Records of the Subprefect of Pest-Pilis-Solt-Kiskun County

The fond of the records of the Subprefect is one of the key collections pertaining to the history of the Jewish communities and the Holocaust in Pest-Pilis-Solt-Kiskun County. The most relevant parts are the following:

IV.B. 408.a-b. Classified and Administrative records, 1876-1944 The survived material from the years 1938-1943 (Boxes 240-259), include records concerning the implementation of the anti-Jewish laws and instances of bureaucratic and illegal antisemitic measures, including the withdrawal of trade licences and permits, quitting rental agreements of Jews, exclusion of Jews from the municipal committees and social organizations, registration and expropriation of Jewish landholdings; administrative procedures against Jewish communities; Jewish responses, including requests for exemption, cases of magyarization of names, citizenship cases, petitions for birth certificates and other family documents, activities of Zionist organizations; activities of the national socialists and other extreme right-wing movements, hate speech and propaganda. The Holocaust-related part of the collection (boxes 642-687) includes the implementation of anti-Jewish decrees, internment of Jewish individuals, ghettoization, transit camps, labour service, expropriation of Jewish wealth, cases of escape, rescue and mitigation, exemption cases, antisemitic propaganda (posters, fliers), as well as reports and denunciations against Jews. Post-Holocaust records include petitions of returning survivors for social aid and restitution, the re-establishment of Jewish organizations, participation of Jews in the social and economic life, including the restart of enterprises and reports about abandoned property.

IV.B. 408.c. Records of Petty Offences, 1884-1944 This part of the collection includes cases of Jewish tradesmen, merchants, shop- and innkeepers and other individuals as well as industrial and commercial companies who violated (or were falsely accused of violating) economic laws. Jewish-related cases can be localized by the registries and indexes.

IV.B. 408.d. Passport issues, 1904-1944 The collection includes documentation pertaining to the requests for passports, as well as lists of passport holders and registries and indexes of passport holders. Vol. 164 contains the list of passports issued for pro-Nazi activists and sympathizers. Several personal files contain original photos (portraits of the applicants and their family members).

IV.B. 408.e. Naturalization and citizenship, 1882-1944 This subgroup includes registry books on naturalization cases, cases of individuals deprived of Hungarian citizenship and declarations of individuals holding Hungarian citizenship.

IV.B. 408.f. Public welfare The collection holds lists and registries of traders and shopkeepers, declarations of stocks of Jewish companies, appointments of authorized wholesalers and traders (discrimination against Jewish companies), social aid to Jewish individuals, including war widows and orphans and family members of military labour servicemen, documents on ration cards, and many other social matters.

IV.B. 408.g. Mobilization This part of the collection contains plenty of information on the social and economic problems caused by the deportation of Jews in 1944, including doctors and other specialists.

IV.B. 408.i. Records from 1944 handled separately Only one registry book survived from this part of the collection, holding 472 cases from the fateful year of 1944.

IV.B. 408.u. Collection of quarterly reports Subprefects regularly submitted quarterly reports to the Municipal Committee, which covered all aspects of the political, social and economic life of the county. These provide researchers with plenty of information on the implementation of anti-Jewish laws and decrees and anti-Jewish measures in 1944, including disenfranchisement, expropriation of property and ghettoization.

The records of the Mayor’s Office were arranged into 21 provenance subgroups by departments or special functions, numbered from 408. a. to 408. u-2., out of which the most relevant are the following subgroups: a (classified records), b (administrative records), c (records of petty offences), d (passport issues), e (naturalization and citizenship), f (public welfare), g (mobilization), i (records from 1944 handled separately), u (collection of quarterly reports). Within these groups, the files are arranged chronologically, the number of files re-started each year. Initially, each record had an individual number, but later the office introduced the system of basic numbers, in which the number of the file was identical with the number of the latest document within the folder pertaining to the same case. Passport records from the years 1921-1938 are arranged in alphabetical order.