Reforming count who drove Hungary's modernisation, from the Academy of Sciences to the Chain Bridge, and sat in the 1848 cabinet
Born in Vienna in 1791 into the Széchenyis, an old and influential Hungarian noble family, he joined the Austrian army at seventeen, fought in the Napoleonic Wars and left the service as a captain in 1826. In 1825 he gave a year's income from his estates, 60,000 forints, to found the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, and in writings such as Hitel (Credit, 1830) he urged the nobility to give up its feudal privileges. He promoted the regulation of the lower Danube for navigation and the Chain Bridge, the first permanent bridge between Buda and Pest. Envisaging gradual reform within the Habsburg monarchy, he opposed Kossuth's radicalism. In March 1848 he became minister of ways and communications in the Batthyány government, but in early September a nervous breakdown sent him to an asylum at Oberdöbling and out of politics. He shot himself in 1860.
Career timeline
- 1825Endowed the founding of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences
- 1830Published Hitel
- 1848Minister of ways and communications in the Batthyány government
- 1848–1860Lived in the asylum at Döbling
Writer freed from prison on 15 March 1848, publisher of the Workers' Newspaper and one of Hungary's first socialist politicians
Born in 1799 into a serf family at Ácsteszér, he trained as a weaver, became a teacher and wrote popular textbooks. In the 1840s he argued for freeing the serfs without compensation and abolishing feudal relations by revolution; pamphlets such as The Word of the People Is God's Word led to his arrest, and in 1847 he was convicted of press offences and incitement. On 15 March 1848 the people of Pest and the revolutionary youth freed him from prison in Buda. That year he won the Siklós constituency and published the weekly Munkások Újsága (Workers' Newspaper) for workers and peasants, which Kossuth had banned at the end of the year. After the defeat he hid for eight years under his house; sentenced to fifteen years in 1860, he was freed almost blind in 1867. In 1869 he returned to parliament and was elected president of the General Workers' Association. He died in 1884.
Career timeline
- 1847Imprisoned for press offences and incitement
- 1848Deputy for Siklós; published Munkások Újsága
- 1860–1867Imprisoned again
- 1869–1870President of the General Workers' Association
Leader of Hungary's revolution of 1848, who as head of the National Defence Committee and regent-president led the war of independence
Born in 1802 at Monok into a Lutheran family of the lesser nobility, he became a lawyer. Arrested for high treason in 1837 and held until 1840, he edited the Pesti Hírlap from 1841, calling for the abolition of serfdom and aristocratic privilege. He led the founding of the Opposition Party in 1847, wrote its programme and entered the Diet for Pest. His speech of 3 March 1848 helped ignite the revolution in Vienna, and he became finance minister in the Batthyány cabinet. From the end of September, as president of the National Defence Committee, he raised the Honvéd, and in April 1849 he drove through the declaration of independence and became regent-president. On 11 August he handed power to Görgei and fled to the Ottoman Empire; after a tour of the United States he lived in Britain and Italy, condemned the Compromise of 1867 and died in Turin in 1894.
Career timeline
- 1837–1840Imprisoned for high treason
- 1841–1844Editor of the Pesti Hírlap
- 1847Founded the Opposition Party; deputy for Pest
- 1848Minister of finance
- 1848–1849President of the National Defence Committee
- 1849Regent-president of Hungary
- 1849–1894Exile in the Ottoman Empire, Britain and Italy
Hungary's minister of justice in 1848 who defended the April Laws and later led the negotiation of the Compromise of 1867
Born in 1803 at Söjtör in Zala county into an ancient noble family, he studied law and became an advocate. He entered politics in 1833, attending the Diet at Pressburg in place of his elder brother, and in 1842 he freed his serfs and chose to pay taxes. In 1848 he became minister of justice in the Batthyány government; opposed to violence, he urged moderation and made several trips to the court in Vienna, and when compromise failed he resigned his post but stayed in parliament defending the constitutional legitimacy of the April Laws. He withdrew to his estate at Kehida before the war of independence ended and was acquitted by an Austrian court martial after the defeat. In the 1850s he became the emblem of "passive resistance", and he led the delegation that negotiated and signed the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867. He died in 1876.
Career timeline
- 1833First attended the Diet at Pressburg
- 1848Minister of justice in the Batthyány government
- 1850sEmblem of passive resistance
- 1867Led the delegation that signed the Compromise of 1867
