conclusion

The main stimulating factor which made the Bulgarophone population settle permanently in Teleorman County, as it did in all of Wallachia after 1800, was its inclusion in the area’s political economy and urbanizing social milieu. On the one hand, it was the active policy of the Wallachian government to integrate the Bulgarian migrants. As I have shown at the beginning of the first section in this article, the government took a range of measures to keep the Bulgarian migrants on Wallachian lands. This is even more obvious in the case of the second wave of migrants, whose arrival overlapped with the economic liberalization underway after the Adrianopole Treaty. The reasons for these policies were economic, but not related to the development of the rural areas and agriculture. The main target of the government policies was rather the groups of merchants, big leaseholders, and intellectuals who were able to participate actively in the urban and capitalist development of the principality. In this respect, the case of Teleorman County is telling, since at the time it was one of the most urbanized Wallachian counties. On the other hand, the Bulgarophone population easily entered the dense fabric of social and economic relations created by the vertical stratification of the landowners, land workers, and rural dwellers and also by the horizontal relationships of the large landowners. This population was made up of “common people” hired as tenants or simple agricultural workers and individuals engaged in land-related commercial and ownership relations. Particularly in the second half of the nineteenth century, this latter group became significant landowners who often hired members of the Bulgarophone population, either locals or migrants coming from the far side of the Danube. The motives brought forward by the novel economic relations gave rise in the first half of the century to collective projects undertaken by the Bulgarophone economic and social elites, such as the project of founding urban centers. This is how the town of Alexandria took shape, creating opportunities which were used by the Bulgarophones in the second half of nineteenth century to forge new adaptation strategies.

Bibliography

Archival sources

DJANG – Arhivele Naţionale ale Romaniei. Direcţia Judeţeană Galaţi/Romanian National Archives. Galaţi County Departament. Fond Inspecţia Fluvială/River Inspection Fund

DJANTr – Arhivele Naţionale ale Romaniei. Direcţia Judeţeană Teleorman/Romanian National Archives. Teleorman County Departament. Fond “Paraschiv Noica”/ “Paraschiv Noica” Fund

Newspapers

Alegătorul liber / Free elector, National Liberal Party journal, Alexandria, 1905.

Jos reacţiunea / Down with reaction, National Liberal Party journal, Turnu Măgurele, 1889–1901.

Vedea, Conservative Party journal, Alexandria, 1893–1898.

Secondary sources

Brătulescu, Victor. “Maiorul Mişa Anastasievici.” Revista istorică 11, no. 10–12 (1925): 274–77.

Catalina, Ilie. Oraşul Alexandria (judeţul Teleorman). Monografie (1834–1934) [Alexandria town (Teleorman county). Monography (1834–1934)]. Bucharest: Graiul Românesc, 1935.

Chefani-Pătraşcu, Steluţa. Moşieri teleormăneni (1864–1949). Mărire şi decădere [The big landowners of Teleorman: Aggrandisement and decay]. Bucharest: Renaissance, 2011.

Cristea, Stan V., Ecaterina Ţânţăreanu, and Dumitru Avram. Alexandria. Monografie. Alexandria: Teleormanul liber, 1994.

Davidova, Evguenia. Balkan Transitions to Modernity and Nation-states: Through the Eyes of Three Generations of Merchants (1780s–1890s). Leiden–Boston: Brill, 2013.

Diculescu, Vladimir, Sava Iancovici, Cornelia Papacostea Danielopolu, and Mircea N. Popa. Relaţiile comerciale ale Ţării Româneşti cu Peninsula Balcanică (1829–1858) [Wallachian commercial relations with the Balkan Peninsula]. Bucharest: Editura Academiei RSR, 1970.

Donat, Ion, Ion Pătroiu, and Dinică Ciobotea. Catagrafia obştească a Ţării Româneşti din 1831 [The Wallachian fiscal census in 1831]. Helios: Craiova, 2000.

Filitti, Ion C. “Arhondologia Munteniei la 1822–1828” [The Wallachian boyars ranks, 1822–1828]. Revista istorică 15, no. 4–6 (1928): 138–54.

Gane, Constantin. Neamurile Mavrodineşti din Ţara Românească şi Moldova [The Mavrodins in Wallachia and Moldova]. Bucharest: Frăţia Românească, 1942.

Geleleţu, Mihai. Aspecte ale tradiţiei bulgare la Alexandria – Teleorman [Aspects of the Bulgarian tradition in Alexandria – Teleorman]. Bucharest: Comunitatea “Bratstvo” a Bulgarilor din România, 2000.

Georgescu, Pandele. Dicţionarul geografic, statistic, economic şi istoric al judeţului Teleorman [The geographical, statistical, economic, and historical dictionary of Teleorman county]. Bucharest: Tipografia I.V.Socec, 1897.

Georgescu, Vlad. Istoria ideilor politice românesti: (1369–1878) [The history of the Romanian political ideas]. Munich: Ion Dumitru Verlag, 1987.

Gherman, Stelian. “Inginerul Corneliu Casassovici (1886–1961), industriaş, fondator al învăţămîntului superior de textile în România” [The engineer Corneliu Casassovici (1886–1961), entrepreneur, founder of the high education of the textile industry in Romania]. Noema 9 (2010): 388–420.

Guţan, Manuel. Istoria administraţiei publice locale în statul român modern [The history of local public administration in the modern Romanian state]. Bucharest: All Beck, 2005

Hardi, Tamás. “Spatial structure and urban types of the Danubian areas.” Problems of Geography 38, no. 1–2 (2013): 59–73.

Iancovici, Sava. “Din legăturile lui Miloş Obrenovici cu Ţara Românească” [The relations of Miloş Obrenovici with Wallachia]. Romanoslavica 5 (1962): 163–79.

Iancu, Andreea Roxana. “Stingerea familiei boiereşti şi strategii de salvare la începutul secolului al XIX-lea în Ţara Românească: Studii de caz” [The extinction of the boyar families and recovering strategies at the beginning of the nineteenth century in Wallachia: Case studies]. Revista istorică 15, no. 3–4 (2004): 179–200.

Iancu, Andreea Roxana. “Defining the Patrimony: Name, Lineage, and Inheritance Practices (Wallachia at the beginning of nineteenth century).” In Wealth in the Ottoman and Post-ottoman History. A Socio-Economic History, edited by Evguenia Davidova, 50–70. London–New York: I.B.Tauris, 2016.

Kosev Dimitar, Virzhinija Paskaleva, and Vladimir Diculescu. “Despre situaţia şi activitatea economică a imigraţiei bulgare în Muntenia şi Oltenia în secolul al XIX (până la războiul ruso-turc din 1877–1878” [About the economic situation and activity of the emigrated Bulgarians in Wallachia and Oltenia in the nineteenth century (until the Russian–Turkish 1877–1878 war)]. In Relaţii româno–bulgare de-a lungul veacurilor XII–XIX. Studii [The Romanian–Bulgarian relationships from the twelfth to the nineteenth centuries]. Vol. I, collective edition, 253–82. Bucharest: Editura Academiei RSR, 1971.

Liiceanu, Gabriel. Jurnalul de la Păltiniş [The Păltiniş diary]. Bucharest: Cartea românească, 1983.

Mladenov, Maxim, Nikolai Jechev, and Blagovest Njagulov. Bulgarite v Rumunija. XVII–XX v: Materiali i dokumenti [Bulgarians in Romania, from the seventeenth to the twentieth centuries: Materials and documents]. Sofia: Akademichno Izd. Marin Drinov, 1994.

Molnár, Monika F. “Borders of the Ottoman Empire: Theoretical Questions and Solutions in Practice (1699–1856).” In Regions, Borders, Societies, Identities in Central and Southeast Europe, 17th–21st Centuries: Collected Studies, edited by Penka Peykovska, Gábor Demeter, 34–44. Sofia–Budapest: Prime Rate Kft, 2013.

Nica, Marian. Studiu monografic complex al comunei Băbăiţa, judeţul Teleorman [The monographic study of Băbăiţa commune, Teleorman county]. Alexandria: Tipoalex, 1999.

Noica, Nicolae Şt. Neamul Noica [The Noica family]. Bucharest: Cadmos, 2009.

Nour, Antonian. Istoricul oraşului Alexandria [The history of Alexandria]. Turnu Măgurele: Institutul de arte grafice Lumina Teleormanului, 1927.

Pascal, Ion C. Carte de hotărnicie a unei părţi din moşia Ţigăneşti-Calomfireşti [The topographical plan of a part of the land property Ţigăneşti-Calomfireşti]. Bucharest: Tipografia Curţii regale, 1902.

Pascal, Ion C., Carte de hotărnicie a unei părţi din moşia Vităneşti, comuna Măgura, plasa Câlniştea, judeţul Vlaşca, proprietatea dlui. Grigore I. Noica [The topographical plan of the land property Vităneşti, Câlniştea administration, Vlaşca county. Owner Mr. Grigore I. Noica]. Bucharest: Tipografia Curţii Regale, 1904.

Pătrănescu, Marin. Monografia comunei Buzescu, judeţul Teleorman [The monography of Buzescu commune: Teleorman county]. Râmnicu-Vâlcea: Editura Antim Ivireanul, 2004.

Penelea-Filitti, Georgeta. Les foires de la Valachie pendant 1774–1848. Bucharest: Editura Academiei RSR, 1973.

Popescu, Anca. “Ester au XVIe siècle – nouvelles contributions.” Revue des Études Sud-Est Europeénes 50, no. 1–4 (2012): 191–202.

Roman, Louis. “Aşezări de bulgari şi alţi sud dunăreni în Ţara Românească (1740–1834)” [The settlements with Bulgarians and other South Danubian migrants in Wallachia (1740 – 1834)]. In Relaţii româno–bulgare de-a lungul veacurilor [The Romanian–Bulgarian relationships along the centuries]. Vol. 2, collective editor, 126–43. Bucharest: Editura Academiei RSR, 1984.

Romanski, Stojan. Bulgarite vuv Vlashko i Moldova: Dokumenti [Bulgarians in Wallachia and Moldova: Documents]. Sofia: Durzhavna Pechatnica, 1930.

Sachelarie Ovid, and Nicolae Stoicescu (eds.). Instituţii feudale din Ţările Române: Dicţionar [Feudal institutions in the Romanian Principalities: A dictionary]. Bucharest: Ed. Academiei RSR, 1988.

Siupiur, Elena. Bulgarskata emigrantska inteligentsija v Rumunija prez 19 vek [Bulgarian intellectual emigration in Romania during the nineteenth century]. Sofia: Izdaltelstvo BAN, 1982.

Siupiur Elena. Intelectuali, elite, clase politice moderne în sud estul european : Secolul 19 [Intellectuals, elites, and modern political groups in Southeastern Europe: Nineteenth century]. Bucharest: Domino, 2004.

Staicu, Ion N. Aşezările judeţului Teleorman: Originea, denumirea şi progresul lor [The settlements of Teleorman county: Origin, name, and their progress]. Turnu Măgurele: Tipografia Gheorghe I. Mitu, 1939.

Stănescu, Ion Al., and Iulian F. Preda. Licuriciu: Monografie. Alexandria: Tipoalex, 2007.

Stroescu, Petre. Oraşul Roşiorii de Vede. Alexandria: Tipografia Alecsandri, 1933.

Sturdza, Mihai Dim. Familiile boiereşti din Moldova şi Ţara Românească: Enciclopedie istorică, genealogică şi biografică [The boyar families in Moldova and Wallachia: Historical, genealogical, and biographical Encyclopedia]. Vol 2. Bucharest: Simetria, 2007.

Şerban, Stelu. “Obrazat na bulgarite v mestnite vestnitsi ot regiona Teleorman, Rumunija, 1878–1908g. Konstruirane na natsionalna drugost v edin periferen rajon” [The image of the Bulgarians in the Teleorman local press, Romania, 1878–1908. Construction of the national ‘otherness’ in a peripheral area]. In Šišmanovi dni 2012, edited by Lozanka Peicheva, 235–49. Sofia: Akademichno izdatelstvo Marin Drinov, 2013.

Trajkov, Veselin, and Nikolaj Jechev. Bulgarskata emigratsija v Rumunija, XIV vek–1878 [Bulgarian migration in Romania, fourtheenth century–1878]. Sofia: Izdatelstvo nauka i izkustvo, 1986.

Velichi, Constantin. “Bulgares, Serbes, Grecs et Roumains dans le mouvement revolutionnaire de Brăila de 1841.” Romanoslavica 1 (1958): 237–60.

Velichi, Constantin. “Emigrarea bulgarilor în Ţara Românească în timpul războiului ruso–turc din 1806–1810” [The Bulgarian migration in Wallachia during the Russian–Ottoman war, 1806–1810]. Romanoslavica 8 (1963): 27–57.

Velichi, Constantin. “Emigrarea bulgarilor din Sliven în Ţara Românească în anul 1830” [The Bulgarian migration from Sliven in Wallachia in 1830]. Romanoslavica 10 (1964): 289–314.

Velichi, Constantin. “Emigrări la nord şi la sud de Dunăre în perioada 1828–1834” [Migrations at the north and south of the Danube between 1828–1834]. Romanoslavica 11 (1965): 67–116.

Velichi, Constantin. “Bulgarii din Ţara Românească participanţi la revoluţia burghezo-democratică din 1848” [Bulgarians in Wallachia participating in the 1848 revolution]. In Relaţii româno–bulgare de-a lungul veacurilor XII–XIX. Studii [Romanian–Bulgarian relationships from the 12th to 19th centuries. Studies]. Vol. 1, collective edition, 253–82. Bucharest: Editura Academiei RSR, 1971.

Veliki, Konstantin. “Materiali ot rumunski arhivi za bulgarskite emigranti vuv Vlashko (1831–1855)” [Sources from Romanian archives about Bulgarian immigrants in Wallachia (1831–1855)]. Izvestija na durzhavnite arhivi 64 (1992): 233–66.

Veliki Konstantin, and Veselin Trajkov. Bulgarskata emigratsija vuv Valahija sled rusko–turskata vojna 1828–1829: Sbornik ot dokumenti [Bulgarian emigration in Wallachia after the 1828–1829 Russian–Turkish war: Collection of documents]. Sofia: Izdatelstvo na BAN, 1980.

Mobile Elites: Bulgarian Emigrants in the Middle of the Nineteenth Century and the Accommodation of Difference in the Balkans

Ana-Teodora Kurkina

Graduiertenschule für Ost- und Südosteuropastudien, Universität Regensburg

This article addresses the issue of accommodating difference through an analysis of a specific group of mobile public actors who can be defined as “mobile elites.” Using the Bulgarian emigrants in the middle of the nineteenth century as a typical case of an exiled elite, I link this case to other European Romantic intellectuals and sketch a grand-scale scheme of regional traffic in ideas. I suggest that emigration as such instigates the consolidation of nationalist elites. Thus, elites can be viewed as large, separate, and often mobile groups, which negotiate their respective interests and search for compromises.
I contend that mobile public actors influence the societies in which they dwell by creating sets of networks which stretch over the whole region. The notion of “mobile elites” can therefore be a helpful tool in defining emigrant intellectuals. Furthermore, the activities of these intellectuals shed light on the ways in which migrant groups seek accommodation, pursue their political aims, and attempt to find compromises which can eventually yield beneficial outcomes.

Keywords: migration, elite theory, social networking, Bulgarian nation and state-building, Georgi Rakovski, Hristo Botev, othering.

In 1877, Ivan Ivanov, the head of the “Society for the spread of education among the Bulgarians,” wrote a letter to Ivan Aksakov, a prominent Russian Slavophile, discussing the destinies of the many Bulgarian volunteers employed by the Russian Army in the Russian-Turkish war. These men were mostly young and active individuals living scattered in Romania and Serbia. Ivanov mentioned that these migrant-volunteers (around 200 people) were paid 15 rubles a day, which assured their wellbeing and covered most of their needs. Yet, these men became a highly problematic group to accommodate when they lost this income, leaving them in foreign lands without legitimate means of supporting themselves. Ivanov contended that “[m]any of them are incapable of work.”1 They were primarily “hajduks,” i.e. outlaws, and their lifestyle preferences hardly coincided with the grand-scale nation and state-building ideas cherished and preached by the mobile ideologists, who sought their cooperation.

Bulgarian vagabonds who found temporary or permanent shelter in Romania, Serbia or Russia represent a typical case of migrants who were led and coordinated by a cohort of intellectuals. The ideologists were a different type of migrants altogether: they were organizers involved in mediating relations between their compatriots, the Great Powers, and the host states in which they lived. They were emigrants, but their position was different from that of their less prominent peers in a number of subtle ways which made their voices convincing and their ideology significant to the local governments, their followers and even their opponents. Nevertheless, the reality of migration united them with a much larger mass of their misplaced compatriots.

Migration is a notion that refers to a wide array of mobile people, often ignoring the fundamental differences between various groups of individuals who are considered migrants. However, different clusters of migrants have different patterns of movement which cannot all be brought together under one umbrella term. Therefore, in this article, I explore a case of the accommodation of a foreign group by several host states. In other words, I am examining the case of an emigrant elite involved in what Joep Leerssen describes as “the cultivation of culture”2 and intellectual and artistic creativity. The issue emerges in the wake of population movements and remains vital in the process of negotiating difference in the Balkans, a region contested by the authors of multiple state-and nation-building projects during the long nineteenth century and beyond. Furthermore, the discourses initiated and perpetuated by the mobile elites persisted well beyond the nineteenth century, leaving their imprints on the ideologies, paths, and propagandistic strategies of their later adherents.

When examining the case of mobile elites, one can present them as arguably the most influential group of migrants, a group that has potential power to influence their less-engaged compatriots.3 Because of their ideological activities, the mobile elites can be regarded as a link between migrants and host states. I suggest that these elites can either facilitate or hamper the accommodation of their peers into a foreign society, while relying mostly on their vast social networking and knowledge exchange.4 I analyze the ways in which these networks function by examining the example of the Bulgarian mid-nineteenth-century emigrants in Serbia, Romania, and Russia.

Building on Bernhard Giesen’s theory regarding intellectual elites which generate national communities,5 I use a comparative approach to differentiate groups of mobile ideologists from their less involved compatriots and to investigate the potential sway of their arguments among their respective national groups. Moreover, an analysis of the writings of the mobile elites offers an opportunity to trace their interconnections and follow their state-building plans, some of which later influenced regional politics. While many projects turned out to be wildly unsuccessful, most of them had lasting consequences. Lyuben Karavelov became an apostle of Balkan federalism for the future generations of socialists from the region.6 Hristo Botev claimed the place of a national Romantic poet, whose influence on Bulgarian literature crossed over into politics. Georgi Rakovski became an ideological symbol for the future generations of the Balkan politicians, and one could list many other similar examples.7

The emigrants who left Bulgaria in the middle of the nineteenth century represent a typical case of an exiled elite that can be linked to other European nationalist intellectuals (such as the post-1849 Hungarian emigrants). They can be viewed as a large, separate, transnational group, which negotiated its national interests and searched for compromises. Although they did not necessarily contribute to the economic development of their host states, they initiated and influenced the regional traffic in ideas, promoting and cultivating their national culture and state-building aspirations.

I begin by analyzing the concept of mobile elites and examining how the multiple identities of migrants can facilitate the accommodation of their national group in a host state or influence the politics within the borders of their own country. The second section of my essay deals with the networking systems developed and sustained by the emigrants and their methods of transmitting information that influenced their societies and those of others. It also addresses the idea of a common space shared by the European Romantic elites, which enabled them to promote their state-building and nation-building ideas and defend the rights of their respective groups internationally. The final section explores the impact of the mobile elites on their peers and host-societies and examines how the extent of this impact was determined by their active networking, lack of resources, or proposed goals.

Mobile Elites and Their Troublesome Identities: Refugees, Emigrants, Exiles, and Romantic Heroes

The term “migrant” encompasses people with dramatically diverse lives, political views, and destinies. The story of the protagonists of the current article is not different. The nineteenth-century Bulgarian revolutionaries whose destinies have been thoroughly studied by researchers and iconised by their descendants comprised only a tiny share of all the Bulgarian migrants living in the Romanian cities of Brăila or Bucharest or settled in Odessa or Belgrade.8 One thinks of penniless hajduks and rich merchants when dealing with people who moved for economic or political reasons.

