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One page of Beifeld's narrative text dated April 1943 describing the nasty treatment of Jewish Labor Servicemen by antisemitic Hungarian soldiers during the final weeks of their stay in the Soviet Union.

Photograph | Digitized | Photograph Number: 58129

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    One page of Beifeld's narrative text dated April 1943 describing the nasty treatment of Jewish Labor Servicemen by antisemitic Hungarian soldiers during the final weeks of their stay in the Soviet Union.
    One page of Beifeld's narrative text dated April 1943 describing the nasty treatment of Jewish Labor Servicemen by antisemitic Hungarian soldiers during the final weeks of their stay in the Soviet Union. "At dawn on April 29 [1943], about 109 persons from former Company 109 were escorted to the nearby village of Korocha. There were seven or eight hundred of us here, crowded into a shabby barn with no water, food, or heating. The way they received us made us understand immediately that we came to a bad place. As we entered the village and the local [Hungarian] guards took note of us, they right away used sticks and rifle butts to make us move faster. As soon as our two wagons arrived packed with entirely broken people, suffering from typhoid fever, the guards started to beat them, yelling that stinking Jewish malingerers, how dare they torture the poor horses! They threw the helpless patients from the wagons, made them line up with us, and left us standing there for hours. This was followed by organized looting...They took almost everything we still had left, and chased us up to the already crowded, lice-infested barn...The treatment and the food were so horrible, however, that typhoid fever, dysentery, and the brutality of the guards killed our comrades one after another." One page of an illustrated album produced by Gyorgy Beifeld (1902-1982), a Hungarian Jew from Budapest, who was drafted into the Munkaszolgalat (Hungarian Labor Service system) and spent more than a year on the Soviet front, from April 1942 through May 1943. The album contains 402 drawings and watercolors by Byfield, as well as a narrative of his experiences.

    Overview

    Caption
    One page of Beifeld's narrative text dated April 1943 describing the nasty treatment of Jewish Labor Servicemen by antisemitic Hungarian soldiers during the final weeks of their stay in the Soviet Union.

    "At dawn on April 29 [1943], about 109 persons from former Company 109 were escorted to the nearby village of Korocha. There were seven or eight hundred of us here, crowded into a shabby barn with no water, food, or heating. The way they received us made us understand immediately that we came to a bad place. As we entered the village and the local [Hungarian] guards took note of us, they right away used sticks and rifle butts to make us move faster. As soon as our two wagons arrived packed with entirely broken people, suffering from typhoid fever, the guards started to beat them, yelling that stinking Jewish malingerers, how dare they torture the poor horses! They threw the helpless patients from the wagons, made them line up with us, and left us standing there for hours. This was followed by organized looting...They took almost everything we still had left, and chased us up to the already crowded, lice-infested barn...The treatment and the food were so horrible, however, that typhoid fever, dysentery, and the brutality of the guards killed our comrades one after another."

    One page of an illustrated album produced by Gyorgy Beifeld (1902-1982), a Hungarian Jew from Budapest, who was drafted into the Munkaszolgalat (Hungarian Labor Service system) and spent more than a year on the Soviet front, from April 1942 through May 1943. The album contains 402 drawings and watercolors by Byfield, as well as a narrative of his experiences.
    Date
    April 1942 - May 1943
    Locale
    USSR
    Photo Credit
    United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, courtesy of George Byfield (Gyorgy Beifeld)

    Rights & Restrictions

    Photo Source
    United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
    Copyright: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
    Provenance: George Byfield (Gyorgy Beifeld)
    Source Record ID: Collections: 2001.156

    Keywords & Subjects

    Administrative Notes

    Biography
    Gyorgy Beifeld (later George W. Byfield) was born in Budapest, Hungary on April 8, 1902. The son of a banker, Gyorgy received a law degree and worked as a stock broker. He was conscripted into the Hungarian Labor Service (Munkaszolgalat ) and served for 13 months on the Soviet front, from April 1942 until May 1943. He was wounded on August 28, 1942 at Prilushkniy. In 1943 Gyorgy returned to Budapest. The following year he appears to have been re-drafted or arrested, because he ended up in Dachau at the conclusion of World War II. After his liberation, he returned to Hungary, but left again after the communist takeover. Gyorgy immigrated to Australia in 1949 and settled in Sydney, where he and his wife later operated a successful tobacco shop. He died in Sydney on June 14, 1982.
    Record last modified:
    2004-02-26 00:00:00
    This page:
    https:​/​/collections.ushmm.org​/search​/catalog​/pa1143355

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