István Horthy

In his youth, István Horthy and his younger brother Miklós Jr. were active members of a Catholic Scout troop of the Hungarian Scout Association (Magyar Cserkészszövetség), even though he was a Protestant.[1] Horthy graduated as a mechanical engineer in 1928. He went to the United States for one year and worked in the Ford factory in Detroit, Michigan.

Returning to the Kingdom of Hungary, he worked in MÁVAG's locomotive factory in this occupation. On the forefront of the designer team, he took part in the development of many great projects, such as the Locomotive 424. Between 1934 and 1938, Horthy was director of the company and after 1938 he became its general manager. In 1940, he married Countess Ilona Edelsheim-Gyulai.

István was pro-Western, and he strenuously confronted Nazism, often making his criticism public, despite Hungary being a part of the Axis. In January 1942, he had been elected Deputy Regent, and for some time, the "small regent" enjoyed massive popularity in Hungary. Shortly thereafter, István was sent to the Eastern Front. His humanity, and his disagreement in the "Jewish Question" appears even here, too – a quote from one of his letters, which he sent to his father from Kiev: "[...] Yet another sad topic: the Jewish companies, as I hear, -there 20 or 30,000 [men]-, are at the mercy of the sadist's passions, in every regard; the stomach of man gets ache [looking at this]; it is abhorrent, that in the 20th century, it happens at us, too... [...] I fear, we will pay for this very dearly once. (Is it possible to take them home to work there?) Otherwise, in spring, only a few will be alive. [...]"[2]

István Horthy died in a much-publicized flying accident in Russia on 20 August 1942 (18 August, according to other authors),[3] shortly after his arrival.[4] He was then serving in the Royal Hungarian Air Force (Magyar Királyi Honvéd Légierő), MKHL, with the rank of 1/Lt, as a fighter pilot. His unit, 1/3 Fighter Squadron, was supporting the Hungarian Second Army against Soviet forces. He was flying his MÁVAG Héja I ("Hawk I"), V.421, a Hungarian fighter based on the Italian Reggiane Re.2000. During his 25th operational sortie, soon after takeoff from an airfield near Ilovskoye, the other pilot flying with him asked Horthy to increase his altitude. István pulled up rapidly. His aircraft (which had become much more prone to stalls after a steel plate was added behind the cockpit of all Héja Is to protect pilots, but shifting the plane's center of gravity) stalled and crashed.[5] According to other sources, his aircraft entered a flat spin after he made a turn at low speed to fly in close formation with a He 46 reconnaissance aircraft. Some were convinced that the Germans had sabotaged his aircraft.[6][7]

His only son, Sharif István Horthy, is a successful engineer.

Hungary honoured István Horthy by issuing a commemorative postage-stamp on 15 October 1942.[8]

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