While most inquiries “encompass theories about the motivations for migrations, about how migration is shaped by local, regional, and international economies,”9 as well as other important interdependencies, the classification of migrants as such remains a topic only rarely addressed. And yet, in addition to the economic outcomes associated with migration, one should also address the ways in which certain groups can influence and determine how their peers and they themselves integrate into a foreign society.10 Those who form a mobile elite constitute an entirely different group within the existing community of migrants.

Although “well-integrated migrants can become ‘nearly one of us’ (but never completely so), whilst the ‘underserving’ are seen as ‘too different’, as an impediment and, indeed, at times, as a threat to a sustainable society,”11 the cases of mobile elites demonstrate another picture. Moreover, that picture is paradoxical. The protagonists of the current inquiry belonged to a group of Romanticist intellectuals, and as members of this group they shared more with one another than they did with their regular compatriots. In fact, it was the reality of political emigration that forced the nineteenth-century elites to acknowledge and later exploit regional political situations, searching for allies for themselves as individuals and for their groups.

The Bulgarian mobile elites often repeated the strategies adopted by their Polish, Hungarian, and even Romanian predecessors. The defeat of the Hungarian revolution and the fall of a short-lived Hungarian state in 1849 created a cohort of brilliantly educated individuals who chose the path of emigration.12 Pushed out of the Habsburg Empire, these individuals had to reconsider not only their relations with the former host state, but also their relations with fellow minorities and their strategies of accommodation.13 They had to become diplomats and mediators who negotiated with the elites of the states which hosted them. A complicated web of interconnections stretched from one cohort of emigrants to another. Hungarian emigrants became acquainted with the Romanian “fourty-eighters” and Polish emigrants in Paris. The Romanian exiled ideologists (including the future prime minister of the Danubian Principalities, Ion Brătianu), were later the ones to accept the Bulgarian emigrants into their state.

What unites all these outstanding individuals and their less prominent compatriots was the reality of their exile. The Polish community of outstanding “cultivators of culture” in Paris and its much less notable peers shared the same experiences, but they shared them differently. Mobile elites were a thin layer of the privileged (due to their education, social status etc.), holding power in accordance with elite theory.14 They were intellectual elites who happened to be in exile. Their social capital had greater significance than that of their regular compatriots. Most of them profited from their imperial background to some extent, preserving the connections they had gained in their respective empires (as was true in the case of Prince Adam Czartoryski, for instance). Yet they were shrewd enough to formulate their subsequent political stances in accordance with the general Romanticist trends. Their political Romanticism came from cultural Romanticism,15 which in its turn made them primarily European romanticist nationalists, whose approaches, if not possible state-building plans, did not differ significantly.

Emigrant elites, like regular migrants, use their connections as important sources of social capital consisting essentially of “social networks and the associated norms of reciprocity and trustworthiness.”16 Yet networks often transcend the bounds of local communities,17 becoming links that bind together different ideologists, who exchange ideas and aspire to win one another’s support or debate with one another. Through networks, the elites rely on social resources that are accessible through one’s direct or indirect ties.18 While social resources exert a significant effect on the attained statuses, they can also be transferable. It is through those resources that the emigrant elites managed to become a part of a nationalist Romanticist intellectual group and simultaneously remain within their smaller community, originating among the aspiring minorities. The public sphere they addressed, however, transcended that modest group.

“Public sphere initially emerged as a powerful counterweight to traditional forms of political authority, inserting itself between the private life of the family and the arcana imperii of the early modern state apparatus,”19 so the identities of the Bulgarian mobile elites can be analyzed through that connection. They were, on the one hand, private and confined to their own circle. On the other hand, they were or aspired to be part of a larger community of European intellectuals. Since “individuals become integrated in groups through processes of recurrent social interaction and communication,”20 emigrants’ publications facilitated cooperation. However, it was effective information exchange that made the works of the public actors and their organizational and unifying abilities operational. They exchanged information and created links between their community and that of their host states.

Before the Russian-Turkish War of 1877/78, cohorts of Bulgarian revolutionaries found shelters in neighboring Serbian and Romanian lands or opted for further destinations like Russia.21 The colonies they formed became outposts, where nation-building and state-building ideas were exchanged, conceived, and promoted. In a biographical note dedicated to Georgi Sava Rakovski, an ever-roaming emigrant, a revolutionary and a notable ideologist of Bulgarian liberation, Veselin Trajkov stresses Rakovski’s unique position as a truly international revolutionary ideologist.22 Like Rakovski, who became one of the minds behind a number of Bulgarian revolutionary societies, branching out in the Balkans, notable poet Hristo Botev was also one of the emigrant ideologists involved in promoting his national cause.23 What unites these individuals, except for their causes, debated, but often shared, is their experience of migration and their elite statuses.

Ivan Vazov, acclaimed writer and an emigrant in his youth, a representative of a younger generation of the Bulgarian intellectuals, published a novel and a theatre play featuring a romanticized version of the events of his turbulent youth. As outcasts living on the banks of the Danube after the failed attempts to liberate their nation from the Ottoman Empire, the protagonists led miserable lives. In the beginning of his novel, Vazov notes, “Romania offered them hospitality, but a type of hospitality that an empty shore gives to sailors, tossed out by the storms, shattered and broken. They were in a society, yet they were in a desert.”24 Vazov’s accounts should be understood as a romanticized version of the events, much like many of the subsequent memoirs and descriptions of the lives of the propagandists of the Bulgarian revival. In his Memoirs of the Bulgarian Uprisings: Eyewitness’ Reports. 1870–1876, Zahari Stoyanov tells similar polished stories of noble fighters for freedom and the hardships they had to endure.25

Even the revolutionaries who could hardly be considered ideologists left memoirs, in which they presented themselves as heroes fighting for the liberation of their respective nations. Panayot Hitov, for instance, started out as an outlaw in the Balkan Mountains only later to become one of the most prominent figures in the Bulgarian revolutionary movement.26 While Hitov was initially a hajduk and hardly an ideologist, the emigrant destinies of Hristo Botev, Lyuben Karavelov, or even the instigator of revolutions Georgi Rakovski did not differ significantly. During his exile in Romania, Botev shared space with the acclaimed national hero Vasil Levski, and lived in a windmill in the outskirts of Bucharest.27 Judging by the accounts of several of these public actors, one may wonder whether they can be considered “elites” and, if yes, how their identities can be fully defined.

The border between an ideologist and an outlaw is truly delicate, and arguably more delicate in the Bulgarian case than in any other. Romanticist elites as such represented a group of individuals who contributed to their national causes while forging or attempting to forge political cooperation, publishing their ideas, and spreading these ideas within and beyond their circles. In order to transmit a political statement, they needed to make it attractive and worthy of association both for their compatriots and for the agents in the host states. A “mobile elite” thus could not be a closed group. Mostly emigrant intellectuals tried to widen their club in a desperate search for support.28

While the earlier cases of the Polish emigrants are remarkably similar to their Bulgarian followers, they bear one significant difference.29 The Bulgarian intellectuals were almost all poor, of humble descent, and relatively unknown (initially) in the foreign circles, while the Polish elite included a number of rather famous, rich, or noble individuals. Hungarian post-1849 emigrants represented a similar pattern, although often featuring notable modest protagonists. Similarly, the Romanian exiles in Paris were overwhelming brilliantly educated and often rich noblemen.30 While in the long run, these social differences could easily be obscured by the strategy chosen by a given individual (the quantity and quality of publications and one’s active attempts to engage the public actors in the host state and the home state mattered), they initially posed obstacles for the career of a public actor. Lajos Kossuth was a “mere low-nobleman from Upper Hungary,” lacking the bright social standing of many of his peers,31 and he had to create a freedom-fighter reputation for himself rather than rely on the already existing financial and political power of his name or family. Many other Hungarian, Romanian, and Polish exiles, on the other hand, had the leverage that he lacked. Alexandru Golescu, for example, a rich Romanian noble and an emigrant in Paris, enjoyed a number of privileges derived from his status, which allowed him immediate entry into the higher circles of French social life.32 That was certainly not the case of Georgi Rakovski, who constantly had to struggle to win the recognition of the Russian, Serbian, or Romanian authorities.

Prominent nineteenth-century Bulgarian intellectuals had merchant or low-middle class backgrounds. Most of them had been educated in the Greek circles of the Ottoman Empire or in Russia.33Many opted for schools based in the Danubian Principalities or chose the institutions offered by the Ottoman Empire to their newly-groomed elites. Some of them would later continue their pursuit of knowledge in the West. Through the mixture of their Ottoman background, partially European education, local experiences, and connections to Western political ideals (including Kantian perceptions of a possible European world order) they reached fellow-intellectuals in Romania, Serbia, Russia, and Greece. Their destinies were not too different from the destinies of the intellectuals in the Habsburg or Russian Empires.34 Their orienteers lay in the West or in Russia. They wanted to belong to the circle of European intellectuals that encompassed foreign elites, yet they were not necessarily seen as such in their host societies. Nevertheless, the attempts of the Bulgarians to establish connections with the elites of their host states resembled the attempts of their Polish and Hungarian predecessors. They tried to engage the local agents who were either interested in their cause or shared some of their goals.35

The Bulgarian emigrants longed for international connections. In a typography in Bucharest, Botev enjoyed the company of a Polish emigrant named Henryk Dembicki (who was the illustrator of a journal published by Botev), a Russian emigrant named Nechaev, and a number of Romanian socialists.36 Nevertheless, his Bulgarian identity was never in question. He, like many of his compatriots, believed himself to be a representative of the Bulgarian nation, of which he had a rather romanticized and dramatized idea. Yet his connections to a diverse circle of intellectuals he had met in Romania shaped his vision of the Balkans. In 1875, Botev, addressing the publications of the Serbian newspapers regarding a possibility of a Serbian-Bulgarian union, wrote that any such idea had to be based on “the freedom of nations, personal freedoms, and free labor.”37 He therefore linked progressive European ideals of the time to the destiny of his nation. He published abroad and phrased his statements with the intention of giving them universal appeal, understandable not only to his revolutionary compatriots, but to the Serbian and Romanian elites. Botev, therefore, reconciled his identity as a Bulgarian and a revolutionary with that of an emigrant and a Romantic poet.

Romanian exile became a leitmotiv in the memoirs, letters and publications of the Bulgarian emigrants that was destined to create links between the intellectuals of the two countries in the middle of the nineteenth century. In July 1868, Kazakovich, a Bulgarian from Alexandria, wrote to one of the most prominent Bulgarians in Bucharest, Ivan Kasabov, that Romania offered the Bulgarian youth every opportunity for education and that teacher Hristo Zlatovich had been granted rights by the authorities to educate the local Bulgarian children to “feel Bulgarian even if they were born in Romania.”38 In 1869, in an article published in the newspaper Svoboda, Lyuben Karavelov called Romania “the Second Switzerland,”39 a sort of a bastion of liberty and culture. Overly idealistic federalist Karavelov certainly was not striving to give an adequate description of his host state. Rather, he sought to promote the links that could facilitate the accommodation of his fellow emigrants. His accounts were meant to explain to the local Bulgarian public that one could easily be Bulgarian in Romania. Moreover, he wished to convince them that both Romania and Bulgaria could benefit from the activities of the émigré communities in the long run.

The presence of the Bulgarian intellectuals in Romania brought not only the like-minded Romanian elites to them, as was true in the case of the connections between Rosetti and Botev. It also resulted in a number of coordinated publications that were intended to influence the mutual perceptions of the local public and the exiles. Such was the Buduchnost-Viitorul journal, published by Georgi Sava Rakovski. In an article published in 1864, he called Romania a “free and inviolable asylum,”40 where he could continue his political activities (although Rakovski’s whole destiny was marked by troubles caused by the authorities of the states in which he resided), remain Bulgarian, and become an internationally acknowledged intellectual, a multi-lingual regional agent, a prominent publicist, and a revolutionary.

It was a mixture of romanticism and mobility that made exiled elites exhibit a number of coexisting identities. “Exile” added flavor to a national cause, romanticizing it, while “emigration” was often associated with hardships and lack of acceptance. Mobile elites, paradoxically, embodied both. They were the people who often turned their “hardship” into romanticized banners to brandish in front of the public. They did not exhibit a singular identity, but encompassed several, often turning their rhetoric to the universal values of “progress and freedoms.” For example, Levski referred not simply to the “Bulgarian nation,” its interests, and displaced or mistreated Bulgarians, but rather to a “sacred and pure republic.”41 Universal romanticist values surpassed the standard agenda of being Bulgarian and appealed to wider audiences.42 The journals published by the emigrants often addressed the public in their host states (as was true in the case of Viitorul), tackling the issues that the Balkan nations might have in common. Highlighting shared burdens and goals rather than differences, the mobile elites created ideological links that could facilitate the acceptance of their compatriots by the foreign states. Furthermore, they mostly relied on their revolutionary networks to increase their influence on the foreign public.

Mobile Elites and Their Networking Systems: People with a Thousand Voices

As Deborah Rice points out, “[t]he original source of all social cohesion lies in interpersonal networks that emerge once two or more individuals perceive or experience a common ground between them.”43 The creation of that common ground and the avoidance of possible dangers was one of the key factors that determined the strategies adopted by the mobile elites. Too crude and active involvement, like in the case of Rakovski or Hitov, could create problems with the local authorities. Rakovski was convinced that foreign help was needed in order to create a viable Bulgarian nation-state in one form or another.44 His attempts to forge an alliance with the Greeks in 1840s and later in 1860s proved fruitless, as did his attempts to instigate a revolt in Brăila in 1841.45 The revolt was quickly put down by Prince Ghica, who valued peace with the Ottoman Empire more than he did friendly relations with the Bulgarian revolutionaries.

In the 1860s, Rakovski settled in Belgrade, where he once again attempted to find common goals with several prominent Serbian politicians. For a time, he managed to attract Michael Obrenovich to his cause.46 In Serbia, Rakovski started publishing his Danubian Swan, a journal aimed primarily at promoting the independence of the Bulgarian Exarchate from Constantinople and the emancipation of the Bulgarian nation.47 A vast array of interconnections is reflected in numerous organizations established by Rakovski and his compatriots outside of Bulgaria. Rakovski’s attempts to coordinate revolutionary activities in Serbia failed, and the legion that was supposed to liberate Bulgaria from the Ottomans was disbanded. Yet many of the volunteers assembled by Rakovski remained under the influence of his authority.

Most of these revolutionary networks relied on the tolerance of the local governments and the possibility of establishing a dialogue. In 1869, Dimitar Obshti invited Panayot Hitov to Brăila, assuring him that he did not have to worry about the local authorities, since they had connections with the local merchants. He wrote: “After having seen me, the merchants in Brăila asked about you, wondering why you would not come and what they can do to assist you.”48 In this case, personal connections turned into international connections that facilitated the intricacies of travel. The local merchants sustained personal or trade relations with the exiles. The emigrants promoted their political agendas and engaged their fellow revolutionaries with the help of the local intermediaries, whose ethnic backgrounds rarely mattered. Their ideological orientation played a more significant role.

Nevertheless, the attitudes of the emigrants could change quickly. Rakovski is only one of many examples of radically shifting opinions. He had initially regarded the Russian Empire as a savior of his nation, but within a decade he had changed his opinion dramatically.49 The emigrants living in Russia, on the other hand, had to adapt to the circumstances there, attempting to forge relations with prominent politicians and intellectuals whom they could attract to their side.

During his life in Russia, Lyuben Karavelov published a book consisting entirely of the dramatic tales about the lives of simple Bulgarians under the “Turkish yoke.”50 Written in Russian, the book first appeared in print in Moscow. While it is difficult to reflect on the volume’s overall popularity, the mere fact that it was published (with an optimistic dedication to the Russians who believed in common Slavic ideals and to whom Bulgarian lives mattered) offers testimony to the activities of a mobile intellectual, who attempted to forge connections with his peers in a host state.

The mobile elites persisted through communication, and this communication assured not only their success, but also opportunities for their peers to integrate. Karavelov hoped his book would be read by the Russian public, which would eventually feel compassion for his compatriots and the fate of his motherland. Similarly, the Bulgarian students in Petersburg wrote to Nikolay Ignatiev, a prominent Russian statesman and one of the architects of the favorable San-Stefano Treaty of 1878, asking for further assistance: “Your Excellency has justly drawn the borders of the San-Stefano Bulgaria, creating an ideal for the current and future generations of our nation.”51 The letter conveyed a message similar to that of Karavelov’s stories published in Russian. It was a hopeful acknowledgement of a connection, even if it might have been overstated, an attempt to gather support for a national cause. The Bulgarian students hoped to offer an example of Bulgarians in Russia, something that could attract public attention to their cause and influence the portrayal (preferably positively) of their compatriots in the Russian public sphere.

The important trait of emigrants in the eyes of their host societies is their deceiving “homogeneity.” The Polish romanticist emigrants (most prominently Chopin and Mickiewicz) made their nation a hit in France, much as Kossuth and Pulszky introduced the idea of a Hungarian nation to the West.52 Decades before, the protagonists of the Greek revival accomplished a similar goal for their nation, starting a wave of Philhellenism that enveloped all sides of European cultural life, including art and literature.53 What united these different people was their double status, i.e. that of an emigrant and that of a mobile intellectual. The Bulgarian elites had their share of successes as well, although on a smaller scale. The presence of the Bulgarian emigrants in Russia and the activities of the various Slavic societies inspired Ivan Turgenev to create a poem dedicated to the massacres in Bulgaria.54 Turgenev’s “Croquet at Windsor” was based on the aftermath of the April Uprising, while his famous novel On the Eve became a testimony to the stories of the Bulgarians living in Russia. On the Eve features a Bulgarian protagonist who was loosely modeled on a real emigrant, a student of Moscow State University.55 Migrants, intellectuals, and regular refugees provoked compassionate responses, which was precisely their intention.

Russian Slavophiles sought contact with the Balkan Slavs, and often their attempts were met eagerly by the Balkan public actors, including those residing in Russia.56 Furthermore, these mobile elites created symbolic capital for their compatriots, since a significant number of them were turned into national heroes, praised by both their peers and future generations. Vasil Levski became the epitome of a freedom fighter, used and abused in Bulgarian politics up to the present day,57 much like Lajos Kossuth and a long list of other European national heroes.58

Scrutinizing their lives, one may wonder what made precisely these individuals reference points for their fellow-intellectuals and followers. While there was certainly a vast array of different factors that contributed to an individual’s fame, including personal qualities and skills, mobility and a cohort of skillful chroniclers remained an important catalyst for the emergence subsequently of a reputation as a revolutionary. Zahari Stoyanov thoroughly documented the paths to Bulgarian liberation in his monumental work. Kossuth, for example, not only left volumes of writings in different languages himself, but also became a prominent figure in the memoirs of his peers.59 Vast informational networks united these intellectuals, turning some of them into chroniclers, others into heroes, and some into both. Thus, the methods they used to transmit information that could leave a lasting impact were rather straightforward. They presented themselves as truly transnational figures, although always highlighting their background, and they sought like-minded individuals in their host states with whom they attempted to engage (not always successfully). They tailored their ideas to the general Romanticist views and political trends of the epoch, and they actively published and spread the works of their compatriots and fellow revolutionaries. Thanks to their louder voices, they assumed the roles of “national representatives,” claiming to protect the interests of their fellow emigrants and their compatriots.

Mobile Elites and Their Political Impact: Failed Connections?

Empires often served as links that bound various public actors together: they offered career opportunities, regulated many aspects of their citizens’ lives, and, subsequently, assured a communication space that facilitated the exchange of ideas between various public figures.60 The emigrant revolutionaries in the Ottoman, Habsburg, and Russian Empires relied heavily on these imperial interconnections to curry support for their causes. Rakovski, Botev, and Karavelov all actively engaged in publishing journals and brochures. They hoped to address a wider audience, though their circle was relatively narrow.

Lyuben Karavelov published his apologetic remarks regarding federative ideas, mostly with the intention of attracting his co-nationals and involving foreign public actors. Criticizing the Greeks’ “favorable” relations with the Ottoman Empire, he wrote in the journal Svoboda, “[i]t becomes clear that the South Slavs and Romanians are more despised by the Greeks than the Mohammedans. Therefore, the Greeks resemble Hungarians, who like them, wish to create vast and powerful states without people.”61 Given the emigrants’ precarious relations even with their mobile fellows and local governments, their disappointed criticism of potential partners was justified. They sought connections, but their attempts to establish meaningful links failed more often than they succeeded.

