Page 35 - Studia Universitatis Hereditati, vol 11(2) (2023)

‘counter-revolutionaries’. However, as the histo-
rian K. Tsivos, mentions, a rumour spread that
the refugees supported the Soviet intervention,
a rumour – unfounded – that was also spread
by the radio station Free Europe (Tsivos 2022,
72). Among the incidents against refugees, men-
tioned in the KKE archives, are threats to em-
ployees and residents of a pedikos stathmos in
Ballaton Kenese by Hungarian demonstrators,
and the death of a 17-year-old refugee in the Sta-
lin-Varos region (Tsivos 2022, 72–73). As a result
of this situation, the historian continues, the ref-
ugees asked to leave the country, a proposal that 35
was adopted both by the head of KKE in Hun-
ti gary and by the Hungarian Communist Party,
which asked for refugees to be sent to other so-
cialist countries. In December 1956, 800 of them
ta arrived in Těchonín. However, the behaviour Figure 7: Těchonín’s musicians tenants, n.d. around 1957
of these refugees was completely different from
that of the tenants of the barracks. In his report,
the director of Těchonín (Tsivos 2022, 72) not-
di ed that: (source: Savas’ personal archive)
With the Greeks from Hungary, we were
Often, but not always, refugees’ accounts of
confronted with phenomena of extreme
their time in the host countries, especially those
nationalism, Western mores and attitudes,
who remained loyal to KKE even after the end
particularly among young people, hostile
here attitudes towards the Soviet Union and its the refugee population and/or between KKE ex- remembering the former eastern bloc: who owns the legacy – the case of těchonín
of exile, play down the tensions that arose within
army, while, according to some complaints,
ecutives on the spot and the refugees. They also
certain political refugees should not have
often avoid commenting on the unfavourable
come here because they sided with the coun-
conditions in which some refugees found them-
ter-revolution at the time of the events [in
selves because of their ideological differences, al-
Budapest].
Savas, who recalls the arrival of refugees
Their accounts presented the refugee commu-
studiauniversitatis
from Hungary at Těchonín, does not com-
nities as a coherent whole, without antagonisms
ment on the context of their departure or the di- though in some cases this was an open secret.
vergence of positions within KKE at the time. and closely linked to the Party. This practice of
However, in his interview about Těchonín and embellishing refugee communities with regard
its importance for the lives of refugees in Czech- to outsiders, i.e. those who are not our commu-
oslovakia, he notes that: nist comrades, can be explained, on one hand,
by the polemics created about the history of the
for me it is important and it was important
this system, this socialist system showed me civil war and its memory in Greek society, and
that at the time, at the beginning of popular particularly in Greek historiography, and on the
democracy, [that] it could help people, that other hand, by the widespread anti-communism
is to say those who were in a difficult situa- in Eastern Europe on the other (Blaive 2020),
tion [...]. which have produced within refugee communi-