Hungarian refugees Larry (Laurence) and Anna Herbert are still thankful to this day for the opportunity to become naturalized Canadian citizens. Here is a glimpse into how it all happened.
Larry Herbert was born in Kislod, Hungary in 1933. He was engaged to be married to Anna Gazso - a girl who lived down the street. Anna was also born in Kislod in 1938.
It was 62 years ago, that Larry picked up his wages for the last time and in the middle of the night the young couple and eight other young adults fled their county of birth by the light of the moon and headed for Austria to escape the tyranny of communism. They crawled through ditches to escape the guards who, if they caught them, would shoot them from tanks patrolling the borders. When they arrived at the bridge where their hand drawn map instructed them to cross the river, they found that the bridge had been blown up. They continued on to a more dangerous area to cross the river and when they arrived on the other side the bullets were flying. They had to crawl in the marsh along the side of the river until they arrived at the border. To their relief, the border guards were asleep on the job so they were able to just walk across to safety.
Once they made it past the border and into Austria, they were housed in a refugee camp for a period of one week. They left the refugee camp with only the clothes on their backs. They were issued temporary passports and after signing documents agreeing to get jobs and pay back the airfare they were flown to Canada. Larry and Anna and other refugees landed in Toronto, Ont. in December of 1956.
Anna said, "When we arrived in Toronto we were met by officials from the Canadian Red Cross. Larry and I each received $5 and the news that we did not have to pay back the cost of our airfare. That was great news and the $5 seemed like a fortune. The Canadians and the Hungarian Canadians were wonderful to us. They shared their food with us and gave us clothing. They helped us send the news back home that we made it safely to Canada. We felt that we were lucky to be alive.
"We could not speak English but we did speak German so that was a start. We moved to Sarnia, Ont. because I had an aunt and some cousins living there. The first thing we did was get a marriage license and we had a church wedding. We found work and started to learn the English language.
"We lived there for 13 years. Larry worked as a millwright at Canadian Oil and I worked in the hotel industry. We saved some money and bought a small house.
"In 1969 we heard that the pulp mills in Prince George were hiring. We took a holiday in July and went to Prince George. We couldn't believe it but it was snowing in Prince George on Canada Day that year. We liked Prince George because of all the hunting and fishing and the fact that we would have a paid move to Prince George if we accepted a job at Canfor. The drawback was that there was very little housing and we could not find anything that we really liked.
"We returned to Ontario and prepared to move. Larry left for Prince George, I sold the house and sadly said good bye to all my friends and then I followed Larry."
Anna became a stay at home mom. They bought some land and had a house built. They sold that house and built another one because they needed a bigger house because their family was growing.
Larry worked at Intercontinental Pulp as a millwright and retired in 1993 after 24 years on the job.
They traveled a bit and then lived at Cluculz Lake for a few years until health issues caused them to move back to Prince George.
They had three children; John (deceased), Larry and Elizabeth. They had two grandchildren and three step-grandchildren. Sadly, their grandchild Ryan passed away.
Anna said, "We are thankful to have lived our lives here in Canada and especially Prince George. I am still in touch on a regular basis with my friends back in Ontario as well as my friends and family here in Prince George. They are all my greatest source of enjoyment."