The Bulgarian Secret Central Committee is one of the examples of a Bulgarian-Romanian collaborative effort that did not endure. The organization emerged in 1866 with several prominent Romanian liberals backing it.62 Subsequently, the prominent public actors of the organization forced Alexandru Ioan Cuza to abdicate, severely damaging Romanian relations with the Ottoman Empire. Following the events, Bulgarian elites living in Bucharest seemed resourceful allies to the Romanian liberals. Although Rakovski himself was not prone to cooperate with the liberals, another prominent emigrant, Ivan Kasabov, was eager to oblige. Kasabov hoped to further the outbreak of a Bulgarian revolt on Ottoman territory through the cooperative endeavor.63

The “Holly Coalition,” which was the result of this temporary alliance, had to ensure a full-fledged Balkan uprising with the subsequent establishment of a Balkan federative state. The Romanian side seemed eager to forge contacts with the emigrant revolutionaries, offering them funds in return for their military support. While the Bulgarian emigrant leaders had to ensure the participation of their compatriots in the affair, they established connections with the leaders of the host state. However, the alliance was short-lived. Following the restoration of Ottoman-Romanian relations and the election of Charles Hohenzollern as a new Romanian sovereign, cooperation with the Bulgarian emigrants in support of their cause ceased to be profitable for the Romanian side.64

Thus, most of the enterprises initiated by the Bulgarian mobile elites yielded little success.65 Nevertheless, after the emergence of the Bulgarian Principality, many of the emigrant’s ideas found new meaning in the policies of a newly-formed Bulgaria. In 1886, Prince Alexander Battenberg suggested a Romanian-Bulgarian alliance similar to the Austro-Hungarian Compromise, a union that represented a way of improving the political statuses of both nations, heavily based on the ideas expressed by the Bulgarian emigrants, who had once lived in Romania.66 Furthermore, in a letter to Alexandru Sturdza, Battenberg reflected on the “brotherly hospitality” granted the Bulgarian exiles in Romania, something the prince considered an important foundation for strengthening the connections between the two nations.67

The emigrant elites offered solutions to the irredentist problems arising in Bulgaria and in their former host states. Nevertheless, most of their projects were either overly idealistic or were simply never really accomplished. With the appearance of the Bulgarian Principality, the former emigrants changed their goals and returned to Bulgaria. Some had accomplished careers in the new state (like Bulgaria’s distinguished prime minister, Stefan Stambolov), yet others perished before the signing of the treaty of Berlin (for instance Georgi Rakovski, Levski, and others). However, the patterns established by the mid-nineteenth-century emigrants persisted.

In 1902, a Bulgarian emigrant association from Macedonia in Ruse sent a letter to count Ignatiev. This time, a different cohort of emigrant elites was attempting to forge alliances and act as their group’s voices. These public actors not only adopted the strategies of their predecessors, the emigrants of the Bulgarian revival, but also relied on their experiences in addressing Ignatiev.

In their letter, the emigrants implored the count to come to their aid and use his influence to improve the position of all the Bulgarians:

Raise once again your powerful voice and proclaim that the Bulgarians from Macedonia and Odrin deserve support and political freedom, that the time has come for the sufferings of these slaves to end. The voices of these doomed ones make us mourn them, and we must meet with you, Your Grace, our dear and precious guest, with grief and sorrow.”68

Among the multiple addresses sent to Ignatiev by the emigrants, there was a series of remarkable attempts to connect the causes and views of the emigrants with those of the statesman.69 The Bulgarian public actors would allude to a common Slavic sentiment and the shared legacy of Orthodoxy, and they also mentioned the Greek threat and the “chimerical idea of a Byzantine Empire” that allegedly haunted the Greek rivals of the Bulgarian nationalists.

One of the reasons emigrant elites tended to be vocal in promoting the national causes lies in their precarious position. They depended on the good will of the officials of the host states, and they were either welcomed or considered a dangerous element. Under these circumstances, the existence of the Bulgarian legions in Serbia, the flourishing cultural life of the Bulgarian emigrants in Odessa,70 their revolutionary networking in the Danubian Principalities, and even their pursuit of studies in Russia were always at risk. Careful navigation within the complicated web of social networking was necessary for the mobile elites. They searched for ways to promote their respective national causes, and they served as voices for their fellow emigrants, who, even unwillingly, were often associated with their loud and proud representatives. Often the consequences of their careless actions could be projected upon the whole group of migrants. The mobile ideologists were perceived not only as prominent public actors promoting the Romanticist cause of national emancipation, but also as “others.”

The balance between those two aspects depended on both the actions of the elites and the political circumstances in which they lived. Many of the former emigrants and their associates became genuinely important links between their respective group and the foreign powers. Stoyan Zaimov, a public figure and writer, is one such example. Decades after the Russian-Turkish War of 1877/78, Zaimov received a message from Petr Agatev, a Russian friend, who thanked him for his hospitality and guidance during his visit to Bulgaria, expressing his wish to popularize the cause of the “Tsar-liberator” committee in Russia. Agatev wrote, “I send you my sincere gratitude for the commemoration of the deeds and the preservation of the memory of our soldiers perished in Bulgaria.”71 The connections established years before the Balkan Wars had their impact on the lasting relations between various factions, including the links between the local intellectuals.

Conclusion: Emigrants, Intellectuals, Visionaries?

Mobile elites represent a specific stratum of migrants that has the important function of mediating relations between their peers and the host states, influencing both simultaneously. Mobile elites target prominent public figures in their host states, engaging them in the creation of projects and plans that have the potential to reshape the political balance in a region. Mobile intellectuals get involved in local politics, while attempting to promote the agendas of their group. Furthermore, they attempt to bind their group’s wellbeing with that of the host state, assuring their group’s integration. When their activities are aimed at national liberation and similar causes, they promote peaceful existence and political unions with their host states.72

While most of the mobile mid-nineteenth century agents can be regarded as typical political emigrants, they belonged to a much larger club of European intellectuals, sharing and discussing the ideas of Mazzini or Kossuth and receptive to the latest political trends not only in their respective region, but abroad. Their connections to the Western space of political ideas made them international figures, often with equal fame. However, they were not simply international intellectuals, but agents who were instrumental in accommodating their migrant peers, who were less vocal in foreign societies. While mobile intellectuals never ceased being emigrants, willingly or not, they represented the entire group of migrants. While this particularity often determined the actions of the elites, it also granted them a rare opportunity to speak as voices of their nation. Thus, they subsequently influenced their own societies by creating future reference points, such as memoirs and chronicles of their own actions and those of their fellow emigrants.

In 1868, Hristo Botev wrote,

...[i]f the whole of the Bulgarian nation rises, Serbia and Montenegro surpass their borders and the Bosnians and Herzegovinians put down their weapons before Andrassy’s second proclamation the (Eastern) question will be solved and the freedom of the Balkan peninsula will be assured. Isn’t this the era we are entering now?73

His multiple publications addressed a diverse public. Botev targeted his fellow emigrants and people who might have shared his goals and beliefs in the foreign countries. He reflected on the destinies of the peoples of the Balkan peninsula, looking at the streets of Bucharest and attempting to define his own place in the state that hosted him and could become a worthy ally in the future. He was Bulgarian, yet he was a Romantic poet like his Romantic European counterparts, having more in common with Petőfi or Mickiewicz than with an uneducated peasant in the Balkan Mountains. He managed to walk on the edges of identities and to fit into two groups and influence not only Bulgarian literature and political thought, but also the societies in which he dwelled. While many emigrants failed (sometimes miserably) to achieve their immediate goals (uprisings, revolutions, etc.), they offer a keen researcher a pattern of accommodation that is seldom acknowledged. Their activities had impacts that transcended their own time and sent messages to future generations.

Bibliography

Archival sources

Bulgarian Historical Archives (БИА). Fond 87, arh. ed. IIА 8431.

Bulgarian Historical Archives (БИА). Fond 154, arh. ed. 6.

Central State Historical Archives (ЦДИА). Fond 1325 К, opis 1, arh. ed. 25.

Central State Historical Archives (ЦДИА). Fond 820, opis 1, arh. ed. 7.

The state archive of the Russian Federation (ГАРФ). Fond 730, opis 1, ed. hr. 74.

The State Archive of the Russian Federation (ГАРФ). Fond 1750, оpis 2, ed. hr. 36.

The State Archive of the Russian Federation (ГАРФ). Fond 730, opis 1, ed. hr. 79.

The Archive of the Romanian Ministry of Foreign Affairs (Arhiva M.A.E). Vol. 198, dosar 21.

Secondary sources

Adzhenov, Ivan. Svedeniia i zapisi za zhivota na Georgi Sava Rakovski pocherpnati iz ustmennite negovi raskazi, sâshto i iz mnogobroinite mu suchineniia, koito prigotviha pochva za politicheskoto osvobozhdeniie na bulgari [Materials and sources related to the life of Georgi Sava Rakovski discovered through his oral tales and his many compositions, which prepared the soil for the political liberation of the Bulgarian nation]. Ruse: Tipo-Hromo Litografiia na Drobniak I Krâstev, n.d.

Anthias, Floya, and Mojca Pajnik. “Contesting integration-migration management and gender hierarchies.” In Contesting Integration, Engendering Migration: Theory and Practice, edited by Floya Anthias and Mojca Pajnik, 1–13. New York: Palgrave McMillian, 2014.

Bade, Klaus J. Migration in European History. Malden, MA: Blackwell Pub., 2003.

Batakovic, Dusan, Milan Protic, Nikola Samarzic, and Aleksandar Fotic. Histoire du Peuple Serbe. Paris: L’ Age de l’ Homme, 2005.

Botev, Hristo. “Samo razumniyat i bratskiyat soyuz mezhdu narodite shte unishtozhi teglilata.” [Only a reasonable and brotherly union of the nations will destroy opression]. Zname 1, no. 14 (1875).

Botev, Hristo. Pulno subranie na suchineniyata. Vol. 3. Statii po politicheski i obshtestveni vuprosi [Complete works. Articles about political and social issues]. Sofia: Knizharnica Nov svet, 1940.

Bottomore, Tom. Elites and Society. London: Routledge, 1993.

Jianu, Angela. A circle of friends: Romanian revolutionaries and political exile, 1840–1859. Leiden: Brill, 2011.

Brettell, Caroline. “Theorizing migration in anthropology. The social construction of networks, identities, communities, and global scapes.” In Migration Theory: Talking across Disciplines, edited by Caroline B. Brettell and James F. Hollifield, 161–83. New York: Routledge, 2007.

Brunnbauer, Ulf. “Der Balkan als translokaler Raum. Verflechtung, Bewegung und Geschichte.“ Südosteuropa-Mitteilungen 51, no. 3 (2011): 78–94.

Buchen, Tim, Rolf Mate. “Eliten und ihre imperialen Biographien.” In Eliten Im Vielvolkerreich, Imperiale Biographien in Russland Und Osterreich-Ungarn (1850–1918), edited by Mate Rolf and Tim Buchen, 3–32. Munich: De Gruyter Oldenbourg, 2015.

Buchenau, Klaus. “Religionen auf dem Balkan.” In Der Balkan: Ein Handbuch, edited by Uwe Hinrichs, Thede Kahl et al, 191–214. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2014.

Burmov, Alexandar. Taen Tsentralen Bulgarski Komitet: Obrazuvane i purvi period ot razvitieto mu [The Bulgarian Secret Central Committee: its’ formation and the first period of its development]. Vol. 2. Sofia: Bulgarskata Akademiya na Naukite, 1974.

Case, Holly. “The Strange Politics of Federative Ideas in East-Central Europe.” The Journal of Modern History 85, no. 4 (2013): 833–66.

Constantinescu-Iaşi, Petre. Din activitatea lui Hristo Botev şi a altor revoluţionari bulgari din Bucureşti [From the activities of Hristo Botev and other Bulgarian revolutionaries in Bucharest]. Bucharest: Ed. Acad. Republicii Populare Române, 1950.

Deák, István. The lawful revolution: Louis Kossuth and the Hungarians. 1848–1849. New York: Columbia University Press, 1979.

Dénes, Iván Zoltán. “Reinterpreting a ‘Founding Father’: Kossuth Images and Their Contexts, 1848–2009.” East Central Europe 37, no. 1 (2010): 90–117.

Doynov, Stefan. Bulgarskoto natsionalno-osvoboditelno dvizhenie 1800–1812 [The Bulgarian movement of national liberation 1800–1812]. Sofia: Bulgarskata Akademiya na Naukite, 1979.

Drumev, Vasil. Suchinenia. Vol. 2. Kritika. Publicistika. Rechi. Pisma [Compositions. Critics. Journalism. Speeches. Letters]. Sofia: Bulgarski Pisatel, 1968.

Elsner, Benjamin. “Does Emigration Benefit the Stayers? Evidence from EU Enlargement.” Journal of Population Economics 26, no. 2 (2013): 531–53.

Emden, Christian, Midgley, David. Beyond Habermas: democracy, knowledge, and the public sphere. New York: Berghahn Books, 2013.

Giesen, Bernhard. Die Intellektuellen und die Nation: Eine deutsche Achsenzeit. Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp, 1993.

Hitov, Panayot. Moeto putuvane po Stara Planina [My journey in the Balkan Mountains], edited by Alexandar Burmov. Sofia: Hemus, 1940.

Hitov, Panayot. Kak stanah haydutin: familiarni zabelezhki [How I became a hajduk: familiar notes]. Sofia: Otechestvo, 1982.

Iordan, Alexandru. “Primul ziar bulgaro-român ‘Bădăşnost-Viitorul’.” Viaţa Românească 32, no. 7 (1940): 3–16.

Isabella, Maurizio. Risorgimento in exile: Italian Emigres and the Liberal International in the Post-Napoleonic Era. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.

Karavelov, Lyuben. “Koyto iska chuzhdoto, toy izgubva i svoeto.” N.p.: n.p., n.d.

Karavelov, Lyuben. Stranici iz knigi stradaniy bolgarskogo pelmeni [Pages from the book of the Bulgarian sufferings]. Moscow: Universitetskaya tipografiya Katkov i ko. na Strastnom bulvare, 1868.

Kasabov, Ivan. Moite Spomeni ot Vazrazhdaneto na Bulgariia i Revoliucioni Idei [My memories about the Revival of Bulgaria and revolutionary ideas]. Sofia: Sineva, 2009.

Kiossev, Alexandar. “Legacy or legacies. Competition and conflicts.” In Europe and the Historical Legacies in the Balkans, edited by Raymond Detrez and Barbara Segaert, 49–69. Brussels: Peter Lang, 2008.

Leerssen, Joseph Theodoor. National Thought in Europe: A Cultural History. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2006.

Lengyel, Tamás. A Magyar emigráció és a nemzetiségek Világos után [Hungarian Emigration and the Nationalities after Világos]. Budapest: Apollo, 1938.

Lin, Nan. “Social Networks and Status Attainment.” Annual Review of Sociology 25, no. 1 (1999): 467–87.

Lyulyushev, Marin. Prosvetnoto delo na bulgarskata emigratsiya v Rumuniya prez Vuzrazhdaneto [The enlightenment legacy of the Bulgarians emigration in Romania during the Revival]. Sofia: Nauka i izkustvo, 1986.

Mineva, Emilia. Istoriko-filosofska mozaika ot 19 vek [The historical-philosophical puzzle of the nineteenth century]. Sofia: Proektoria, 2015.

Morgan, B. S. “Social Geography, Spatial Structure and Social Structure.” GeoJournal 9, no. 3 (1984): 301–10.

Peckham, Morse. Romanticism and ideology. Hanover: Wesleyan University Press, 1995.

Pulszky, Ferenc. Életem és korom [My life and my times]. Budapest: Franklin, 1884.

Putnam, Robert. “’E Pluribus unum’: Diversity and Community in the Twenty-first Century.” Scandinavian Political Studies 30, no. 2 (2007): 137–74.

Rakovski, Georgi Sava. Preselenie v Rusiya ili ruskata ubiystvenna politika za bulgarite: Predislovie ot Zahari Stoyanov [The resettlement to Russia or Russia’s malign policy towards the Bulgarians: Introduction by Zahari Stoyanov]. Sofia: Skoropechatnica na K.T. Kushlev, 1886.

Rice, Deborah. “Governing through networks: A systemic approach.” In Network Theory in the Public Sector: Building New Theoretical Frameworks, edited by Robyn Keast and Myrna P Mandell, 103–18. New York: Routledge, 2014.

Roessel, David. In Byron’s Shadow: Modern Greece in the English & American Imagination. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2002.

Ryan, Louise, Rosemary Sales, Mary Tilki, and Bernadetta Siara. “Social Networks, Social Support and Social Capital: The Experiences of Recent Polish Migrants in London.” Sociology 42, no. 4 (2008): 672–90.

Spira, György. Kossuth és alkotmányterve [Kossuth and his constitution plan]. Debrecen: Csokonai kiadó, 1989.

Stoenescu, Alex Mihai. Istoria Loviturilor de Stat în România [History of coups d’état in Romania]. Vol. 2. Bucharest: Editura RAO 2001.

Stoyanov, Zahari. Zapiski po bulgarskite vustaniya: Razkaz na ochevidci [Notes about the Bulgarian uprisings: The eyewitnesses’ stories]. Vol. 1–3. Sofia: Bulgarski pisatel, 1977.

Strashimirov, Dimitar. Istoriya na Aprilskoto Vustanie [The history of the April Uprising]. Sofia: Akademichno Izdatelstvo Prof. Marin Drinov, 1996.

Todorova, Maria. Bones of contention: the living archive of Vasil Levski and the making of Bulgaria’s national hero. Budapest: CEU Press, 2009.

Tóth, Heléna. “The Historian’s Scales: Families in Exile in the Aftermath of the Revolutions of 1848.” The Hungarian Historical Review 1, no. 3–4 (2012): 294–314. 

Traykov, Veselin. Rakovski i Balkanskite Narodi [Rakovski and the Balkan nations]. Vol. 2. Sofia: Bulgarskata Akademiya na Naukite, 1971.

Traykov, Veselin. Georgi Stoykov Rakovski: Biografiya. [Georgi Stoykov Rakovski: A biography]. Sofia: Bulgarskata Akademiya na Naukite, 1974.

Turgenev, Ivan. Polnoe sobranie sochineniyi pisem: Sochinenia [The complete collection of compositions and letters: Compositions]. Moscow–Leningrad: Izdatelstvo nauka, 1967.

Undzhiev, Ivan, Undzhieva, Cveta. Hristo Botev – zhivot i delo [Hristo Botev – his life and legacy]. Sofia: Nauka i izkustvo, 1975.

Vazov, Ivan. Nemili, nedragi [Unloved, uncherished]. Sofia: Bulgarski pisatel, 1974.

Wellman, Barry. “The community question: The intimate networks of East Yorkers.” American Journal of Sociology 84, no. 5 (1979): 1201–33.

Zahra, Tara. “Imagined Noncommunities: National Indifference as a Category of Analysis.” Slavic Review 69, no. 1 (2010): 93–119.

God Brought the Hungarians: Emigration and Refugee Relief in the Light of Cold War Religion

James P. Niessen

Rutgers University

The ample literature on the Hungarian refugee crisis of 1956/57 has focused on its diplomatic and political aspects, mentioning the role of religions and faith-based organizations only in passing. This study seeks to address this lacuna by focusing on religion as an element of the Cold War, a motive for emigration, and an organizing framework for refugee relief. The chronology begins with the end of World War II. Austria, the country of first asylum, and the United States, the dominant financier and resettlement country, are the primary geographic focus. Reflecting the preponderance of Catholics in the Hungarian migrants’ population, special attention is given to Catholic Relief Services, though Jewish aid organizations and the World Council of Churches are not neglected.

