The following is an adapted version of an article originally published in Magyar Krónika.
The Hungarian coronation regalia was hidden in a petrol drum cut in two.
On 27 March 1945 Hungarian crown guards evacuated the Holy Crown, the coronation regalia, and the Holy Right from the country and hid them a month later in Mattsee, in Austrian territory. As written on the website of the Hungarian National Museum, the relics only returned home from the United States in 1978.
In March 1945 the fighting was still going on in the Transdanubian region, with the Germans planning to launch another counter-attack at the Margit Line linking the Drava and the Danube. The crown jewels and the Holy Right were first taken to Veszprém, then to Kőszeg and Velem to escape the approaching Soviet troops. Then, on 27 March, the crown guards transported the treasures to Austria.
A month later, at the last Royal Hungarian Crown Council in Salzburg, the fate of the regalia and relics was sealed: it was concluded that they could not fall into the hands of the Allies.
In the spirit of this decision, the Holy Right and the coronation robe would be entrusted to the parish priest of Mattsee, 25 kilometres from Salzburg, and the crown jewels were buried in a halved petrol drum on the border.
Shortly afterwards, the crown guards were captured by the Americans, and the opening of the crown depository in Augsburg revealed the fraud. Finally, Colonel Ernő Pajtás disclosed what had happened, and the Americans found the coronation regalia together with the Holy Right. The latter was returned to the country, but the coronation regalia moved around a lot in the following years until they were shipped to America and stored in the Treasury’s Bullion Depository at Fort Knox until the 1970s.
‘The crown jewels were buried in a halved petrol drum on the border’
The communist leadership made several attempts to reclaim them, but the US side was not open to this until 1977. In December of that year a Hungarian delegation was allowed to travel to the United States to identify the treasures, and in January 1978 the Holy Crown and other insignia finally returned home.
You can read more about the history of the Holy Crown here.
Otherwise, the Crown had to be removed in a hurry during the 1848–49 Revolution, too. When Windisch-Grätz’s troops threatened Buda and Pest, Sámuel Bónis, a member of Parliament, escorted by grenadiers, had it taken across the bridge to Debrecen, on whose metal structure a temporary bridge deck was laid so that it could be used already during construction and, with special permission, by people other than those working on the bridge.
Related articles:
Click here to read the original article.
