Committee for Hungarian Refugee Relief

The US President's Committee for Hungarian Refugee Relief was established by President Dwight D. Eisenhower on December 12, 1956. Tracy S. Voorhees served as chairman.^[1] The need for such a committee came about as a result of the United States' desire to provide for a share of the Hungarians who fled their country beginning in October 1956. The Committee operated until May 1957. During this time, the Committee helped re-settle in the United States over 30,000 Hungarian refugees.^[2] The committee's small staff was funded from the Special Projects Group appropriation. A portion of the committee's records are preserved in Voorhees' papers in Special Collections and University Archives at Rutgers University and are accessible online.

Duties and objectives

• To assist in every way possible the various religious and other voluntary agencies engaged in work for Hungarian refugees.
• To coordinate the efforts of these agencies, with special emphasis on those activities related to resettlement of the refugees. The committee also served as a focal point to which offers of homes and jobs could be forwarded.
• To coordinate the efforts of the voluntary agencies with the work of the interested governmental departments.

References

External links

• U.S. President's Committee for Hungarian Refugee Relief Records, Dwight D. Eisenhower Presidential Library
• Hungarian Refugees Received on Prince Edward Island, Canada (1956-1957)
• Resources on Refugees of the Revolution of 1956 in the United States

This page was last edited on 1 July 2023, at 00:13