A disembodied statue of Joseph Stalin's head on the streets of Budapest during the Hungarian Revolution, 1956

 

Stalin's memorial was demolished on 23 October 1956, enraged by the anti-Soviet mob during Hungary's October Revolution.

Built as Stalin's birthday on his seventh birthday (December 21, 1949), the Stalin memorial in Budapest became the iconic scene of the Hungarian uprising in 1956.

The monument was built on the edge of the city park Wersligat in Budapest. The large monument was a total of 25 meters long. The bronze statue stood eight meters high on a four-meter-high limestone base at the top of an eighteen-meter-wide. Stalin was depicted as a speaker, standing tall and stern with his right hand on his chest. The edges of the tribune were decorated with relief statues in which the Hungarians welcomed their leader. The memorial not only demonstrated the power of Stalin, but also the power of the Hungarian Working People's Party.

The large monument was a total of 25 meters long. The memorial not only demonstrated the power of Stalin, but also the power of the Hungarian Working People's Party.

On October 23, 1956, approximately two hundred thousand Hungarians gathered in Budapest to demonstrate sympathy for the Poles, who had received political reform during the Polish October. The Hungarians broadcast sixteen demands on radio, one of them being the disintegration of Stalin's statue.

One hundred thousand Hungarian revolutionaries demolished Stalin's statue, leaving only his shoes, in which he carried the Hungarian flag. The bronze name of the Hungarian leader, teacher and "best friend" was inscribed. Before climbing over the statue, someone placed a sign on Stalin's mouth that said, "Russians, don't leave me behind when you run away!". The revolutionaries said "Russia go home!" While pulling the statue down. "welcome." And other derogatory remarks were fragmented over fragmented parts of the statue.

There is a contemporary report about how this came about (translated from Hungarian):

“Eventually we managed to secure the place and start the trucks. Then the strings began to pull the nefarious hatred of a symbol by the neck. All together, repeatedly, pull, watch out! - And the statue does not move. The wires spoke one by one and we were fighting our tears, feeling angry and impotence. But we said: man put it there, man should be able to remove it. We had to think something.

One of the engineering students (such as myself) says that their school is relatively nearby, they have gas cutting equipment there. Five boys bring cutters, as we work on it people become happy; Instead of shrinking, the crowd increases. We get a lot of help, many of us are skilled with equipment because we were engineering students and welcomed by trade. With all this we know that we cut the statue from below the knee in minutes; The biggest issue was to push the crowd back because everyone was eager for help. There were no owners and workers, apprentices and teachers then and there. Everyone was equal there and everyone wanted to help.

It finally happened, we managed to bring the crowd back; And then the trucks can get compromised statue, cracking and rusting. It must have been the happiest moment of my life up to that point, which was witness to how the huge, hideous symbol crashed to the ground. When we lay there we drove it and we crossed with excitement, as if we had defeated the whole communism and we embraced each other with joy. "

Note "WC" is inscribed on the monument.

"[The protesters] were put [...] a thick steel cord around the 25-meter-tall Stalin statue, while the others, who were coming in trucks with oxygen cylinders and metal cutting strip pipes, were placed on the statue. Started working on bronze shoes. […] An hour later the statue fell down from his pedestal. "

The fragmented parts of the statue were disparaged.

The remains of the statue on the Grand Boulevard.

The site of the former Stalin monument now occupies the commemoration of the 1956 revolution, which was completed in 2006 for the 50th anniversary of the historic event. A life-size copy of the Tribune was created in Statue Park in Budapest in 2006 with broken bronze boots on top of a pedestal. It is not an exact copy of the original but only an artistic recreation by the sculptor oskk Eleőd.