LUTZ, CARL°

LUTZ, CARL ° (Charles ; 1895–1975), Swiss diplomat who was responsible for saving Jewish lives in World War ii. Lutz was made responsible for the interests of a number of countries who had severed relations with Hungary. He arrived in Budapest on January 2, 1942. As the representative of British interests, he came into contact with Moshe (Miklos) Krausz, the Jewish Agency immigration representative in Budapest. They developed a good relationship, working to maintain the modest flow of immigrants from Hungary to Palestine until the German occupation in March 1944.

Following the German occupation, Lutz gave Krausz and his team diplomatic protection in a Swiss office building. During the concentration and ensuing deportation of Hungarian Jewry – according to German documents 437,401 Jews were deported on 147 trains between May 15 and July 9, primarily to Birkenau, where a railroad spur was built directly into the camp to receive them – Krausz continued to try to foster emigration to Palestine and implored the Swiss and the Jewish Agency to influence the British to declare the holders of Palestine visas potential British citizens. At the height of the deportations, in late June 1944, the British agreed to Krausz's proposal. On July 7, the Hungarian regent, Miklos Horthy, declared that the deportations must cease. Soon after he also declared his willingness to allow 7,500 Jews to immigrate to Palestine, along with their families. This became known as the Horthy Offer, and it rendered Palestine visas even more valuable.

Working with Lutz, Krausz assembled a team, which was comprised mostly of Zionist youth movement members. From the Glass House on Vadasz Utca, a Swiss holding, they distributed Palestine visas along with Schutzbriefe, letters of protection in the name of Switzerland. Some 50,000 Schutzbriefe were disseminated. After October 15, 1944, when the fascist Arrow Cross leader Ferenc Szalasi was brought to power by the Nazis, Lutz and other neutral diplomats redoubled their efforts to protect Jews from deportation. In addition to safeguarding those Jews who held legitimate Schutzbriefe, they also tried to help the thousands who held counterfeit documents. They intervened with the Hungarian authorities, trying to stop the deportations altogether, and – until that was possible – to mitigate their effect.

In November, the Hungarian authorities declared that a ghetto must be established for those Jews without Schutzbriefe, while Jews holding legitimate papers would be housed under the auspices of their foreign protectors. Lutz and the other neutral diplomats did what they could to prevent the founding of the ghetto. Although they managed to have its establishment postponed, they could not avert its ultimate creation. Once it was set up, they did their best to care for the Jews' day-to-day needs, working with the Zionist youth underground. Lutz, along with other neutral diplomats, also procured homes for the Jews under his protection. Jews bearing false Schutzbriefe found their way in to these homes and Lutz did his best to protect them as well. Nonetheless, both he and Raoul *Wallenberg, a Swedish attaché, were forced to delineate between Jews with real documents and Jews with forged papers at the concentration point in Obuda. Lutz also tried to save the deportees, who were being marched from Obuda to the Austrian border by foot. He filled out unused Salvadorean visas in their names and managed to pluck Jews from the lines of the Death March. With the conquest of Pest by the Soviets in mid-January 1945, Lutz moved to Buda. There he protected Jews in a Swiss building until that side of the city was also taken in mid-February. Lutz's work in saving Jews was officially recognized by *Yad Vashem in 1965.

bibliography:

Grossman, Nur das Gewissen: Carl Lutz undseine Budapester Aktion; Geschichte und Portrait (1986).

[Robert Rozett]