Internment and Deportation of the Transcarpathian Hungarians in conditions of Soviet Power (1944-1946)

The article deals with the difficult fate of the Transcarpathian Hungarians at the final stage of the World War II and the first years of Soviet Transcarpathia. In 1944 Hungary, as a country ally of Nazi Germany, became a place of mass deportations. The same applies to Hungarian population living outside the official borders of Hungary. This is the Transcarpathian Hungarians who suffered a similar fate. The task of the Soviet Union - the country-victor of the war, became not the destruction of the deported, and acquisition of workforce. Soviet leaders since the war tried to use prisoners of war and civilian population of the occupied territories as it gratuitous labor. Since November 1944 the Hungarian and German minorities of the region endured difficult times of national, political, and ideological pressures suffered persecution on ethnic grounds. The purpose of our article is to clarify the causes, forms, methods, and the main consequences of deportations of the Hungarian population from the territory of the Transcarpathia in the POW (prisoners of war) camps. To analyze the actions of the military authorities of the 4th Ukrainian Front, in this case, the position of local authorities, rural communities. Based on the works of Ukrainian scientists, Hungarian and Hungarian-speaking authors published in the post-Soviet period, the author tried to analyze the Soviet policy towards the Hungarian minority. Recently, researchers have engaged in publication of previously inaccessible documents, which largely filled the lack of sources. Among the pioneers in this business we call A. Korsun and G. Dupka. The beginning of deportations of Transcarpathian Hungarians became the ruling military council of the 4th Ukrainian Front on 13 November 1944 number 0036 which was supposed "to register for military service all persons aged 18 to 50 years of German and Hungarian nationality residing currently on the liberated territory of Transcarpathian Ukraine...". In most Hungarian settlements repression began in mid-November 1944. First, "military service" were gathered in Camp of Svalyava town where they were kept for two months, then were transported by train to camps of the cities Sambor, Turka, Stryi, and then - were taken deep into USSR. According to various estimates in Soviet POW camps were sent from 25 to 30-50 thousand Transcarpathian Hungarians men aged from 18 to 50 years. This does not take into account the fact that much of the repressed never served in the Hungarian army, which during World War II led operations against the armed forces of the USSR. We can state that the deportations were carried out for ethnic acquaint. This, in the opinion of the Soviet government was to "neutralize" compact living Hungarian National Minorities in the shortest possible time to carry out activities on the Sovietization of the Transcarpathia.

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