Keywords: religion, Hungarian refugees, Catholic Relief Services, World Council of Churches, Camp Kilmer

Current interest in the refugee phenomenon has inspired valuable new research on the Hungarian refugee crisis of 1956/57. The crisis was the focus of several panels at the 1956 and Socialism conference in Eger in September 2016, and it was the theme of an issue of the journal Világtörténet published several weeks later.1 Authors have rightly pointed out the role of the Cold War conflict in determining the defeat of the Hungarian Revolution, the flight of 200,000 citizens to Austria and Yugoslavia, and their warm reception and, for the most part, fairly rapid resettlement. There are many worthwhile publications in Hungarian, German, and English about the international and local aspects of this crisis.2

Historians have generally mentioned religious factors only in passing. In this essay, I call attention to several non-government archival collections which few historians have consulted, and I examine the phenomenon of Cold War religion, Hungarian religious identity as a motivating factor in the decision to emigrate, and above all the role of faith-based relief organizations. The chronological frame begins in the immediate postwar period, providing the prehistory of the Hungarian crisis before focusing on the aftermath of the Revolution. The politics and resolution of the crisis were international, but Austria and the United States played unique roles and receive most of my attention. Nearly all the refugees who left Hungary in 1956/57 and earlier came through Austria, where they were granted initial asylum and the opportunity to settle, repatriate, or travel onward. The United States proved the most popular destination of resettlement for both economic and political reasons, and ultimately the United States accepted more refugees than any other country. The United States was also decisive in the financial, political, and organizational resolution of the refugee crisis of 1956/57.

Religious persecution had led to many earlier waves of emigration in the history of Europe. This was especially the case in early modern Europe, and indeed it was fundamental to the establishment of Geneva in Switzerland as the center of international humanitarianism. Three centuries after Geneva provided a home and ecclesiastical center for Calvinist fugitives, it became the birthplace of the Geneva Conventions (1864–1949) for the treatment of non-combatants in wartime, the International Committee of the Red Cross, the League of Nations, and, after World War II, the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) and many related agencies.3

Cold War Religion

One of the important memory sites for Hungarian Americans and historians of the refugee crisis of 1956/57 no longer exists today: Camp Kilmer in Piscataway, New Jersey. The closed army camp was reactivated in November 1956 as the central reception center for Hungarian refugees to the U.S., and in five months received more than 32,000 of them. Americans greeted the new arrivals with banners and signs bearing the inscription: Welcome [to America], in English and in Hungarian. A Hungarian in Camp Kilmer explained to Eileen Egan of Catholic Relief Services: “The words mean, in our way of expressing it, ‘God brought you.’ That is ‘Isten Hozta.’ You say this to guests whom you welcome gladly.”4 The Hungarian phrase appears in at least one decidedly unreligious context in American political history: President Bill Clinton employed it as a toast welcoming President Árpád Göncz in 1999, and he claimed it had appeared on streamers welcoming exiled statesman Lajos Kossuth to New York in 1851.5 We do not know the intention behind the use of the Hungarian phrase during the Hungarian crisis, but it will serve here as a gateway into a discussion of the ways in which religion and politics overlapped at the time.

The Chairman of the President’s Committee for Hungarian Refugee Relief, Tracy S. Voorhees, is at the center in both government photos below. In the photo on the right, he is welcoming a refugee ship in Brooklyn, and in the photo on the left he is at Camp Kilmer. The others appear to be exclusively American officials. Voorhees was very attentive to the impact of public image: he wanted the world to see the contrast between humanitarian America, with its peaceful use of the military, and Soviet oppression. The reference to God would have been invisible to most Americans, but it was not lost on the Hungarians (the text in the photo, “Isten hozott,” is the same phrase as the phrase cited above, “Isten Hozta,” but using the informal form of address in Hungarian). God was missing in Communist Hungary’s public discourse, but was prominent in that of contemporary America.

East European Communists persecuted religion both on ideological grounds and in order to eliminate autonomous centers of resistance. This pattern was important for the emerging association in the West of anti-Communism with religious identity. The nexus of the Cold War and religion in the U.S. has attracted the attention of much recent scholarship. Dianne Kirby writes in her contribution to the Cambridge History of Christianity: “The concept of the Cold War as one of history’s great religious wars, a global conflict between the god-fearing and the godless, derives from the fact that ideology, based on and informed by religious beliefs and values, was central in shaping both perceptions of and responses to the USSR.”6 The Jewish conservative Will Herberg argued in his popular 1955 book Protestant, Catholic, Jew: An Essay in American Religious Sociology that American ethnic history had evolved toward a common “framework,” “the American way of life.”7 He went on to claim that this framework might even be seen as a jointly held religion. The American theologian Reinhold Niebuhr wrote in 1960 that Communism’s threat was stymied “by the historical dynamism of the Judaeo-Christian tradition.”8

This was America, where politicians’ declarations of faith still respected the strict separation of churches and state. But what about Europe? Pope Pius XII had been cautious in his stance toward the Third Reich in World War II, arguably because of the dangers posed to the Church in occupied Europe and to the Vatican itself. Communism posed no such existential threat to the Vatican, though in postwar Italy it was a serious political threat. The Pope’s encyclical denouncing contemporary atheism, Anni Sacri (1950), did not name Communism or the Soviet Union, but it left no doubt about the Pope’s view of Soviet religious policy. The emerging Christian Democratic parties, while they grew out of the Catholic political tradition of protecting the weak and favoring a mixed economy, shared the American condemnation of Communism and support for the Atlantic alliance. They generally had the support of religious leaders in these stances.9 The Holy See rejected Communism even more strongly than did West European political leaders. Its decree of July 1949 stated that “Catholics who ‘profess, defend or propagate’ communist doctrine should be excommunicated as apostates.”10

The dominant status of the Catholic Church in Austria was governed by the formally still valid Concordat of 1933, which had been suppressed by the Third Reich and subsequently restored, but not recognized by the Austrian socialists. European governments typically contributed to the financial support of the churches, but rarely interfered in their administrative decisions.11 In the U.S., the homeland of Cold War religion, religious organizations supported themselves solely through private donations.

Religion and the Refugee Relief Agencies

Both in North America and in Western Europe, the churches supported agencies for the care of the disadvantaged members of society that organized hospitals, food assistance, and missionary activity, both at home and abroad. Of greatest impact were the Catholic agencies, the National Catholic Welfare Conference-Catholic Relief Service in the U.S. and Caritas in most European countries. Protestants and Jews had analogous organizations.

These agencies were engaged in refugee relief, and not only in their home countries. Both Hebrew and Christian scripture stipulates that the faithful should practice hospitality and compassion to strangers in their midst. The Book of Exodus recounts an escape from slavery to freedom and asserts: “You shall not oppress an alien; you well know how it feels to be an alien, since you were once aliens yourselves in the land of Egypt” (Exodus 23:9). The Gospel of Matthew recounts the Holy Family’s flight into Egypt, and Luke recounts Jesus’ parable of the Good Samaritan and concludes with the admonition to “go and do likewise.” The Acts of the Apostles downplay the importance of borders and preach the common humanity of people, regardless of ancestry. Christians and Jews don’t always observe these principles, but the principles inspire their refugee relief activity.12

Jewish mutual aid and Christian missions signaled the entry of the U.S. onto the international humanitarian scene in the late nineteenth century. As the country entered World War I in 1917, its government encouraged the mobilization of religious organizations to meet anticipated humanitarian needs. The massive population movements of World War II created an even greater challenge for armies and a role for non-governmental agencies. The leaders of the advancing Allied forces, especially in the U.S. Army, realized that they needed help. It was natural that they turned to the International Committee of the Red Cross and its national affiliates. The religiously based agencies were more diverse, but the spiritual dimension enabled them not only to raise funds rapidly (at which the Red Cross was very adept), but also to mobilize a broadly based network of agencies and communities for volunteer work. The need and opportunity created a conundrum in American law, however: in view of the separation of church and state, what would be the nature of the collaboration between the government and the religious agencies? The solution was to create on the one hand a federal office to accredit the NGOs (the prevailing term was voluntary agencies) and, on the other, a private organization consisting of these accredited agencies, which would coordinate their work and interface with the government. The private organization, established in 1944, was the American Council of Voluntary Agencies for Foreign Service (ACVAFS). A central principle of the ACVAFS was the primacy of service over sectarianism. The Committee on Migration and Refugee Affairs rapidly became the ACVAFS’s most active component.13

European countries faced less of a challenge in coordinating the voluntary agencies because they had a history of financial and political involvement in the churches. Organizations analogous to the ACVAFS arose in all West European countries in the immediate postwar years, and they were themselves coordinated beginning in 1948 by the Standing Conference of Voluntary Agencies Working for Refugees.14

The chief religiously based agencies that were engaged on behalf of refugees were those of the Catholics, the Jews, the Lutherans, the Quakers, and the World Council of Churches.

The Catholic agencies in most countries bore the name Caritas and operated under the authority of diocesan bishops, but with a national federation for coordination. In the wake of World War II, the American counterpart would soon dwarf each local Caritas in its resources. During the war, it assumed the name War Relief Services-National Catholic Welfare Conference, renamed Catholic Relief Services (CRS-NCWC) in 1955. The CRS established offices in most European countries at the end of the war, both to distribute food and clothing but, increasingly after 1948, also to coordinate resettlement into third countries. A board of American archbishops and bishops met periodically in Washington, DC to oversee the WRS/CRS, and it was encouraged in its work by the Holy See. The coordinator of all of the activities of the CRS in Europe was a Catholic layman and former religious brother from New Jersey, James J. Norris.15

Pope Pius XII promulgated his apostolic constitution Exsul Familia Nazarethana [The Exiled Family from Nazareth] in 1952 to affirm the compassionate concern of the Church for migrants, including the practice of appointing missionary priests for migrants of their own nationality. The document placed the newly founded International Catholic Migration Commission (ICMC) in a historical and doctrinal context.16 The ICMC, led for the first ten years of its existence by Norris and based in Geneva, would coordinate aid to migrants by country-based agencies, organize international conferences on the subject, and publish a journal entitled Migration News beginning in 1951.17

Two major agencies and then the newly emerged State of Israel were the principal sources of Jewish relief. The American Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) worked largely to aid Jewish communities in place, while the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS) was older, not as well funded, and focused largely on migrants and resettlement. In light of anti-Semitism and the Holocaust, the relief work of these agencies relied less on scriptural injunctions than on fundamental solidarity.18 Zionism and resettlement in Israel were less of a concern for these organizations than they were for the Jewish Agency, which was formed in Palestine before the establishment of the State of Israel and then supported by the new state afterwards.

The World Lutheran Federation (WLF) served to bring together the variants of this denomination, which reflected various organizational and doctrinal solutions in their respective countries. The Evangelisches Hilfswerk was an important Lutheran relief organization for postwar Germany and Austria, where the initial focus of refugee relief was on the eleven million German expellees from the East. The American branch of the WLF serving refugees was the Lutheran Relief Service, LRS.

The humanitarian engagement of the Quakers was of long standing, and organized in the twentieth century as the Friends Relief Service and its American arm, the American Friends Service Committee (AFSC). Reflecting the relatively small membership of this denomination, the AFSC engaged with needy communities of all religious and ethnic backgrounds.

Ecumenical activists inspired the eventual foundation of the World Council of Churches (WCC) in Geneva in 1948, whose arm for refugee relief was Church World Service. The WCC’s membership included most Protestant and Orthodox churches and often worked closely with the Lutherans and Quakers. Roland Elliott of Church World Service wrote about his encounter with Hungarians at the border with Austria: “I have seen the face of Jesus Christ, as His Church is struggling to meet this tragic and heroic situation...we have the privileged responsibility of opening our homes to those who come to the U.S.A.”19 The words of Gaither P. Warfield, the Director of the Methodist Committee for Overseas Relief, may adequately summarize the thinking of many Protestants. He wrote in 1958 that “Christian charity says that needy people, even panhandlers, are personalities, loved by God and precious in his sight.”20

The Catholic Church was not a member of the WCC, and the anxiety of some Catholic leaders about CWS contact with Catholic migrants helped inspire the establishment of the ICMC. Norris, whose Catholic piety and doctrinal orthodoxy were never in doubt, was quite happy to collaborate with his non-Catholic counterparts. I found no evidence that his clerical superiors in the CRS had a problem with this. Indeed, he had a good working relationship with the Holy See’s Deputy Secretary of State, Msgr. Montini, the later Pope Paul VI.

Two accounts of the refugee work of the CRS and WCC during the 1950s by Edgar H.S. Chandler and Eileen Eagan reveal significant similarities in these organizations’ service to migrants around the world. Chandler, the Director of the WCC’s Refugee Service and President of the Standing Conference of Voluntary Agencies Working for Refugees in 1959, was an American Congregationalist. In his view, the refugee worker was a sort of missionary, but one with a “soul on fire” to help one’s fellow human in need, anywhere and regardless of nationality and denomination. His 1959 account of the WCC’s refugee work only occasionally mentions the religion of WCC staffers and their clients around the world.21 Egan was a long-time staffer of the CRS. She wrote, “Thomas Merton recalls to us that we will find Christ in the rejected, the refugee ‘for whom there is no room.’ We will only find Christ if we find room for the forsaken ones in our heart.”22 Egan’s book only rarely mentions the WCC, and Chandler’s the CRS. It may be that these groups represented different fundamental attitudes toward social service. In the view of Edward Duff, the Catholic approach was more communitarian, while that of the Protestants was predicated on the faith of the individual.23 By analogy, the Protestant and Orthodox churches organized themselves on an explicitly national basis. The WCC, however, was no less international than the Catholic Church.

According to Allied and Soviet estimates, each bloc was caring for roughly seven million displaced persons (DPs) in September 1945. Repatriation and resettlement of many of these people took place over the course of two years under the auspices of the United Nations, but the task of providing care for migrants in place fell principally on the voluntary organizations. The expulsion of Germans from Poland, Czechoslovakia, and Hungary by 1947 increased the unsettled population in occupied Germany again, and again the volunteer organizations were needed. Two new categories of migrants moved westward into Central Europe in 1946–48: Jewish survivors and opponents of the emerging Communist regimes. We will now turn to these groups as they relate to Hungary.

The Hungarian Refugee

The number of non-Jewish DPs from Hungary in the western occupation zones at the end of the war has been estimated at 112,000, of which 16,000 had been repatriated by September 1945.24 118,000 DPs from Hungary were registered in Germany in 1949.25 Many DPs were politically conservative, including adherents of the last wartime Hungarian government. Hungarian Primate Cardinal Mindszenty encouraged émigré priests to provide spiritual care for Hungarians who remained abroad. The Holy See appointed a former military chaplain who had come to Germany with the retreating Hungarians, Zoltán Kótai, as supervisor of pastoral care for Hungarian Catholics in Germany and Austria, and he served in this position in 1946–50. In January 1946, he reported that 109 Hungarian priests were active in Germany and Austria. The Protestant Hungarians also had their émigré clergy, and in greater numbers than the Catholics, whose bishops urged priests to stay with their parishes in Hungary if possible.26

Jewish survivors of the Hungarian Holocaust were also present among the DPs in Germany and Austria. Scandalously, they were often housed alongside their former German and Hungarian persecutors in the camps, but with a lower caloric ration. An American rabbi in the U.S. Army’s chaplain corps, Abraham J. Klausner, was an early witness to these conditions, and an American Protestant scholar named Earl G. Harrison, the U.S. representative on the Intergovernmental Committee on Refugees, toured the camps with the assistance of the European director of the JDC and wrote a report that was instrumental in rectifying these injustices. 27

A study commissioned by the World Jewish Congress indicated that 165,330 Jews had survived the Holocaust in Hungary and remained there at the end of the war. This figure may not adequately account for changes in borders, migration, and self-identity.28 A wave of anti-Semitic incidents in Hungary during the spring of 1946, more or less tolerated by the police, prompted many survivors to leave Hungary. Financial support from the JDC and World Jewish Congress and the collaboration of the Hungarian National Bank facilitated the resettlement of 15,000 Hungarian Jewish survivors.29 This emigration was part of an international movement and a complex organization known as Brichah, flight, which brought perhaps 250,000 Jews out of Central Europe between 1945 and 1948.30 The total post-Holocaust Jewish emigration from Hungary up to 1956 may have been as high as 50,000. 17,000 Jewish refugees may have gone to Israel and less than half that number to the U.S.31

Aid to Hungary’s religious groups in money and in kind was substantial after the end of the war. The JDC recommenced operation in Hungary at the end of 1944, and it had an office in Budapest from February 1945 until it was forced to close in 1953. The value of support for Hungary during this period is recorded as nearly 50 million USD, prompting a historian to refer to this aid as a “small Marshall Plan for Hungary.”32 The JDC managed to maneuver for years in the complex politics of the anti-Fascist but also increasingly anti-Zionist regime. The CRS was able to open an office in Budapest at the end of 1945, but it had to close it earlier than the JDC, in 1950. Aid to Hungary raised by the American Catholic bishops was small compared to that from the JDC, recorded as 631,600 USD in Hungary in 1947–50.33

The early closure of the CRS office in Budapest reflected the difficult position of the Catholic Church in Hungary, whose combative leader, Cardinal Mindszenty, was arrested in 1949. As was its custom in other countries, the ACVAFS established a committee to coordinate the activity of its member agencies in Hungary, but it only functioned from 1946 to 1948. Its chairman was Henry E. Muller of the Unitarian Service Committee, whose coreligionists constituted one-tenth of one percent of the population according to the 1949 census (Catholics were 70.5 percent, Calvinists 21.9 percent, and Jews 2.7 percent). New agencies joined the committee in 1947, and the agencies’ food and clothing aid reportedly had the support of Prime Minister Lajos Dinnyés, but at its last meeting in June 1948 the members reported that operations in Hungary were becoming increasingly difficult because of the government’s distrust of foreign influence and organizational autonomy.34

The leaders of Hungary’s Christian churches and Jewish community were obliged in 1949–50 to conclude restrictive agreements. Marxist ideology saw no constructive role for religious faith, and the Hungarian regime saw none for clergy or organizations not under its complete control. The nationalization of schools run by the Catholic church removed 4,500 members of religious orders from the classroom. In 1950, 11,000 members of orders were expelled from their residences and 59 orders were abolished.35 Protestant and Jewish schools were also nationalized. Show trials led to the imprisonment of Cardinal Mindszenty, his successor as leader of Hungarian Catholics, Archbishop Grősz, and large numbers of other clergy. Lutheran bishop Lajos Ordass was tried and imprisoned, and Reformed bishops László Ravasz and László Pap were forced out of public life.

Religious order priests whose schools were closed were for the most part deprived of opportunities to serve as priests. Some found placement in the parishes thanks to the support of bishops who were willing to take this risky step, but many left the country illegally. Law XXVI, promulgated in 1950, defined illegal travel abroad as a crime against the state order because it deprived the country of labor and capital and placed the fugitive in the service of imperialist interests and spies.36 More than 70 Jesuits, Cistercians, and Paulines left the country illegally in this period.37 Those accused of assisting illegal emigration were tried and convicted under Law XXVI.

The CRS sponsored the resettlement of hundreds of Catholic clergy from East Central Europe to the U.S. Fr. László Szépe, the coordinator of the priests serving Hungarian refugees in Austria, wrote to the office in New York in 1949: “as our people are gradually emigrating, and a part of them of them is leaving for the United States, some of the clergymen would like to follow them. Would you kindly send me the necessary forms.” The annual report of WRS to its supervisory board for 1951–52 stated that “415 displaced priests from Iron Curtain countries have been brought to US since 1948.”38

Religious congregations in the diaspora were well supplied with new immigrant clergy. For many emigrants, the loss of the homeland, hunger, the uncertainty of life in the DP camps, and then adjustment to a new homeland after resettlement were dispiriting. The Catholic priests’ sense of mission lent purpose and optimism to their segment of the Hungarian emigration.39 In the reports to Hungary’s spy agency, the harmful influence of the “reactionary” clergy on Hungarian emigrants and their hostile attitude toward the socialist order were repeatedly emphasized.40 Religious communities provided an important support network for the recent Hungarian émigrés. To the extent that they had a political orientation, it was indeed decidedly conservative.

International Organizations and Austria in 1956

Three successive agencies of the United Nations coordinated refugee relief on behalf of the international organization beginning in 1943: the United Nations Refugee and Rehabilitation Administration (UNRRA), the International Refugee Organization (IRO), and, beginning in 1951, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). Continuing challenges for these organizations included the international dispute about their purpose and the limited funding placed at their disposal. The status of refugee, defined by the Geneva Convention of 1951, prescribed political or religious persecution in one’s home country as a precondition, and thus excluded many emigrants from international protection. The Soviet Union favored repatriation of emigrants, and resettlement was supported increasingly by the West as an alternative, but subject to the willingness of the receiving country. Another international agency in Geneva, which focused on resettlement and excluded members of the Soviet bloc, was the Intergovernmental Committee on European Migration (ICEM).

