Metadata: Records of the Orphans’ Court of Pest-Pilis-Solt-Kiskun County, 1876-1950
Collection
- Country:
- Hungary
- Holding institution:
- National Archives of Hungary, Pest County Archives
- Holding institution (official language):
- Magyar Nemzeti Levéltár Pest Megyei Levéltára
- Postal address:
- Pf. 141., H-1450 Budapest, Hungary
- Phone number:
- +36 1 455 9050
- Web address:
- http://mnl.gov.hu/pml/
- Email:
- pml@mnl.gov.hu
- Reference number:
- IV.B. 410
- Title:
- Records of the Orphans’ Court of Pest-Pilis-Solt-Kiskun County, 1876-1950
- Title (official language):
- Pest-Pilis-Solt-Kiskun vármegye árvaszékének iratai, 1876-1950
- Creator/accumulator:
- Orphans’ Court of Pest-Pilis-Solt-Kiskun County
- Date(s):
- 1876/1950
- Language:
- Hungarian
- Extent:
- 1071.07 linear metres
- Type of material:
- Textual material
- Physical condition:
- good
- Scope and content:
-
The collection contains records regarding the matters of Jewish orphans and other persons under guardianship from the localities of Pest-Pilis-Solt Kiskun County between 1876 and 1950. Jewish-related material is scattered throughout the material. As for the pre-1944 parts, Jewish-related files can be located by family names and actual cases. The records of the Orphans’ Court from 1944 (fascicles 1-257) are one of the key sources pertaining to the nationalisation of the wealth of Hungarian Jews in spring/summer 1944. According to decree no. 230.000/1944 of the Ministry of Interior on 10 April 1944 on the handling of the assets of “absent” Jews (that is, those who were promptly taken to the ghettos and collection camps after April 16 and therefore could not report their property as prescribed in governmental decree no. 1600/1944 issued on the same day) fell on the Orphans’ Courts of the counties and cities. They were entitled to appoint public trustees (közgyámok) and guardians to take over and handle all the property of the Jews. The decree quoted above referred to Act 20 of 1877, which allowed (in urgent cases) to put those people under guardianship, who were “absent, staying in an unknown locality, or hampered from returning home and handling their property”. Soon after, government officials realised the task was far beyond the ability of the Orphans’ Courts. At the beginning of May, Financial Directorates were made responsible for the appropriation, inventorying and safekeeping of Jewish property.
Post-1944 records in the collection contain plenty of information pertaining to the inheritance of citizens murdered during the Holocaust. Under the terms of Article 27 of the Treaty of Peace with Hungary signed at Paris on 10 February 1947, Hungary was committed to restore the property, legal rights and interests of all those who suffered persecution based on racial origin or religion, or, if restoration was impossible, make fair compensation. Any property that remained heirless or unclaimed for six months after the coming into force of the Treaty was to be transferred by the Hungarian government to organisations representing the victims. The value of the property was to be used for relief and rehabilitation of survivors in Hungary. (See: https://www.loc.gov/law/help/us-treaties/bevans/m-ust000004-0453.pdf) As a result, the Hungarian state initiated legal procedures in 1947 in order to identify heirless or unclaimed property of people who fell victim to Fascist persecution, overwhelmingly Jews. The Orphans’ Courts were the key administrative bodies in this process. Relevant records of the Orphans’ Court of Pest-Pilis-Solt-Kiskun County from this period include declarations of death (holttá nyilvánítás) introduced by relatives at the local District Courts (járásbíróság). According to Governmental Decree no. 4700 of 1945, the procedure was announced in the state bulletin Magyar Közlöny and after 60 days the given person was declared legally dead, unless the authorities received evidence that he or she was alive. Thematic group C/4 of the general records include more than 200 inheritance cases from various municipalities in Pest-Pilis-Solt-Kiskun County from 1947-1948. (nos. 243/1948─5057/1948; 19169/48─28801/48 56066/48─77061/48)
Besides, there are two other types of files in this part of the collection:
1. inventories of inheritance (hagyatéki leltárak), which consist of the names of successors, the place and dare of declaration of death. The inventories were taken in the presence of one of the successors.
2. guardianship cases (gondnokság alá helyezés): in the absence of the owner or any legal successors, the property was declared abandoned and placed under the guardianship of state-appointed individuals.
- Archival history:
- The records of the Orphans’ Courts were handed over to the Pest County Archives in the early 1950s.
- Administrative/biographical history:
- Orphans’ Courts were administrative bodies serving as public trustees in the counties and cities in Hungary between 1877 and 1950. According to Act 20 of 1877, Orphans’ Court was declared the public trustee of first instance (elsőfokú gyámhatóság). The Orphans’s Court consisted of a chair, at least two members and a notary as well as the Public Prosecutor (tiszti ügyész), but the latter did not have a right to vote. Act 35 of 1923 modified this system and from this time on one assessor (előadó ülnök) handled the matters of orphans and other clients, under the supervision of the chair. The Orphans’ Court was entitled to appoint guardians and wardens (gyám; gondnok) and to supervise them, to make decisions concerning the wealth of the wards, boarding, and the maintenance and other matters concerning the children of divorced parents, and various other matters.
- Access points: locations:
- Bács-Kiskun
- System of arrangement:
- The records of the Orphans’ Court of Pest-Pilis-Solt-Kiskun County were arranged into the following provenance subgroups (állag): IV. 410. a. Minutes of council meetings, IV. 410. b. Presidential records, IV. 410. c. General records, IV. 410. d. Records of Orphans’ Prosecutor–Árvaügyészi iratok, IV. 410. e. Records of Orphans’ Cashier–Árvapénztári iratok. Within these groups, the files are arranged chronologically, the number of files re-started each year. Certain cases from the years 1938-1944 are handled separately (C/2, kiemelt különcsomók) and arranged in alphabetical order.
- Finding aids:
-
Indexes and registry books are available for the entire collection.
Ernő Lakatos, ed: A Magyar Állami Levéltárak fondjegyzéke, Vol. III. A Területi Levéltárak fondjegyzékei Part 13. A Pest Megyei Levéltár fondjainak jegyzéke. Budapest: Magyar Országos Levéltár, 1975.
An outdated file-level description in Hungarian is available on-line. Pest County Archives has prepared a revised edition of the description lately, but it was not publicly accessible at the time of writing.
- Yerusha Network member:
- Hungarian Jewish Museum and Archives
- Author of the description:
- László Csősz; Hungarian National Archives; 20-11-2015 (In cooperation with the European Holocaust Research Infrastructure)
