On this day: Hungary’s 1956 revolt and Canada’s refugees

On Oct. 23, 1956, university students marching through the streets of Budapest were joined by workers and others, the start of a revolution that would send tens of thousands of Hungarians to Canada.

According to the House of Commons Standing Committee on Citizenship and Immigration, the crowd grew to about 100,000 people that day. The committee’s report said security police opened fire on the crowd and killed hundreds.

Historian Istvan Deak, writing for the Canada-Hungary Educational Foundation, described the uprising as lasting 13 days, from Oct. 23 to Nov. 4, 1956. Journalist Judy Stoffman, in a piece also published by the foundation, described the same span, from the first student demonstrations in Budapest to what she called the revolution’s “final bloody end.” Parks Canada says Soviet troops marched on Budapest to crush a revolution that sought political reform and independence from the Soviet Union.

Many Hungarians fled. The Commons committee estimated that about 200,000 left the country. Parks Canada says thousands found safety in neighbouring nations.

Canada became a major destination. Parks Canada says that in 1956 and 1957 Canada received more than 37,500 refugees who fled Hungary. The agency says the federal government acted quickly to select, transport and resettle people in co-operation with non-profit organizations.

Sources differ slightly on the total. The Commons committee report put the number of Hungarians who eventually settled in Canada at over 37,000. The Canada-Hungary Educational Foundation uses a figure of about 38,000 and says most of the refugees arrived in 1957. The figures are close, and the differences likely reflect rounding and the way arrivals were counted, though the sources do not say.

The scale of the response has been recognized formally. Parks Canada designated the Refugees of the 1956 Hungarian Revolution a National Historic Event on Jan. 12, 2010, under the Historic Sites and Monuments Act. Its plaque is at 1575 Lake Shore Blvd. W. in Toronto. The agency says Canada admitted the refugees as immigrants “with the support of its population.”

A national monument to the refugees stands on Maple Island in Ottawa. The Canada-Hungary Educational Foundation says it was unveiled on Oct. 4, 2006, ahead of the 50th anniversary of the uprising.

The foundation quotes Susan Papp-Aykler as saying that no other country accepted more refugees per capita than Canada. The claim is attributed to her on the foundation’s site, and the sources reviewed here do not independently verify it.

The 1956 arrivals were not Canada’s first experience welcoming people displaced by conflict or persecution. Earlier chapters include the Underground Railroad, which brought freedom seekers to places such as St. Catharines, Ont., where Harriet Tubman made her base in 1851. Today, newcomers arrive mostly through economic programs such as Express Entry.

Further reading is available from Parks Canada’s National Historic Event page on the refugees, the House of Commons committee’s report on the 50th anniversary, and the Canada-Hungary Educational Foundation’s Hungarian Presence website.

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