Baron Lagos Hatvany, a Jew and at one time one of Hungary’s wealthiest men, will be released this morning from prison, where he was committed over a year ago after being found guilty of “slandering the Hungarian nation,” because of articles he had written seven years before in a Viennese newspaper of the Hungarian emigres.
Baron Hatvany, who was one of the supporters of Count Michael Karolyi’s short-lived Hungarian republic, returned more than a year ago to Hungary after living seven years abroad as a political refugee. Upon his return he was almost immediately arrested and sentenced to a prison term of seven years. A court of appeal reduced the sentence of imprisonment to a year and a half. Baron Hatvany and his family have now paid the whole fine and a pardon has been granted by Regent Horthy.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
