Imre Nagy
Prime Minister during the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, executed after its suppression.
Life
Son of a peasant
Nagy came from a peasant family. Captured by the Russian army in World War I, he joined the Communist Party in the Soviet Union. After World War II he returned to Hungary and led land reform.
New Course
After Stalin's death in 1953 he became Prime Minister and pursued a relaxing "New Course", but two years later he was pushed out of office by Rákosi. In October 1956, when mass protests broke out in Budapest, he became Prime Minister again, announced a multi-party system, withdrew from the Warsaw Pact and declared neutrality.
1956
In November the Soviet Union sent troops to crush the uprising. He took refuge in the Yugoslav embassy, was arrested when he came out, and in 1958 was executed after a secret trial. In 1989 he was rehabilitated and reburied, with hundreds of thousands attending.
Legacy
Nagy is the symbolic figure of the Hungarian Revolution of 1956, and his reburial in 1989 became a defining moment of Hungary's political transformation.
Did you know? June 16, the day he was executed, was also the day he was reburied thirty-one years later.
Key dates
- 1945Led land reform
- 1953Became Prime Minister, pursued the New Course
- 1955Removed from office
- 1956Prime Minister again; arrested after Soviet troops moved in
- 1958Executed
- 1989Rehabilitated and reburied