The UNHCR relied upon the Red Cross, ICEM, and the voluntary agencies to compensate for its own limitations. The first High Commissioner, the Dutchman Dr. G. J. van Heuven Goedhart, far from taking a rigidly secular stance, recognized the religious motivation of many voluntary agencies as appropriate and valuable. His address at the international Catholic migration congress organized by the ICMC in the Netherlands in September 1954 followed one by Msgr. Edward E. Swanstrom, the Executive Director of WRS. Applauding the American monsignor’s remarks, Goedhart asserted that “the Christian spirit behind the work is the main impetus, the most important impetus, which will lead us to achieve our goal.”41

The goal of refugee relief—resettlement, permanent settlement, or repatriation—was an ongoing challenge for Austria, which received two million refugees after 1945 of whom about 700,000 would eventually remain in Austria.42 Some 114,000 so-called old refugees, 20,000 of them living in camps, remained in Austria on the eve of the Hungarian crisis.43 Some were German expellees for whom the Austrian government took responsibility, while others were non-Germans. Thus the Austrian government, UNHCR, and associated agencies were collaborators of long standing; the UNHCR, ICEM, and the voluntary agencies maintained offices in Vienna, and both the ACVAFS and its Austrian counterpart periodically convened meetings of their affiliated agencies.44 The achievement of Austrian sovereignty by the State Treaty of 1955 increased the government’s ability to address emigrants’ needs by eliminating the division of the country into zones of military occupation and reducing the pressure by the Soviet Union for the repatriation of émigrés. The ruling coalition of the two major parties, ÖVP (the People’s Party, or Christian Democrats) and SPÖ (the Socialists), was united in its support for sovereignty and refugee relief. The ÖVP supplied Austria’s Chancellor, Julius Raab, and Foreign Minister, Leopold Figl, while the SPÖ supplied the Minister of Interior, Oskar Helmer. As we will see, Helmer played a crucial role in the refugee program.

In the spirit of the government coalition, Austria’s Catholic bishops issued a pastoral letter on social concerns criticizing both liberal capitalism and Communism and calling for social solidarity and partnership, with the traditional Catholic preference for local over government initiative.45 The bishops’ letter, dated October 16, 1956, was surely in the minds of many Austrian Catholics on the eve of the Hungarian revolution. The Catholic Archbishop of Vienna, Franz König, called upon his SOS Department and Caritas to collect and distribute donations for Hungarians after October 23. Both the Austrian government and the UN General Assembly called for an end to the fighting and the sending of humanitarian aid to the Hungarian people. The leaders of Austrian Caritas and the WCC delivered a major shipment to Győr on October 31, and convoys of Caritas and the Red Cross made it as far as Budapest. Donations of medicine, food, and clothing from governments and private agencies began arriving in Austria and Hungary by land and air. Archbishop König became co-chair of an Österreichisches Nationalkommittee für Ungarn, which coordinated aid “with the participation of all welfare groups, Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish, public and private.” Fr. Fabian Flynn, the head of the CRS office in Vienna, reportedly led two convoys with ten trucks of supplies to Budapest and personally met Cardinal Mindszenty, but was turned back on a third trip.46 Other religious agencies were similarly engaged.

After the second Soviet intervention on November 4, the aid convoys were no longer able to enter Hungary. There was a new emphasis on refugee relief, which the UN’s General Secretary assigned to the UNHCR. On October 28, when 10,000 refugees had already entered Austria, Oskar Helmer declared that his country would grant asylum to any Hungarian who requested it, without examining individuals’ motives. Fearing much larger numbers would overwhelm Austria, Helmer wired the countries represented in the leadership of the UNHCR and ICEM on November 4 to ask them to pledge donations and accept Hungarians for resettlement.

Religious Agencies Meet the Refugee Crisis in Austria

The UNHCR and ICEM had access to national governments (among which the American government donated more money and material for refugee relief than any other source), but the voluntary societies had the ability to mobilize rapidly and motivate volunteers. As the flow of Hungarians across the largely open Austrian border swelled on 4 November, Helmer called an emergency meeting of König’s committee, and Caritas volunteers began a desperate effort to prepare the former Soviet camp at Traiskirchen. The camp was in terrible shape when the first Hungarians arrived that evening. But many organizations pitched in to get the situation under control. A British Quaker reported:

One sees...all manner of uniforms. A boy scout for instance, suddenly charges up a long flight of stairs; a Catholic priest goes from room to room; a journalist squats on the edge of
somebody’s bed struggling to get a coherent story on to [sic] paper. All have come to help; everybody wants to do something useful, and it is indeed surprising that out of the chaos little miracles of organization do emerge and impossible things do get done.47

Having relatively small communities in the countries of resettlement, the Quakers were given the task of overall coordination of clothing distribution in the camp.

At a higher level, the agency leaders found coordination challenging because of their organizations’ independence, missionary impulse, and the extraordinary emergency they faced and wanted to address without delay. Charles H. Jordan was the JDC’s Director General for Overseas Operations representing the Standing Conference of Voluntary Agencies. He convened agencies in Vienna on the evening of November 5 in hopes of leaving immediately afterwards for consultations in New York, but decided to delay his departure. The ICEM office reported after talking to him that, “[e]ach voluntary agency evidently wanted its own particular empire protected and there was great difficulty to combine ideas and co-ordinate activities,” and “Jordan was thoroughly disappointed with the outcome of the meeting.” ICEM for its part disapproved of the desire of Caritas and CRS to move Catholic refugees out of the camps and into smaller, private facilities. ICEM objected to this and resolved to consult Norris about it.48

The push by the Austrian government for resettlement, to which ICEM, the UNHCR, and member governments were responding, prompted resistance by the voluntary agencies. Helmer and ICEM preferred to keep the refugees in camps as long as they were in Austria so that they could be registered there and communicate promptly with governments about resettlement opportunities. Caritas for its part claimed that many refugees were deciding in favor of resettlement too hastily, under the pressure of the inhumane and demoralizing conditions in the camps and the recruitment efforts of receiving countries. Traiskirchen, it was reported, could provide places to sleep for only three-fourths of its 4,000 residents, and it lacked electricity and running water. Caritas arranged and helped pay (with support from the government) for thousands of refugees to stay in hotels where they could recover from the shock of their life-changing experience, receive counselling about options for employment, resettlement, or even repatriation (“for no one has the right to deny fugitives their homeland forever”), and decide whether they wanted to travel farther or wait for their relatives.49 The program was called Gastaktion, “because Christ comes as guest in the person of the refugee.” Its originator was the director of Vienna Caritas since 1950, Msgr. Leopold Ungar, and it was reportedly imitated by the Evangelisches Hilfswerk, JDC, and the Knights of Malta, another Catholic aid organization, which all created similar programs.50

In the case of the JDC, more was involved than parallel thinking, let alone imitation. According to the JDC Annual Report,

Because Austria had the greatest difficulty in accommodating refugees—in the beginning the camps even lacked basic necessities—the Austrian Government appealed to the population and to voluntary agencies for help. Jewish refugees also found it difficult to be quartered with some antagonistic elements among the Hungarians and [the] JDC thereupon set up a housing scheme for the placement of 9000 refugees in inns, hotels, furnished rooms and small installations.

This was very expensive, and it was gradually superseded by the establishment of two Austrian camps exclusively for Jewish refugees supported jointly by the Red Cross, the Austrian government, and the JDC.51 The provision of kosher kitchens was one consideration, but not the only one, since Orthodox Jews constituted only a minority of the Hungarian Jews.

The religious agencies gave special, but not exclusive, attention to their coreligionists. There were variations in the religious distribution of the refugees in 1956–57 compared to the data in Hungary’s 1949 census. Two surveys by the Austrian government52 of the Hungarians still present in the country in February and October 1957 found the percentage of Catholics consistent with their percentage in 1949, that of the Protestants lower, and that of the Jews much higher:

1949 census53 February 1, 1957 October 28, 1957

Table 1. Religious distribution of Hungarians in Austria

The low percentage of Protestants may be in large part a consequence of the emigrants’ geographic origin. A later analysis of the emigrants by Hungary’s Central Statistical Office provided no religious data, but noted that more than 80 percent of the refugees had a last Hungarian place of residence in Budapest or towns further west, whereas the largest concentration of Protestants was in the east.54 In the case of 365 refugees interviewed by the Columbia University Research Project Hungary (CURPH), whose metadata are searchable online, a preponderance of Catholics and residents of Budapest is observable.55 One may argue, as does András Mink is examining the CURPH findings, that “Western observers...had an obsolete image of an essentially rural and religious Hungarian society and disregarded the urbanization, industrialization and secularization that had been under way [sic] long before the communist takeover.”56 The fact remains that governments and relief agencies, and not only CURPH, attached importance to religious categories.

A modest but significant number of clergy left the country. Of the 365 CURPH interview subjects, seven were identified as Catholic priests.57 Applying the same ratio for the 200,000 56ers would produce a total of 3,836 priests. The leadership of the Jesuits in Hungary voted after the Revolution to send the thirty novices of its province abroad.58 The superior of the Paulines, István Jenő Csellár, had been imprisoned in 1951 for various alleged crimes, including providing assistance for illegal émigrés. Csellár himself joined the exodus after the Revolution, as evidenced by his petition for admission to the U.S. from Austria, along with two other members of his order. He entered the U.S. in July 1957. 59

The percentage of Jewish emigrants was remarkably high relative to their remaining population, which had continued to shrink after 1949 due to legal and illegal emigration. Given the varying criteria for Jewish identity, historians are cautious in their estimates of the number of Jewish 56ers, ranging from 15,000 to 30,000, from one-fifth to one-third of the members of the Jewish population of Hungary who had remained on the eve of the revolution. Jewish survivors in Hungary were understandably anxious about the possibility of an anti-Semitic upsurge, and this, more than the actual incidents during the revolution, may explain the Jewish exodus.60 Fully two-thirds (8117) of the Hungarian citizens granted permission to emigrate legally in the first five months of 1957 emigrated to Israel.61

A high percentage of all the emigrants chose the United States as their desired destination, between 45 percent and 53 percent in the two Austrian surveys.62 More émigrés ended up settling in the U.S. than in any other country, but there were many who, hoping in vain for an American visa, refused to go elsewhere and became demoralized and in some cases suicidal.

The U.S. was as eager as other countries to expedite resettlement, as was urgently demanded by the Austrians, but it faced certain legal limitations unknown to other receiving countries. A provision in the Refugee Relief Act stated that an entry visa required an assurance that the traveler would not become a public charge, and during the period of greatest urgency the voluntary agencies were granted responsibility for assurances based on a quota for their coreligionists. Pierce Gerety, special assistant to the U.S. Secretary of State for refugee affairs, told an emergency meeting of the ACVAFS in November: “The Austrian government wants these people out as quickly as possible.” The committee’s chair, Msgr. Swanstrom, and other agency representatives expressed concern about pressure for rapid action, especially because they did not want to be the ones to decide who would get visas to enter the U.S.63 It was apparently this peculiarity in American procedures that prompted an agreement between the CRS and ICMC according to which the CRS would focus its immigration counseling on movements to the U.S., whereas the ICMC and Caritas would “counsel schemes both inside and outside Europe.”64 Fr. Flynn wrote New York from the Vienna office of the CRS describing the pressure he was under, but he also reported improvement:

Of the thousands of Hungarian Refugees who have already gone to the United States under the emergency and sponsored by CRS I doubt that more than 200 were really thoroughly interviewed. We simply were not given the time [by the Embassy] to do this… Now, as I said before, and thank God, we can act in a more orderly and sensible manner.65

The CRS staff in Austria, bolstered by colleagues from neighboring countries and volunteers, numbered 225 in locations around the country. The head of the Salzburg office of the CRS reported that the work was “a nightmare of improvisation” and “not entirely free from confusion,” but succeeded thanks to dedication and collaboration with the many other agencies and organizations.66

James Norris wrote that “the sudden Hungarian exodus has constituted the biggest movement of Catholic refugees. Yet Catholic organizations have not been alone in coping with the problem.”67 The ICMC’s Migration News understandably focused on the Catholic organizations, and indeed they had far more staff working directly with the Hungarian refugees than the other religious agencies. A coordinating committee for government, intergovernmental, and voluntary agencies working on the Hungarian refugee crisis met in Geneva seventeen times between 13 November 1956 and 21 October 1957. The minutes reveal strong engagement not only by the CRS and ICMC, but also by Charles Jordan, representing the Standing Conference of Voluntary Agencies Working for Refugees and the JDC, Edgar Chandler, and various representatives of the UNHCR, ICEM, Red Cross, U.S. Escapee Program, CARE, AFSC, and various smaller agencies.68

Recurrent topics in the coordinating committee included the current status of refugee flow into and out of Hungary, the management of the camps by the Red Cross or the Austrian government, and the supply of food and clothing. Both the Catholic agencies and those with fewer staff on the ground in Austria distributed materials collected through their own fundraising efforts as well as those supplied by U.S. government surplus and USEP funds. Within the ACVAFS New York office, the Committee on Migration and Refugee Affairs focused on the movement of people, whereas a separate Ad Hoc Committee on Hungary was dedicated to the supply of material within both Austria and Hungary.69 The Vienna council of the ACVAFS may have met less frequently (there are relatively few minutes in the ACVAFS archives) because it was so busy actually working with the refugees. One topic documented in the records is the division of proceeds from a fundraising effort on behalf of Hungarian youth. One such breakdown was 56 percent for CRS, 21 percent for the Lutheran World Federation/World Council of Churches, 11 percent for AJDC, and 2 percent each for the Brethren Service Commission, the Hungarian Refugee Service, the International Social Service, the World Ort Union, and the YMCA/YWCA.70

Care for the several thousand unaccompanied youth was an increasingly common topic in the committee meetings, especially as the number of Hungarian refugees waned in 1957. The worldwide interest in adopting refugee orphans far outstripped their actual number. The UNHCR, Austrian and Hungarian governments, and the voluntary agencies were all engaged in a discussion about the options for repatriation, resettlement, or settlement in Austria. Many voluntary agencies helped establish group homes and schools for Hungarian young people who resettled in Germany or stayed in Austria.71

Hungarian intelligence analysis of intercepted mail72 reported frequent contacts between the refugees and the clergy in the camps and resettlement communities. Allegations of anti-Communist agitation in these encounters, recruitment into intelligence services, or dissemination of propaganda seem to have been exaggerations. The religious component of these encounters presumed concern for the individual traveler and how he or she might deal with the available choices with the help of a kind word and ready ear, perhaps also with sacraments or prayer. In their committee reports, the WCC and the Catholic agencies emphasized that they had staff who spoke Hungarian and sought out the refugees. On November 23, 1956, Pope Pius named Bishop Stephan László, administrator of the Burgenland province (where most of the refugees entered Austria) and a speaker of Hungarian, as Apostolic Visitor for the Catholic Hungarian refugees in Austria. In this position, László had authority over all Hungarian priests arriving in Austria as refugees and the responsibility of ensuring that priests with knowledge of Hungarian attend to the refugees wherever they were. László published a bulletin in German and another in Hungarian for clergy working with the refugees.73

In the United States, the religious agencies and clergy detailed to Camp Kilmer participated in the processing of refugees, performed religious services, and held weddings. The fifteen members of the President’s Committee for Hungarian Refugee Relief in Washington, DC included CRS Director Msgr. Edward Swanson, Charles P. Taft (one of the founders of the WCC), and ACVAFS Chairman Moses A. Leavitt of the JDC. Four of the seven voluntary agencies represented at Camp Kilmer were religious in character: the CRS, CWS, HIAS, and LRS. Camp Kilmer’s operating manual states:

the NCWC often assigns groups of refugees to a given Diocese, which is in turn expected to work out the actual sponsorships locally within the parishes. In all instances, the Sponsoring
Agency is the organization to which the United States Government and the Hungarians look for the finalizing of the resettlement plan, as well as the maintenance of contact.74

Many refugees left the camp in response to invitations from relatives or employers without waiting for religious sponsorship. In all, 32,000 refugees passed through Camp Kilmer before it closed in April, 1957. The religious agencies and at least one Hungarian American organization criticized the decision to channel refugees through Camp Kilmer.75 On 13 November 1956, the CRS invited diocesan resettlement directors to notify the central office if they were ready to receive Hungarians in large quantities, encouraging them to write: “send us a planeload.” A follow-up circular issued on 3 December stated: “We have had dozens of requests for planeloads of refugees for specific cities... We have agreed that all refugees would come to Camp Kilmer where we would group them for transportation to specific destinations.”

According to the Resettlement Newsletter of the CRS, twelve dioceses did receive planeloads, carrying 75-100 people at a time.76 Two Hungarian priests organized the reception of the planeload that landed in Chicago on 13 December and apparently supplied the front page headline in the Chicago Daily Sun-Times: “Isten Hozta a Szabadság Országabá [sic] (Translation from Hungarian: God Brought You to Freedom’s Country.”77 Another paper reported: “A Hungarian refugee broke into a warm smile” at the sight of the headline.78

Conclusion

The history of the reception of Hungarian refugees after the 1956 Revolution has generally been recounted as an impressive success story. The refugees in general were highly educated, and they brought with them youthful ambition. They benefitted from growing economies in the host countries, thus it might seem that they were predestined for success in their new lives. We can ascribe the warm welcome they received in part to the Cold War heroization of freedom fighters and victims of Communist repression. This study suggests that the religious or spiritual message in this welcome must also be considered. Voluntary agencies, their donors, and volunteers were not immune to the political milieu, but they were also motivated by their particular, and indeed widely shared, humanitarian mission.

The collaboration between the bureaucrats and the voluntary agencies was largely successful, despite their at times diverging missions. The resolutely upbeat tone of American government relief managers was at odds with the occasionally tense exchanges between the American officials and voluntary agency representatives. In contrast to the positive note in the promotional materials of the President’s Committee for Hungarian Refugee Relief, its chair, Tracy Voorhees, regretted the American decision to phase out large-scale refugee relief in the spring of 1957 in response to declining support for the program in Congress. Fr. Flynn, the director of the CRS office in Vienna, spoke to a meeting of Catholic resettlement directors in New York on February 19, 1957. He painted an alarming picture of overcrowding in Austrian camps, and he lamented the flagging support for the refugees among politicians.79 The demoralizing waits endured by refugees still stranded in the Austrian camps and cases of unemployment in countries of resettlement prompted some refugees to return to Hungary. Voluntary repatriation reached over 20,000 by 1960.80

The ACVAFS published a report in April 1958 that noted various purported shortcomings in the reception of Hungarian refugees, from the federal government’s preference for routing refugees through Camp Kilmer to inadequate attention to humanitarian considerations and inequitable, inconsistent criteria applied in the selection of candidates for resettlement.81 Fr. Flynn had called in his 19 February address for the U.S. government and the UNHCR to act more responsibly. This would indeed occur in the coming years, as both took on a larger share of the initiative and expense of refugee relief. The relative impact of the voluntary agencies would consequently decline, although they continue to exert some influence to the present day.82

Bibliography

Archival Sources

AANY Archives of the Ardiocese of New York, Yonkers. Cardinal Spellman Papers

ABTL Állambiztonsági Szolgálatok Történeti Levéltára, Budapest, Hungary

AJDC American Jewish Distribution Committee, New York, online archives at

http://archives.jdc.org/

CMS Center for Migration Studies, New York

CZW Caritas Zentrale Wien, Austria. Binder of reports on the Hungarian Crisis

DAE Diözesanarchiv Eisenstadt, Austria. Nachlass Bischof László

DAW Diözesanarchiv Wien, Austria

IOM International Organization for Migration, Geneva, Switzerland. Library Archives.

Intergovernmental Committee for European Migration, Records

SCUA Special Collections and University Archives, Rutgers University,

New Brunswick, New Jersey

American Council of Voluntary Societies for Foreign Service, Papers

UNOG Archives of the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland. United Nations High

Commissioner for Refugees

Secondary Sources

American Council of Voluntary Agencies for Foreign Service, Report of Fact Finding Committee of the Committee on Migration and Refugee Problems, April 21, 1958. Online at JDC Archives online. Accessed May 20, 2017. http://archives.jdc.org/.

