Meisner, Peter (Oral history)

Hungarian Jewish schoolchild in Budapest, Hungary, 3/1944-1/1945; student during Hungarian Uprising in Hungarian's People's Republic, 10/1956-11/1956

REEL 1 Background in Budapest, Hungary, 1936-1944: family circumstances; religious character of family; internment of parents, 1941; education. Recollections of period as schoolchild in Budapest, Hungary, 3/1944-2/1945: introduction of anti-Semitic measures after German take over, 3/1944; sheltering from Allied bombing; imposition of Arrow Cross regime, 10/1944; hiding with family; acquiring false papers; hiding of father in one of Raoul Wallenberg's houses; conditions during Siege of Budapest, 29/12/1944-13/2/1945; grandmother's loss of watch to Soviet Army soldier; reaction to surviving war with parents; state of family home. Recollections of period as schoolboy and student in Budapest, Hungary and Hungarian People's Republic, 1945-1955: aspirations for democracy, 1945; religious freedom; reaction to Communist take over, 20/8/1949; confiscation of family property; role as young Communist. REEL 2 Continues: discrimination in education against middle class children; official refusal of request to visit Italy; effect of Imre Nagy's government on his education, 1953. Recollections of period as medical student during Hungarian Uprising in Budapest, Hungarian People's Republic, 10/1956-11/1956: sense that regime could not last by 1955; how external events especially the 20th Communist Party of the Soviet Unions' Congress precipitated uprising; attending student demonstration, 10/1956; bodies brought into university from shooting at Radio Building, 25/10/1956; defection of Hungarian People's Army troops to demonstrators; collapse of regime overnight; attitude towards political future of Hungary; reaction to collapse of regime; mission to collect medicines from Sopron; escape with West German journalist into Austria, 11/1956; realisation that uprising would fail; question of possibility of fascist take over; student organisation. REEL 3 Continues: consequences of revenge taken against State Protection Authority (AVH); listening to western radio broadcasts; insurgents' objectives; role of British Broadcasting Corporation. Aspects of period as refugee in Austria and GB, 11/1956: initial impressions of capitalist nature of west in Vienna, Austria, 11/1956; character of former Soviet Zone of Vienna; emigration from Vienna to study at Oxford, GB, 26/11/1956.