Balogh, Margit, and Jenő Gergely. Egyházak az újkori Magyarországon 1790–1992. Adattár. [Churches in Hungary in the Modern Era, 1790–1992]. Budapest: História, 1996.

Bánkuti, Gábor. Jezsuiták a diktatúrában: A Jézus Társasága Magyarországi Rendtartománya története 1945–1965 [Jesuits in the dictatorship: The history of the Hungarian Province of the Society of Jesus, 1945–1965]. Budapest: L’Harmattan, 2011.

Bauer, Yehuda. Flight and Rescue: Brichah. New York: Random House, 1970.

Borbándi, Gyula. A magyar emigráció életrajza 1945–1985 [A biography of Hungarian emigration, 1945–1985]. Bern: European Protestant Hungarian Free University, 1985.

Boyle, John H. “N.C.W.C.-Austria and the Hungarian Refugees.” Migration News 6, no. 1 (1957): 17–19.

Chandler, Edgar H. S. The High Tower of Refuge: The Inspiring Story of Refugee Relief throughout the World. London: Odhams Press Limited, 1959.

Chiba, Hiromi. “The Role of the Protestant Church in the US Refugee Resettlement Program during the Early Cold War Era: The Methodist Case,” Exchange 43 (2014): 9–28.

Cserháti, Ferenc. “A katolikus egyház szerepe az 1956-os magyar fiatalok beilleszkedésében Németországban” [The role of the Catholic Church in the integration of 1956 Hungarian youth in Germany]. In 1956 utóélete Ausztriában - Európában: a meneküléstől az integrációig: “Kufstein IX.”: tanácskozás Felsőpulyán 2006. szeptember 9–10-én [The afterlife of 1956 in Austria and Europe: From flight to integration: “Kufstein IX.”: Felsőpulya Symposium, September 9–10, 2006], edited by Ernő Nagy and Lajos Böröndi, 161–76. Vienna: Sodalitas, 2007.

Donald and Vera Blinken Collection – Hungarian Refugee Interviews from 1957–1958. Accessed May 15, 2017. http://w3.osaarchivum.org/digitalarchive/blinken/search.php.

Dreisziger, Nándor. Church and Society in Hungary and in the Hungarian Diaspora. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 2016.

Duff, Edward, S.J. The Social Thought of the World Council of Churches. New York: Association Press, 1956.

Dunai, Andrea. “Élet a galutban: Magyar-zsidó “hontalanok” (Displaced Persons) a nyugati megszállás övezetében” [Life in galut: The Hungarian-Jewish “homeless” (displaced persons) in the Western Occupation Zone]. Múlt és jövő 2 (2010): 60.

Egan, Eileen. For Whom There is No Room: Scenes from the Refugee World. New York: Paulist Press, 1995.

1956 és a szocializmus: Válság és újragondolás [1956 and Socialism: Crisis and rethinking] (Webpage). Accessed January 28, 2017. http://1956-2016.uni-eszterhazy.hu/.

Feder, Theodore D. “Ecclesiastical Care of Hungarian Refugees: Jewish Refugees,” Integration: Bulletin International (Association for the Study of the World Refugee Problem, Vaduz; Hofmann-Druck und Verlag, Augsburg). Special issue on Hungary: vol. 5, no 2 (1957): Aid to Hungarian Refugees 1956–1957: Reports to the 7th General Convention of A.W.R./A.E.R. Arnhem, September 9–12, submitted by the Austrian Division, 131.

“Flüchtlingsland Österreich,” on the UNHCR website. Accessed February 4, 2017. http://www.unhcr.at/unhcr/in-oesterreich/fluechtlingsland-oesterreich.html.

Gaál, Károly, ed. 1956 und das Burgenland: Berichte über die Hilfsaktionen für ungarische Flüchtlinge: eine Dokumentation von Studenten des Fachhochschul-Studienganges “Internationale Wirtschaftsbeziehungen.” Eisenstadt: Amt der Burgenländischen Landesregierung, Abt. XII/2, Landesarchiv und Landesbibliothek, 1996.

Gergely, Jenő. Katolikus egyház, magyar társadalom 1890–1986: Prohászkától Lékaiig [Catholic Church, Hungarian society, 1890–1986: From Prohászka to Lékai]. Budapest: Tankönyvkiadó, 1989.

Gorman, Robert F. Historical Dictionary of Refugee and Disaster Relief Organizations. 2nd ed. Lanham: The Scarecrow Press, 2000.

Havasy, Gyula, ed. A magyar katolikusok szenvedései 1944–1989: Havasy Gyula dokumentumgyűjteménye [The sufferings of Hungarian Catholics, 1944–1989: The document collection of Gyula Havasy]. Budapest: n.p., 1990.

Herberg, Will. Protestant, Catholic, Jew: An Essay in American Religious Sociology. New York: Doubleday & Doubleday Company, 1955.

van Heuven Goedhart, GJ. “Address.” In International Catholic Migration Congress organized by the International Catholic Migration Commission, Geneva, and the Central Catholic Emigration Foundation, The Hague. Castle Bouvigne, Breda, Netherlands. September 11–16th 1954. The Hague: Pax, [1954].

Holborn, Louise W. Refugees: A Problem of Our Time: The Work of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, 1951–1972. Metuchen, NJ: The Scarecrow Press, 1975.

Hollenbach, David, SJ. “Religion and Forced Migration.” In The Oxford Handbook of Refugee and Forced Migration Studies, edited by Elena Fiddian-Qasmiyeh, Gil Loescher, Katy Long, and Jando Sigona, 447–51. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2014.

Horváth, Ibolya et al., eds. Iratok az igazságszolgáltatás történetéhez [Writings on the history of the administration of justice], 2 vols. Budapest: Közgazdasági és Jogi Könyvkiadó, 1992.

Kecskés, Gusztáv, ed. Egy globális humanitárius akció hétköznapjai: A magyar menekültek segélyezésének szervezésére létrehozott Koordinációs Bizottság összefoglaló jegyzőkönyvei (Genf, 1956. november 13.−1957. október 29.) [Everyday life in a global humanitarian operation: The summary minutes of the Coordination Committee created to organize the provision of help for the Hungarian refugees (Geneva, November 13, 1956 – October 29, 1957)]. Budapest: MTA Bölcsészettudományi Kutatóközpont, Budapest, 2017.

Kern, Friedrich. Österreich: Offene Grenze der Menschlichkeit: Die Bewältigung des ungarischen Flüchtlingsproblems im Geiste internationaler Solidarität. Vienna: Verlag des Bundesministeriums für Inneres, 1959.

Kirby, Dianne. “The Churches and Christianity in Cold War Europe.” In A Companion to Europe since 1945, edited by Klaus Larres, 183–207. Chichester, UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2009.

Kirby, Dianne. “The Cold War, the Hegemony of the United States, and the Golden Age of Christian Democracy.” In World Christianities, c.1914–c.2000, vol. 9 of The Cambridge History of Christianity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008. Available in Cambridge Histories Online. Accessed January 29, 2017. https://doi.org/10.1017/CHOL9780521815000.017.

Köchler, Hans. “Das Verhältnis von Religion und Politik in Österreich und Europa: Die Idee des säkularen Staates.” Religion und Politik 37 (2013), 5–17. Accessed January 29, 2017. http://www.politischebildung.com/pdfs/37-hk.pdf.

Komoróczy, Géza. A zsidók története Magyarországon [The History of the Jews in Hungary]. Vol. 2: 1849-től a jelenkorig [From 1849 to the present day]. Bratislava: Kalligram, 2012.

Központi Statisztikai Hivatal. 1949. évi népszámlalás. 9. Demográfiai eredmények [The 1949 Census. 9. demographic findings]. Budapest: Állami nyomda, 1950. Pt 2, 12. Accessed January 30, 2017. https://library.hungaricana.hu/hu/view/NEDA_1949_09/?pg=0&layout=s.

“KSH felmérése az 1956-os disszidálásról. Az illegálisan külföldre távozott személyek főbb adatai: 1956. Október 23.–1957. április 30” [The Central Statistics Office assessment of dissidence in 1956: The main data concerning people who fled the country illegally]. Regio: Kisebbségtudományi szemle 2, no. 4 (1991): 174–211.

Kupke, Raymond J. “James J. Norris: An American Catholic Life.” Ph.D. dissertation, Catholic University of America, 1995. Online in ProQuest Dissertations & Theses Global. Accessed January 31, 2017.

László, Károly. Napló-töredék az 1849-iki menekülteket, internáltakat, különösen Kossuthot és környözetét illetőleg, Törökországban és az Amerikai Egyesült Államokban [Diary concerning the 1849 refugees, internees, especially Kossuth and his companions]. Budapest: Franklin-Társulat, 1887.

Loescher, Gil. The UNHCR and World Politics: A Perilous Path. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001.

Luxmoore, Jonathan, and Jolanta Babiuch. The Vatican and the Red Flag: The Struggle for the Soul of Eastern Europe. London: Geoffrey Chapman, 1999.

Marrus, Michael R. The Unwanted: European Refugees in the Twentieth Century. New York: Oxford, 1985.

Mink, András. “Columbia University Research Project Hungary: 1956 Hungarian Refugee Interviews at OSA Archivum, Budapest.” Accessed May 15, 2017. http://w3.osaarchivum.org/digitalarchive/blinken/curph.pdf.

Murber, Ibolya. “Az 1956-os magyar menekültek Ausztriában: Menekültlét és integráció” [The 1956 Hungarian refugees in Austria: Life as refugee and integration]. Múltunk 26, no. 3 (2016): 123–59.

Nagy, Ernő. Magyar középiskolák Ausztriában 1956 után [Hungarian high schools in Austria after 1956]. Budapest: World Federation of Hungarians, 1998.

Nichols, J. Bruce. The Uneasy Alliance: Religion, Refugee Work, and U.S. Foreign Policy. New York: Oxford University Press, 1988.

Niessen, James P. “A befogadás kultúrája és az 1957. januári osztrák menekültkvóta-indítvány” [The culture of welcome and the January 1957 Austrian refugee quota proposal]. Világtörténet 6 (38), no. 3 (2016): 337–56. Accessed May 15, 2017. http://dx.doi.org/doi:10.7282/T3M90BX1.

Niessen, James P. “Hungarian Refugees of 1956: From the Border to Austria, Camp Kilmer, and Elsewhere.” Hungarian Cultural Studies: e-Journal of the American Hungarian Educators Association (AHEA), 9 (2016): 122–36. Accessed May 15, 2017. http://dx.doi.org/10.5195/ahea.2016.261.

Pastor, Peter. “The American Reception and Settlement of Hungarian Refugees in 1956–1957.” Hungarian Cultural Studies: e-Journal of the American Hungarian Educators Association (AHEA), 9 (2016): 197–205. Accessed May 15, 2017. https://doi.org/10.5195/ahea.2016.255.

Porter, Stephen R. Benevolent Empire: U.S. Power, Humanitarianism, and the World’s Dispossessed. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2017.

President’s Committee for Hungarian Refugee Relief. Joyce Kilmer Reception Center: Manual of Policies and Procedures followed in Conjunction with Hungarian Refugee Resettlement. 201-page typescript. Accessed May 15, 2017. http://dx.doi.org/doi:10.7282/T3ZC827K.

Public Papers of the United States Presidents, William J. Clinton. Washington, DC: Office of the Federal Register, National Archives and Records Administration, 2000. Vol. 1. Accessed May 15, 2017. https://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/PPP-1999-book1/pdf/PPP-1999-book1-doc-pg903-2.pdf.

Rásky, Béla. “‘Flüchtlinge haben auch auch Pflichten’: Österreich und die Ungarnflüchtlinge 1956.” Presentation in Budapest, October 12, 1998. http://www.kakanien-revisited.at/beitr/fallstudie/BRasky1.pdf. Accessed February 5, 2017.

Reiss, Elizabeth Clark. ACVAFS: Four Monographs. New York: The American Council of Voluntary Agencies for Foreign Service, 1985.

Rusch, ed. Bischof Paul. Der Sozialhirtenbrief der österreichischen Bischöfe. Innsbruck: Tyrolia-Verlag, 1957.

Stark, Tamás. Hungarian Jews during the Holocaust and after the Second World War, 1939–1949: A Statistical Review. Boulder: East European Monographs, 2000.

Tessarolo, Rev. Giulivo, ed. Exsul Familia: The Church’s Magna Carta for Migrants. Staten Island, NY: St. Charles Seminary, 1962.

Világtörténet 6 (38), no. 3 (2016). Thematic issue on 1956.

Wycislo, Msgr. Aloysius J. “Escape to America.” Catholic World 93, no. 2 (1957): 326–27.

Figure 1. U.S. Army Official Photographs from 1956 preserved in the National Archives and Records Administration. In the public domain; from the 1956 refugee collection of the Blinken OSA Archivum. Accessed October 5, 2017. http://www.refugees1956.org/2017/01/21/1956-hungarian-refugees-in-the-us-photo-gallery/.

Figure 2. Fr. László Szépe to the Catholic Committee for Refugees in New York, 1949, with an appeal for assistance for Hungarian refugees in Austria from Caritas Hungarica in Austria. Source: Center for Migration Studies. 024. NCWC—Department of Immigration—New York Office and NCWC Catholic Committee for Refugees. Records. General Correspondence. Box 21/31. Reprinted with the permission of the Center for Migration Studies of New York.

Figure 3. “Send us a planeload”: The 21 December 1956 issue of the CRS’s Resettlement Newsletter depicts planeloads of people arriving in Detroit and Chicago. CMS 023b. Bureau of Immigration, Box 153. Folder 4857. Hungarians, pt. 2. Reprinted with the permission of the Center for Migration Studies of New York.

A Foreign Labor Force in Early Republican Turkey: The Case of Hungarian Migrant Workers1

Emre Saral

Atatürk Institute, Hacettepe University, Ankara

Beginning in the 1920s, Hungarian workers began to migrate to foreign countries for economic and political reasons. Among them, a group of Hungarians including workers, engineers, and trained experts arrived in Turkey. The laborers from Hungary entered the Turkish market before the Residence Convention signed in 1926, which mutually allowed the citizens of both signatories to reside and work in the two countries. As neither government initially implemented the necessary measures, there had been an uncontrolled flow of workers to Turkey. Enduring poor living conditions and facing several problems, including low wages and lack of social insurance, they were employed in jobs such as house building and railroad construction, and they made a serious contribution to the development of the country in the 1920s and 1930s. This essay presents the situation of the Hungarian migrant workers in Turkey in the interwar period on the basis of official documents held in Hungarian, Turkish, and British archives. I examine the socio-economic situation of Hungarians in Anatolia, the obstacles they faced, the stance of and measures adopted by the Turkish government, and the attempts that were made by the Hungarian diplomatic mission on behalf of the Hungarian citizens living in Turkey.

Keywords: Foreign labor force, Hungarians in Turkey, workers, Turkish–Hungarian relations in the interwar period

Introduction

The harsh terms of the Treaty of Trianon negatively affected the Hungarian economy and the labor market. Many of the members of the new Hungarian minority communities in the neighboring states relocated to Trianon Hungary, and this raised the unemployment rate. Political instability and increasing military production during the many conflicts and armed struggles that broke out in the wake of the war triggered inflation. Real wages also fell. The real wage of an officer at the time of the outbreak of the war had fallen by 67 percent by the end of 1918. In the same period, farming wages dropped by 54 percent and factory workers’ wages by 47 percent.2 Economic problems in Hungary in the aftermath of World War I caught the notice of Turkish public opinion. In an official magazine on Turkey’s foreign affairs in the 1930s, the contention was made that the cease of the flow of seasonal workers from Czechoslovakia to the Hungarian plain in the summertime to work the arable lands had negatively affected the economies of both countries.3

The idea of emigrating appealed to unemployed Hungarians who had to struggle with the effects of World War I and the Treaty of Trianon: “Countries that have more population than capital export people as agricultural laborers. The migrants, like village or urban workers, go abroad for almost no money, and they seek countries wealthier than their homelands and at least as expensive as their livelihoods.”4 Hungarians migrated to a variety of countries, including Germany, France, the USA, Canada, Brazil, Norway, the Netherlands, and Turkey. Approximately 40,000 Hungarians went abroad between 1921 and 1924 and 35,000 between 1925 and 1931.5 Meanwhile, between 1918 and 1924, some 426,000 refugees relocated to Hungary.6

The population of Turkey according to the 1927 census was 13,649,945, of which 6,584,404 were males and 7,065,541 were females.7 If one takes the area of the country (roughly 900,000 km2) into account, it is clear that, given its comparatively low population density, Turkey had a strong need for a labor force and one would not expect high levels of unemployment. Nonetheless, the unemployment rate according to the 1927 census was 39.3 percent.8 Furthermore, non-Muslims in Anatolia left Turkey because of the wars in 1913–23 (they either fled or were deported or expelled). This demographic exchange ended with an agreement between Turkey and Greece held at the Lausanne Conference in 1923. As a consequence of these developments, there was a decline in skilled labor in Turkey in the early 1920s. The 1927 census shows that non-Muslim citizens in Turkey constituted 2.6 percent of the total population.9 Before the war, this rate was around 20 percent10 This is one of the reasons why a huge gap appeared in the Turkish economy.11 There was a lack of skilled workers in professions that required mastery. Thus, in the early republican period, the organization and development of Kemalist Turkey was intended to be based in part on the employment of foreign experts, workers, technicians, and engineers from various professions in order to gain momentum in every sphere of socioeconomic life.12 The Turkish government attempted to take precautions to support the native labor force.13 However, as these attempts would yield results only in the long term, priority was given to the employment of foreign workers and experts in order to come up with radical and quick solutions to Turkish modernization.

When mutual economic relations between the Ottoman Empire and the Austro-Hungarian Empire are examined from the perspective of the labor force, it can be observed that experts from Hungary were employed in Turkey in fields such as forestry, agriculture, veterinary care, and industry.14 There were also attempts to collaborate on railway transportation.15 Hungarians were also employed in mining and mine operations in Anatolia.16 Students were sent to Hungary to learn new agricultural and industrial methods.17

These collaborative efforts were maintained during the interwar period. Hungarians who sought opportunities abroad quickly discovered the potential of Turkey in an economic transformation. On the one hand, the Hungarian authorities and entrepreneurs aimed to supply raw materials, find jobs for thousands of unemployed Hungarian citizens, and find a trade partner for Hungary’s agricultural products. Moreover, Hungary aimed to supply plants in order to make its dismantled factories from the Habsburg period functional again.18 On the other hand, Turkey sought ways to strengthen its recently established economy, address the deficit in its labor market, and continue to benefit from Hungarian labor. These nascent countries had different socio-economic dynamics and structures, in part because one had been part of the Habsburg Empire and one had been the center of the Ottoman Empire.19 The deeper their economic relations became, the more complex and unfamiliar the problems they faced.

Hungarians played a crucial role in the modernization of the recently established Turkish republic. Various experts, such as engineers and architects with higher education degrees, made serious contributions to the reforms of Kemal Atatürk’s Turkey. For instance, Antal Réthly established the modern Turkish meteorological service;20 turcologist Gyula Mészáros founded ethnographical museum in Ankara;21 László Rásonyi, another turcologist, was the first lecturer at the Institute of Hungarology in Ankara;22 engineer György Tittes built the infrastructural facilities of various Anatolian cities;23 engineer János György was appointed chief director of Kemal Atatürk’s farm;24 János Máthe was the gardener for Kemal Atatürk’s house;25 Oszkár Wellman was the agricultural engineer who introduced his Turkish colleagues to new breeding methods;26 the landscape architect Imre Ormos did landscapeing in the new capital, Ankara; histologist Tibor Péterfi27 had many outstanding achievements.28

This essay adds to the extensive literature concerning the activities and contributions of Hungarian technical experts and intellectuals to the modernization of Turkey by focusing on a little known aspect of Turkish–Hungarian relations in the twentieth century. Specifically, I offer an analysis of the foreign manpower of Hungarian origin on the Turkish labor market in the 1920s and 1930s. Hungarian migrants arrived in Turkey and worked there as qualified laborers in various sectors. My essay examines the socioeconomic situation of the Hungarians in Turkey, how the new Turkish nation state handled the foreign labor, the challenges that Hungarians faced, and how the Hungarian legation in Turkey responded to these challenges. I draw on documents found primarily in Hungarian and Turkish archives, though I also use relevant documents held in the Foreign Office of the United Kingdom. My article sheds light on the migration history of both nations with an informative and descriptive approach rather than a theoretical and methodological framework.

The Arrival of Hungarian Manpower on the Turkish Labor Market

The foreign labor force in Turkey consisted not only of Hungarians, but of people of many national backgrounds. There were still non-Turkish workers who had been working for foreign companies in Turkey since the Ottoman period. Despite several challenges and serious unresolved problems between Turkey and Greece throughout the 1920s, Greek citizens were still working in Turkey. A group of White Russians took refuge in Turkey right after the outbreak of the Bolshevik Revolution and became actors on the Turkish market.29 During the political turmoil in the first half of 1920s, citizens of Balkan countries such as Bulgaria, Yugoslavia (primarily Serbs), and Albania also arrived in Turkey.30 German and Austrian workers also came to Turkey. The Hungarian colony did not unquestionably form the largest migrant labor community in Turkey. According to the 1927 and 1935 censuses, the distribution of the population was as follows:

Table 1. Official Statistics on foreign citizens living in Turkey31

Hungarian workers who came to Turkey worked in construction jobs through various contractors.32 It is claimed that some 100 workers of Hungarian origin worked in Ankara and its surroundings by mid-1925.33 They were employed in construction projects such as home building, city sewerage, pavement, water networks, electricity, lighting, etc. They were also employed in the construction of the Ankara–Sivas railway line and construction around the Izmir province.34 Some 300 people with training and experience in construction went to Turkey from the Tolna County in southern Hungary (and in particular Bátaszék, one of the larger cities in the Tolna County).35

According to Hungarian deputy Imre Szabó, there were 800 Hungarian workers in Turkey.36 Camille Jacquart, a French demographer, contends that there were 619 Hungarian citizens in Turkey in 1927.37 According to a report of the Turan Society on the development of economic relations between Turkey and Hungary in 1928 there were 4,000-5,000 Hungarian workers living in Turkey.38 In an embassy report dated 1 February 1927, the number of Hungarians living in the embassy’s area of responsibility was approximately 1,200. This report asserts that a flow of 300-400 Hungarians came to Turkey in the previous year, though the same number of Hungarians returned to their homeland.39 János Vendel, a Jesuit pastor serving in Turkey, arrived at the exaggerated figure of approximately 15,000. He observed that around 1,000-1,100 of them were Catholics who were living in Ankara and its surroundings.40 No official data have been given on the share of foreign citizens on the Turkish labor market due to unregistered employment and inadequate local control mechanisms. However, the official data on the total population of Hungarians in Turkey given by the government is as follows:41

Table 2. Hungarian citizens living in Turkey42

Turkish decision-makers were eager to provide employment opportunities for skilled Hungarian workers. In his interview with the Hungarian newspaper Világ, Ahmed Riza Bey, the representative delegate of the Ankara government in Paris, stated that they would be pleased to benefit from the art and literature of the Hungarian nation and emphasized their need for Hungarian engineers and experts.43As a matter of fact, Ali Haydar Bey, the Mayor of Ankara, paid a five-day of inspection visit to Budapest in 1924 with the intention of “taking some fifty Hungarian artisans to Ankara, where they will help facilitate the reconstruction of the city and the emergence of the institutions.” Haydar Bey also added that they would learn a lot from the Hungarians and benefit from their well-developed industry.44

A remarkable factor that influenced Turkish resolution to bring members of the Hungarian labor force to Turkey was a political one. In the eyes of Turkish authorities, Hungary was an ideal choice as a former ally which would not be an anti-Turkish position. As citizens of a successor of an empire which was economically dependent on the great powers through capitulations, decision-makers of the nascent state turned to nations which had, in the words of Sir George R. Clerk, the British ambassador to Turkey, “vast numbers of economically useful and politically harmless” people.45 This refers simply to nations that would neither be expected to seek further political concessions from Turkey nor to get involved in political activities against it. The Turks would have probably taken into consideration the fact that Hungary, which had recently lost two thirds of its territory and was in socioeconomic turmoil, internationally isolated, and sympathetic towards the Turks, could hardly pose any threat to Turkey’s political or economic interests. In this respect, the unfavorable reaction of Ismet Pasha’s (İnönü), the foreign minister, to the speech given by Hüsrev Bey (Gerede), the Turkish envoy to Budapest, to Miklós Horthy, the Hungarian regent, could be regarded as a sign of how the Turks attached importance to the principle of political and economic independence. Following Hüsrev Bey’s presentation of his letter of credence, the Hungarian leader expressed his opinion that Hungary had a stalwart support of Turkey and would help it in its efforts to approach the prosperity of European civilization. The Turkish diplomat said that he was grateful to the Hungarian regent for his kind words. Ismet Pasha ordered the envoy not to give any approval for such gestures, since “in political relations an envoy should refrain from accepting or confirming such assertions of expertise and scientific affairs, as it would diminish the country’s political credibility.”46

Parallel to this, the Turkish authorities did not want the foreign citizens to form colonies within the Turkish territories. In this respect, the request of a group of 120 Hungarian farmers to establish a village was rejected by the Turkish government, since foreign citizens were prohibited from creating settlements within the territories of the Republic of Turkey.47 Meanwhile Numan Bey (Menemencioğlu), the Turkish chargé d’affaires to Budapest, called to the attention of a delegate of the prestigious Turanian Society that the Hungarian workers in Turkey were expected to serve in Turkey and to abstain from any effort to establish a colony.48 The negative experiences of the Ottoman period shaped this Turkish policy, whereas the Hungarian authorities drew a more pragmatic picture on mutual economic relations: “Should [the Turks] trust foreigners in the construction of railways and factories, then they must tolerate skilled workers in the absence of a Turkish labor force and foreigners in professions that require expertise.”49

Challenges Faced by the Hungarian Migrant Workers in Turkey

A letter from 1925 written by Boldizsár Beck, the representative of Société Anonyme Turque d’Etudes et d’Enterprises Urbaines, a Turco–German joint company, offers a description of the living conditions of the Hungarian workers.50 The letter was addressed to Jakab Klein and Ádám Schmidt from the Hungarian village of Csibrák. Klein and Schmidt had been invited to Ankara to work as skilled laborers. Beck claimed that no diploma was required to work as a bricklayer. He added that in the case of a ten-day-work period, with a daily wage of 5 liras, it would be possible to cover all of the travel expenses to Ankara, including the visa fee, and it would be possible to set aside money in a settlement in which little money was spent.51

It appears that Beck painted a very encouraging picture. However, he may well have been exaggerating in order to attract masses of workers. Indeed, according to the official statistics, the daily average cost of living for a person in Ankara between 1923 and 1925 was 13 or 14 liras, which was equivalent to the national average cost of living.52 Jenő Ruszkay, the commercial attaché, drew a more realistic picture of daily expenditures than Beck. In his report, the Hungarian official described daily life in Ankara as a camp for an ordinary European man in the beginning of 1923. On the basis of his personal experiences, Ruszkay set the daily cost of living at 17 or 18 liras (approx. 1,700 Hungarian crown). The costs which should be covered with this sum were the following: housing: 2.5 liras (a better facility could be rented for 5); heating: 2 liras; meals: 3 liras; transportation (if necessary): 3-4 liras; and tips and various expenditures: 4-5 liras.53 In light of Ruszkay’s report, Beck’s optimistic calculations hardly seem plausible. Therefore, it could be claimed that it was not possible to lead a comfortable life with a daily wage of 5 liras with these living expenses. As a matter of fact, Hungarian workers faced serious challenges in Turkey. In 1925, Tibor Pőzel, the representative of the Hungarian legation in Ankara, described these challenges: inadequate daily wages; the harsh climate of Anatolia; summer diseases, such as malaria; no work due to the cessation of construction in the winter; accommodation in adobe houses and unhygienic places; and finally, the lack of a labor union which would protect the interests of the workers.54

Other factors also worsened the situation of workers. First, legal and institutional deficiencies negatively affected their prospects and the conditions in which they lived. Diplomatic relations between the Kingdom of Hungary and the Republic of Turkey officially began with the Treaty of Friendship signed on December 18, 1923.55 The second legal arrangement between the parties was the Residence Convention of December 8, 1925, which was signed in accordance with the third article of the treaty of friendship, which obliged the parties to make necessary arrangements allowing their citizens mutual rights to travel and reside in each country. This convention could be regarded as the legal guarantee of the free movement of the Hungarian labor force in Turkey. Since the abolition of economic concessions, known as the capitulations, by the Treaty of Lausanne (July 24, 1923), which had applied to foreigners in the Ottoman period, Hungarian citizens in Turkey had been deprived of legal guarantees. The aforementioned convention was consolidated on December 20, 1926 and came into force both in Turkey and Hungary in mid-1927.56 However, Hungarian workers entered the Turkish market in 1924, before the residence convention had been implemented. Thus, the laborers worked in Turkey for almost three years without any legal assurances.

In the session of the Hungarian parliament on October 23, 1926, problems faced by Hungarian workers in Turkey became a subject of discussion. Deputy Imre Szabó made a motion with his assertion that the living conditions of the workers had deteriorated. In his motion, the Hungarian deputy, who criticized the government for not supporting its citizens abroad who were suffering from poverty, posed a question to Lajos Walko, the foreign minister, as to whether or not the government would take necessary measures for possible repatriation.57 A few months later, during the session concerning the ratification of the Turco–Hungarian Residence Convention of 1926, Deputy Géza Malasits, referring to Szabó’s motion, indicated that he was in favor of the convention, which would help settle the problems faced by Hungarians who were unable to get their money and lived under worse conditions.58 During the session, speaker István Görgey, who introduced the draft law, emphasized the lack of legal guarantees for the Hungarian citizens living in Turkey since the abolition of the capitulations. Thus, this agreement aimed to obtain concessions in favor of Hungarian citizens, such as freedom of residence and movement, right to property ownership, and equity in taxation.59 In reply to Szabó’s motion, Walko informed the deputies that the government gave assistance to workers who wanted to return to Hungary or let them work in the Danube Steam Ship Company. Walko argued that workers who were unable to get their wages avoided consulting the Hungarian legation for some reason: „If we knew where they were working, it would be easier to provide them assistance.”60

Second, the absence of a coordinative organ, either separate or joint, that would settle the worker flow also negatively affected the conditions in which the workers lived.. In terms of social policy and labor, a limited population, weak industry, and a weak economy which relied on primitive agrarian society set the framework of the social conditions in the new Turkish state. Turkish decision-makers searched for new methods, including encouraging private entrepreneurship and liberalism to foster economic growth and development. Therefore, beginning in the 1920s, the government attempted to determine the fundamentals of labor relations. Labor law, which regulated these relations, came into force in Turkey in 1936. Although some arrangements had been made concerning workers’ vacation and holidays and the sanitary issues faced by working women and children, there had been no comprehensive regulations concerning the labor until then.61 Talas identified factors such as problems in the functioning of the democratic institutions of the state, an economy with an agricultural society and weak industry, a small working class, the Great Depression, and intolerance of left-wing ideas as reasons for this slow pace of progress.62

Under these circumstances, there was no institution that would make arrangements for foreign labor or handle the problems of foreign workers in Turkey. As a matter of fact, due to the absence of an institution that would check the eligibility of the workers going abroad, regardless of their qualification, every worker who wished to go to Turkey constituted an obstacle to a possible increase in the living standards of Hungarian workers in their host country. In 1923, the Dutch Legation in Istanbul, which provided consular protection to the citizens of Hungary in Turkey, sent a note to the Turkish Foreign Ministry regarding the uncontrollable flow of Hungarian masses to Turkey. They contended that the Turkish legation in Budapest encouraged unemployed Hungarians to go to Turkey regardless of their qualifications or skills. This was why the Dutch consulate urged the Turkish authorities to take the necessary measures in order to stop the flow.63

The absence of such an organ of oversight put the entire burden on the Hungarian legation in Turkey. The Hungarian legation in Ankara addressed the workers’ problems. For instance, citizens from Bátaszék wrote a petition to Hungarian authorities concerning eleven building masters and Mihály Lasko, their foreman in the Turkish town of Bozuyük. As soon as they received bad news from their countrymen in Turkey, they sought assistance from the legation. Répási, the attaché, unable to get in touch with Lasko, was informed that the latter had been unable to pay his workers and had disappeared.64 Furthermore, the embassy sought jobs for its citizens. Hungarian authorities received information on the employment opportunities at the Ankara–Sivas railway construction project, and they lobbied Swedish and Belgian contractors in an attempt to prevail on them to provide employment for Hungarian workers in the undertaking.65

Turkish intolerance of left-wing ideas and, particularly, communism was also an important factor. Given the poor living conditions, the workers’ inability to get full wages, the absence of any guarantee of employment or social facilities that would provide gathering places for the Hungarian community (such as churches, schools, etc.), communist ideas began to spread among Hungarian workers in Turkey.66 Clerk expressed his views in his annual report of 1927. In his assessment, the immediate preoccupation of László Tahy, the Hungarian envoy to Turkey, was “the necessity of preventing Hungarian workmen from coming to Turkey, because those already in Angora seemingly been won over to Communism by propaganda put about by the Soviet embassy, and in consequence, to be sent back to their native land under escort.”67 Tahy convinced Tevfik Rüştü Bey (Aras), Turkish foreign minister, of the premise that, in his own words, “communism spreading among Hungarian workers would be a threat for Turkey as well.”68 Kemalists actually regarded communists as a threat to the social model they sought to build, which was predicated on the emergence of an integrated society without any class distinction.69 This is why the Turkish authorities arrested roughly two hundred Hungarian workers. Some of them were immediately deported, and the rest were given a period of one month to leave the country.70

There is no evidence indicating that the Hungarian communists had any direct contact with their Turkish comrades or intended to spread their ideology in Turkey. Dilaver Bey, the chief of police in Ankara province, informed Tahy that in the light of their interrogation, the main goal of the Hungarian communists was to get their comrades in Ankara back to Hungary illegally.71 According to the indictment issued by the Turkish security officials, the communists, who were unable to maneuver easily in their homeland, were able to organize their activities under Cell No. 10 of the Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party (MSzMP).72 The head of this hierarchical organization was László Mihályfalvi, and the cell had meetings in Lajos Debreczeni’s home in Ankara twice a week. The first task of this organization had been the distribution of magazines entitled Magyar Munkás (“Hungarian Worker”), which was printed in Paris, Az Ember (“Man”), which was printed in the United States, and Új Előre (“Onward Anew”).73 According to the police report, this cell got orders directly from Hungary, and when Kummer’s house was searched, one of the cell members, stamps, member identification cards and lists, forms, and relevant documents were found.74 Workers accused of spreading communist propaganda with the backing of the Soviet embassy in Ankara could not simply be dismissed en masse from the country. The construction of the city had slowly been progressing, and there had been a dearth of skilled workers on the labor market.75 The fact that in 1928, 47 communists from among the accused were expelled with their families to the Soviet Union could have been the consequence of the lobbying activity of the Soviet legation (the Soviet Union was a close ally of Turkey at the time).76

The elimination of the communist threat did not settle all of the problems among the Hungarian workers. One of the repercussions of the communist propaganda was the dramatic increase in prejudice against foreigners. Communists who were able to stay in Turkey and other Hungarians who had no contact with the accused groups were both negatively affected by these developments. As Turkish police began to follow them, employers became reluctant to employ Hungarians. Moreover, as Turkish workers were unable to reach the living standards and acquire the rights of their European counterparts thanks to the long-lasting struggles, the wages of Turkish skilled workers remained very low in the early 1920s. In contrast, foreign workers and skilled laborers who came to Turkey entered the market with high wages. However, the economic crises triggered a general tendency among employers to hire locals instead of foreigners, and this caused a significant decrease in the wages of the Hungarian skilled workers in the construction sector. Beginning in 1932, several Hungarian workers began to leave Turkey because of the preference among employers for hiring locals, the aforementioned decrease in wages, and high taxes.77According to an embassy report of 1932, the annual average wages of Hungarian skilled workers was as follows:78

Table 3. Wages of Hungarian skilled workers

The influence of the Great Depression of 1929 on Turkey affected the labor market as well. The rising unemployment rate prompted the government to take strict measures. In the National Industrial Congress of 1930, the Turkish intolerance of the foreign workers became an issue of debate. The Congress recommended that the employers would no longer hire workers and skilled laborers who were unable to find jobs in their home countries. Moreover, employers were advised to insist that migrant workers present the necessary papers and favor Turkish workers in seasonal jobs.79 The Ministry of Interior declared that it had passed a decree to prevent foreigners from loitering in the Turkish streets without money or a job. According to this decree, foreign citizens who wished to reside in Turkey had to show at least 400 liras at the border check. For people who wished simply to travel through Turkey, this amount was set at 250 liras. Otherwise, foreign visitors were not allowed to enter the country.80 The 1931 program of the Republican People’s Party, the ruling party, also put emphasis on the issue. According to this platform, “the interests of the nationalist Turkish workers are going to be taken into consideration.”81

The roots of economic nationalism in Turkish society go back to the eve of World War I. The Union and Progress Party, which ruled the Ottoman Empire during the war, aimed to strengthen the “national economy” and create a “national bourgeoisie.” In their assessment, this would be possible only with the erosion of non-Muslim economic hegemony. Thus, particular emphasis was put on the “national” aspect of economic life, and foreigners and minorities began to be presented as exploiters of the national economy.82

In this respect, in the beginning of 1932, a draft law concerning the prohibition of foreign workers from certain professions was prepared by the Turkish authorities. This was the fourth reason why the situation of the Hungarian workers worsened in Turkey. According to the law, foreign citizens were prohibited from having a shop or pursuing a profession anywhere but in the major towns. In these towns, they were not allowed to be artisans, itinerant dealers, gardeners, musicians, printers, toy manufacturers, journalists, typographers, newsboys, brokers or agents, dealers in monopoly goods, guides, auctioneers, car-drivers, workmen of all categories, porters, servants, bar-artists, physicians, veterinary surgeons, chemists, dentists, engineers, or lawyers. Foreigners whom the new law affected were allowed to continue practicing their professions for a specified period of time and in the end had to give them up within three years’, by May 1935 the latest. This draft was passed by the parliament and came into force on June 16, 1932.83

Hungarian workers were not the only people negatively affected by the law. It also had consequences for British citizens who were working in İzmir and its surroundings. According to an embassy report, the number of British citizens in Turkey, including wives and families, was roughly 3,500.84 according to a consular report, roughly 53 percent of the total number of British citizens engaged in professional, commercial, and industrial pursuits in İzmir was likely to be affected by law.85 Another consular report from Istanbul dated 1933 noted that within the British colony, the UK citizens of Maltese origin (around 1,200 people) were significantly affected by the law.86 The report also mentioned that Italian and Greek colonies were confronted with the same problem. There were plans to transfer between 8,000 and 10,000 Italian citizens to Pontine Marshes, Italy, where the Greek government was inclined to treat the Greek citizens (of whom there were some 25,000) as refugees.87 The Observer, a British newspaper, drew attention to the issue. According to the news, Greeks, who formed the largest foreign community in Turkey were expected to be the most affected by the arrangement.88 They were especially good at handicrafts, and they were found in larger numbers in most of the professions included in the new bill. The article also mentioned Russian refugees as another group who would also suffer from the new measures, as they were principally chauffeurs, toy manufacturers, artists, and service providers in bars.89

The law complied with the government policy based on economic nationalism in the aftermath of the Great Depression of 1929. From the Hungarian point of view, the law clashed with Article 4 of the Residence Convention of 1926, which allowed the citizens of either country to work in the other.90 However, the Turkish authorities did not take this into account. Şükrü Kaya, the interior minister, defended the draft law by referring to the economic obligations of the state to its citizenry. He argued that proportionally very few foreigners actually worked in the professions listed in the draft law, and thus very few people would actually be affected. He also claimed that the draft law was not intended to prohibit the employment of the foreigners, but merely to create a control mechanism. Thus, it would actually not be against the interests of the foreign labor force.91

Tahy immediately started lobbying against the bill before the Turkish authorities. First, he drew the attention of the relevant Hungarian authorities in Budapest to the possible negative effects of the implementation of the law on Hungarians working in Turkey, such as waiters and drivers. He claimed that it would not be possible for Hungarians in Turkey to work in professions and services such as stone mastery, plumbing, carpentry, or the service industry if the draft law was passed (and he was correct).92

As Tahy foresaw, the protectionist measures taken by the Turkish government negatively affected foreign workers. The law had repercussions in Hungary as well. Governmental bodies, including the Ministry of Commerce, the Ministry of Interior, and the Chambers of Trade and Commerce, contacted the Foreign Ministry to request consultations.93 Tahy made every effort to convince the Turkish authorities to postpone implementation of the law. He lobbied among leading Turkish political figures and the statesmen at the drafting stage of the law in an effort to obtain possible concessions for Hungarians. Both the minister of the interior and the foreign minister told Tahy that the law was a response to public pressure caused by high unemployment rates and the economic crisis.94 Tahy believed that the exclusion of Hungarians from certain professions in Turkey would also put a burden on the Hungarian economy, and his efforts seem to have had some effect, because the parliamentary commission on foreign affairs proposed an amendment to the law concerning the extension of the deadline to cease working in the professions listed from three months to one year.95 According to an amendment passed on 31 May 1933, the deadline was extended for two more years, which made the deadline 21 May 1935.96 Finally, in accordance with a cabinet decision on 10 May 1934, the law was fully implemented.97

Tahy claimed that the Turkish authorities gave him an oral assurance concerning the situation of Hungarians working as qualified bricklayers, locksmiths, painters, and so forth. They would be allowed to continue working, as the law would not include these professions.98 Tahy shared his opinion with his British counterpart, Clerk. The latter wrote the following:

My Hungarian colleague is quite happy about the law, for his nationals are nearly all employed in the building trade as foreman and so on and will therefore be entered as ‘specialists’ and allowed to remain, while those of lower grades have already found life in Turkey too difficult and have gone, or are going, in large numbers to Persia, where, for reasons best known to themselves, they imagine that they will find good and lucrative employment.99

However, his initial optimism was followed by futile diplomatic efforts with the Turkish authorities. Hungarian officials also relied on this argument in their later lobbying activities. Kálmán Kánya, the Hungarian foreign minister, even ordered Mihály Jungerth-Arnóthy, Tahy’s successor in Ankara, to provide written assurance from the Turkish authorities regarding the issue.100 However, in the final draft no such distinction was drawn. Though the Hungarian authorities reiterated this assurance several times to the Turkish side during the talks, their efforts seem to have had little effect on the latter’s decision. As Jungerth brought the issue before Şükrü Kaya, the Interior Minister, Kaya ended the dialogue by criticizing Tahy for his possible misunderstanding: “Monsieur Tahy might have understood my explanation in a quite broad sense, in a sense that even opposed to the entire law, and this is impossible…”101

From early 1935, long negotiations were held between the Hungarian diplomats in Turkey and Turkish authorities concerning the situation of Hungarians, which would be affected by the law. As a consequence of these negotiations, Jungerth and Cevad Acikalın, the head of the relevant department at the Turkish Foreign Ministry, agreed that Hungarians who would declare proof of mastery of their profession would be allowed by the Ministry of Economy to continue working after the deadline.102

Ullein-Reviczky, the head-consul in Istanbul, regularly reported on the situation of Hungarian workers. In his opinion, the Ministry of Interior should have been informed of the issue, which in the eyes of the Foreign Ministry and Ministry of Economy seemed settled, since local security authorities in the small towns of Anatolia would prevent the Hungarians from continuing to pursue their occupations.103 As a matter of fact, Hungarians who began to receive notifications obliging them to give up their professions by May 20, 1935 sought assistance from the Hungarian embassy.104 Within this period, 114 Hungarian workers submitted applications to the Turkish Ministry of Economy for an extension of their work permit.105 However, among the Hungarians, only workers who had training in plumbing and central heating were allowed to continue working after the deadline of May 21, 1935. Apart from them, among the professions including carpenters and house construction workers, only people who worked either for the government or for influential potentates were able to continue working and earn a living.106

An Embassy report indicates that as of January 31, 1935, the total number of Hungarians living in Turkey was around 1,200: 607 in Ankara, 350 in Istanbul, and 250-300 in Anatolia.107 By early 1936, only 200-300 Hungarian workers remained in Turkey. They were either people who had been directly authorized by the cabinet decision or people who had become Turkish citizens. The workers who were authorized by the cabinet decision to remain were offered contracts as experts in various government institutions. The number of such experts who went Turkey between 1936 and 1950 is 157.108 Some of the people who left were repatriated,109 and the rest attempted in large numbers to try their luck in countries like Syria, Iraq, Iran, and the territory of Palestine, where they hoped to find lucrative employment.110

Conclusion

Following the proclamation of the republic in Turkey on October 29, 1923, the main problem concerning the population of the country was a dearth in the labor force of people with the training necessary in order to exploit the resources and maintain and develop industry, not only in agriculture in the fertile part of the country with large arable lands but also in other professions. During World War I and the Turkish War of Independence, many artisans and craftsmen of Greek and Armenian origin left the country (they fled or were expelled or were subjects of population exchange). This led to a deficit in the labor force of the country, a problem which was to be settled by the importation of a foreign labor force for the short term. The foreign labor force on the Turkish market gradually began to diminish between 1932 and 1935, parallel to the rise of nationalism. The effects of the Great Depression also contributed to the emergence of more nationalist attitudes and, in response, government policies. Thus, the Turkish government made legal arrangements according to which only Turkish nationals were allowed to work in some professions.

Hungarian workers escaped unemployment and political turmoil in their country by seeking refuge in Turkey, where they hoped to find safe haven. However, in general, their story did not have a happy ending. Most of them were unable to get accustomed to the living conditions in Anatolia, secure a decent, reliable living and were obliged to leave the country within a short period of time. The factors that influenced their fates can be summarized as 1) inadequate legal arrangements and institutions; 2) the spread of communist ideology among workers and the negative perceptions it created about the workers in Turkish society; and 3) economic measures taken by Turkish government in response to increasingly nationalistic attitudes in Turkish society. First, the residence agreement was signed by the two governments only three years after the first group of Hungarian workers arrived in Turkey. Thus, the laborers worked without any legal protections. Second, both parties were incapable of establishing a mechanism that could control the migrant flow to Turkey. As a result, workers struggled with difficult challenges. Some of them did not hesitate to get in touch with official organs, such as the Hungarian legation in the hopes of finding redress for their griefs. The fundamental problem they faced was bad living and working conditions in Anatolia. Their dissatisfaction led to the spread of communist propaganda among a small group in the colony. The communists saw Anatolia as a convenient place for the spread of their ideology among workers who were displeased with their situation. However, this made the situation worse for almost the entire colony. The Turkish government was strongly opposed to communist ideology, and so, between 1925 and 1927, a witch hunt was started for Turkish and non-Turkish (including Hungarian) communists. There is no evidence of collaboration between Hungarian and Turkish communist groups. The Hungarian communists sought to spread their ideology in Hungary, not Turkey. On the contrary, Hungarian diplomats lobbied their Turkish counterparts to dismiss any communist agitation in their homeland. This is for the fact that, Hungarian communists were taken into custody and expelled from the country in 1927. The rest who remained in Turkey were strictly monitored by the authorities, and they faced mistrust in professional circles. In the meantime, as their daily wages began to decrease, the workers gradually left the country for other destinations.

In the meantime, the Turkish government had already decided to transform its economic policy into a centrally planned model in the aftermath of the Great Depression of 1929. Rising nationalism in Turkish society also drew the attention of government officials. As a consequence of a law passed in 1932, which restricted some professions to Turkish nationals, foreign citizens living in Turkey were forced to give up their professions, regardless of their nationality (i.e. including Hungarians). From 1935 onwards, Hungarian experts, such as skilled workers and engineers, were only allowed to work in Turkey with the direct authorization of the government. The Hungarian legation in Turkey made every effort to protect the interests of these workers. However, their attempts exerted little influence on Turkish decision makers. To sum up, the story of Hungarian migrants in Turkey between 1924 and 1935 cannot be characterizing as long-lasting.

Bibliography

Archival Sources

National Archives of Hungary State Archives, Budapest (MNL OL)

K 63 Political Department

K 64 Political Department Reserved Documents

K 69 Department of Economic Policies

K 70 Department of Legal Affairs

K 79 Embassy in İstanbul - Ankara

K 94 Embassy in Moscow

K 653 Head Consulate in İstanbul

Prime Ministry State Archives of Republic of Turkey Republican Archive, Ankara (BCA)

030.18 Cabinet Decisions

The National Archives UK Foreign Office General Correspondence (FO 371)

“Harpten On Sene Sonra Macaristan,” Ayın Tarihi 20, no. 63–64 (June–July 1929), 4594–95.

“Ecnebiler memleketimize ne şartlar altında gelecekler?” Vakit, November 15, 1930.

“Vilayet Raporu: Ankara.” In 1930 Sanayi Kongresi Tutanakları Raporlar-Kararlar-Zabıtlar. 628–30, Ankara, Millî İktisat ve Tasarruf Cemiyeti, 1930. Accessed June 18, 2017, https://www.tbmm.gov.tr/eyayin/GAZETELER/WEB/KUTUPHANEDE%20BULUNAN%20DIJITAL%20KAYNAKLAR/KITAPLAR/DIGER%20YAYINLAR/197008238%201930%20SANAYI%20KONGRESI%20RAPORLAR%20ZABITLAR/0505_0650%20VILAYET%20RAPORLARI.pdf.

İstatistik Yıllığı 1951, 19. Ankara: Türkiye Cümhuriyeti Başbakanlık İstatistik Genel Müdürlüğü, No: 332.

İstatistik Yıllığı 1934–35. Ankara: İstatistik Genel Dairesi, 1935.

Képviselőházi Napló, 1927, volume 4 [House of Representatives Diary, 1927]. Budapest: Az Athenaum Irodalmi és Nyomdai Részvénytársulat Könyvnyomdája, 1927. Accessed 15 February 2017. https://library.hungaricana.hu/hu/view/OGYK_KN-1927_04/?pg=0&layout=s.

Nemzetgyűlési Napló 1922. XLVI. Kötet [National Assembly Diary, 1922. Vol. 46]. Budapest: Az Athenaum Irodalmi és Nyomdai Részvénytársulat Könyvnyomdája, 1927. Accessed 15 February 2017. https://library.hungaricana.hu/hu/view/OGYK_KN-1922_46/?pg=0&layout=s.

Resmî Gazete [Official Gazette]. June 18, 1927, No. 610.

Resmî Gazete [Official Gazette]. June 16, 1932, No. 2126.

Türkiye Büyük Millet Meclisi (TBMM) [Turkish Grand National Assembly]. Zabıt Ceridesi, 59th parliamentary session, June 4, 1932, 65. Accessed June 20, 2017.

https://www.tbmm.gov.tr/tutanaklar/TUTANAK/TBMM/d04/c009/tbmm04009059.pdf.

TBMM Hariciye Encümeni Mazbatası November 24, 1932. Decision No. 2 - 1/70.

The Observer, January 24, 1932.

Világ, September 7, 1922.

Secondary Sources

Ahmad, Feroz. “Cumhuriyet Türkiye’sinde Sınıf Bilincinin Oluşması, 1923–45.” In Osmanlı’dan Cumhuriyet Türkiyesi’ne İşçiler 1839–1950, edited by Donald Quataert and Erik Jan Zürcher, translated by Cahide Ekiz, 123–54. Istanbul: İletişim Yayınları, 3rd ed, 2011.

Baran Alim, Tülay. “Mütareke Döneminde İstanbul’daki Rus Mültecilerin Yaşamı.”Atatürk Araştırma Merkezi Dergisi 22, no. 64–66 (2006). Accessed June 15, 2017. http://www.atam.gov.tr/dergi/sayi-64-65-66/mutareke-doneminde-istanbuldaki-rus-multeicilerin-yasami.

Bayur, Yusuf Hikmet. Türkiye Devletinin Dış Siyasası. Ankara: TTK, 1995.

Becker, Joachim. “Transition to Capitalism and Dissolution of Empires: The Habsburg and the Ottoman Empires Compared.” In 100. Yılında Balkan Savaşları (1912–1913): İhtilaflı Duruşlar c.1, edited by Mustafa Türkeş, 23–42. Ankara: TTK, 2014.

Csorba, György. “‘Magyar anyakönyv’: Forrás a konstantinápolyi magyarok történetéhez” [“Hungarian Birth Registry”: A source on the history of the Hungarians in Constantinople]. Keletkutatás 39, no. 1 (2011): 131−44.

Çolak, Melek. “Cumhuriyet’in İlk Yıllarında Türkiye–Macaristan İktisadî İlişkileri.” Askerî Tarih Araştırmaları Dergisi 2, no. 4 (2004): 47–54.

Çolak, Melek. Aksakallı Havabakan Antal Bey. Ankara: Yapı Kredi Yayınları, 2012.

Çolak, Melek. “Atatürk Dönemi Türkiye’sinde Bir Macar Meteorolog: Aksakallı Havabakan Antal Réthly (Macar Kaynaklarına Göre).” Cumhuriyet Tarihi Araştırmaları Dergisi 5, no. 9 (2009): 113–36.

Çolak, Melek. “Bir Macar Çocuğun Anılarında Atatürk.” Muğla Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Enstitüsü Dergisi (İLKE) Atatürk’ün Doğumunun 125. Yılı ve Cumhuriyetimizin 83. Yılı Özel Sayısı. Muğla: n.p., 2006. 96–105.

Çolak, Melek. “Atatürk’ün Macar Bahçıvanı János Mathe’nin Anılarında Ankara.” Cumhuriyet Tarihi Araştırmaları Dergisi 4, no. 7 (2008): 184–88.

Dávid, Géza. “Magyarok a köztársaság kori török gazdasági életben: a múlt tényei és a jövő lehetőségei” [Hungarians in Turkish economic life during the republic]. Török Füzetek 12, no. 2 (2004): 13, 16.

Fermi, Laura. Illustrious Immigrants: The Intellectual Migration from Europe 1930–1941. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1968.

Frank, Tibor. “Approaches to Interwar Hungarian Migrations, 1919–1945.” The Hungarian Historical Review, 1, no. 3–4 (2012): 337–52.

Gál, Stephen. “Hungary and the Anglo–Saxon World.” In A Companion to Hungarian Studies, 489–513. Budapest: The Society of the Hungarian Quarterly, 1943.

Gezer Baylı, Gülnaz. “Türkiye’de İstihdam Edilen Fransız Uzmanlar Ve Türk Modernleşmesine Katkıları.” Master’s Thesis, Ankara Hacettepe University, 2013.

György, Péter János. “Horváth László – Lágernapló” [László Horvát – Lager diary] Tempevölgy, December 23–25, 2010, 23–30 Accessed June 18, 2017.

http://tempevolgy.hu/images/PDF/Tempevolgy2010december.pdf.

Jónás, Endre, and Viktor Szondy. Diplomáciai Lexikon [Diplomatic Lexicon]. Budapest: Kulcsár Andor Könyvnyomdája, 1947.

Karabekir, Kazım. I. Dünya Savaşı Anıları. Istanbul: Yapı Kredi Yayınları, 2011.

Karaduman, Hüseyin. “Gyula Mészáros ve Ankara Etnografya Müzesi.” Paper presented at VII. Milletlerarası Türk Halk Kültürü Kongresi, Gaziantep, Turkey, June 27 Haziran – July 1, 2006.

Maskar, Üveis. “Tibor Péterfi 22.6.1883–14.1.1953.” In İstanbul Üniversitesi İstanbul Tıp Fakültesi 6. Kurultayı 2. Türk–Alman Tıbbi İlişkileri Sempozyumu, Istanbul: September 20–25, 1981. 249–58.

Major, Márk Imre. American Hungarian Relations 1918–1944. Hamilton–Ontario: Hunyadi MMK, 1991.

Molnár, Antal. “A Szentszék, a magyar jezsuiták és egy törökországi tudományos intézet alapításának terve (1930–1934)” [The Holy See, the Hungarian Jesuits, and the plan to found a Turkish scholarly institute (1930–1934)]. In Magyarország és a Szentszék diplomáciai kapcsolatai, 1920–2015 [Diplomatic Relations between Hungary and the Holy See, 1920–2015], edited by András Fejérdy, 173–209. Budapest–Rome: METEM/Római Magyar Akadémia, 2015.

Mosonyi, Ferenc. “Franciaországi Magyarok Nyelve” [The Language of Hungarians in France], Korunk 12 (1937): 1036–42.

Namal, Yücel. Türk–Macar İlişkileri. İstanbul: İskenderiye Yayınları, 2009.

Namal, Yücel. “Zonguldak’ta Macar Uzmanlar (1923–1950).” In Karaelmas 2009 Medya Ve Kültür, edited by Nurçay Türkoğlu and Sevilen Toprak Alayoğlu, 99–108. Karaelmas: Urban Kitap, 2009.

Ökçün, Gündüz. 1920–1930 Yılları Arasında Kurulan Türk Anonim Şirketlerinde Yabancı Sermaye. Ankara: Sermaye Piyasası Kurulu Yayın, 1997.

Romsics, Ignác. Magyarország Története a XX. században [The history of Hungary in the twentieth century]. Budapest: Osiris Kiadó, 2005.

Sakal, Fahri. “Türkiye’de Çalışma Hayatının Millileştirilmesi,” Atatürk Araştırma Merkezi Dergisi 20, no. 60 (2004). Accessed June 15, 2017. http://www.atam.gov.tr/dergi/sayi-60/turkiyede-calisma-hayatinin-millilestirilmesi.

Saral, Emre. “Türkiye–Macaristan İlişkileri (1920–1945).” PhD diss., Ankara Hacettepe University, 2016.

Saral, Emre. “Türkiye–Macaristan Dostluk Antlaşması (18 Aralık 1923).” In Halil İnalcık Armağanı – III Tarih Araştırmaları, edited by Ahmet Özcan, 155–80. Ankara: Doğubatı Yayınları, 2017.

Şimşir, Bilâl, ed. Atatürk ve Yabancı Devlet Başkanları. Vol. 3. Ankara: TTK, 2001.

Talas, Cahit. Türkiye’nin Açıklamalı Sosyal Politika Tarihi. Ankara: Bilgi Yayınevi, 1992.

Tekeli, İlhan, and Selim İlkin. 1929 Dünya Buhranında Türkiye’nin İktisadî Politika Arayışları. Ankara: Türkiye Belgesel İktisat Tarihi Serisi, ODTÜ, 1977.

Tittes, György. “Törökország Vízügyi Munkálatai” [Waterworks projects in Turkey]. Vízügyi Közlémenyek 1, no. 3–4 (1937): 493–502.

Toprak, Zafer. İttihad-Terakki ve Cihan Harbi Savaş Ekonomisi ve Türkiye’de Devletçilik. Istanbul: Homer Kitabevi, 2003.

Tóth, Ágnes. Magyar lendkerekek az új Törökország gépezetében, avagy gazdasági és kulturális együttműködés Törökország és Magyarország között az atatürki aranykor időszakában. Budapest: Grotius E-Könyvtár, 2009. Accessed June 15, 2017.

http://www.grotius.hu/doc/pub/VFFOEJ/2009_120_toth_agnes.pdf.

Yavuz, Erdal. “Sanayideki İşgücünün Durumu, 1923–40.” In Osmanlı’dan Cumhuriyet Türkiyesi’ne İşçiler 1839–1950, edited by Donald Quataert and Erik Jan Zürcher, trans. Cahide Ekiz, 155–96. Istanbul: İletişim Yayınları, –2011.

Yıldırım, Seyfi. “Cumhuriyet Döneminde Türk–Macar İlişkileri Çerçevesinde İstihdam Edilen Macar Uzmanlar.” Cumhuriyet Tarihi Araştırmaları Dergisi 8, no. 15 (2012): 121–50.

Yiğit Türker, Pınar. “Türk–Macar İlişkileri (1867–1918).” Master’s Thesis, Muğla Sıtkı Koçman University, 2013.

Zeidler, Miklós. A Revíziós Gondolat [The idea of revision]. Bratislava: Kalligram, 2009.

APPENDIX 1

Table 4. Population of Hungarian Citizens in accordance to the 1927 census: Distribution per provinces111