Attila Petschauer

Attila Petschauer
Personal information
National team  Hungary
Born 14 December 1904
Budapest, Austria-Hungary
Died January 30, 1943(1943-01-30) (aged 38)
Davidovka, Ukraine
Sport
Sport fencing
Event(s) sabre
Medal record
Representing  Hungary
Men's Fencing[1]
Olympic Games
1928 Amsterdam Team sabre
1932 Los Angeles Team sabre
1928 Amsterdam Individual sabre

Attila Petschauer (December 14, 1904 – January 30, 1943) was a Hungarian Olympic champion fencer of Jewish heritage.[2]

Fencing career

Petschauer was born in Budapest, and was Jewish.[3][4][5]

He fenced first at a salle in Budapest opened in 1885 by Jewish maestro Károly Fodor (Mózes Freyberger) from the age of 8 to the age of 20, and then trained at Nemzeti Vivó Club (NVC) which was established by the Zionist lawyer Marcell Hajdu.[6] He won four Hungarian National Youth Championships.[6]

He was a member of the Hungarian fencing team in the 1928 and 1932 Olympics. Petschauer was regarded throughout the late 1920s and early 1930s as one of the world's top fencers.[7][8] Between 1925 and 1931, at the saber world championships he was three times a silver medalist and three times a bronze medalist.[9]

Olympic career

In Amsterdam in 1928 at the age of 23 he was part of the gold medal-winning Hungarian team in sabre, winning all 20 of his competition matches. In the individual sabre competition, Petschauer won the silver medal.[10][6]

In the 1932 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles, Petschauer was again part of the champion Hungarian sabre team.[6] The Hungarians won the gold medal in team sabre, and Petschauer finished 5th in individual sabre.[10]

Murder

Petschauer was arrested by the Nazis in 1943 and sent to a forced labor camp in Davidovka, Ukraine.[11][7][12][13]

Petschauer was tortured and murdered under orders of a Hungarian officer, a fellow former Hungarian Olympian named Kalman Czéh, during his service in a Hungarian-Jewish Forced Labor Battalion.[14][12] A fellow inmate, Olympic champion wrestler Károly Kárpáti, recalled: “The guards shouted: ‘You, Olympic fencing medal winner . . . let’s see how you can climb trees.’ It was midwinter and bitter cold, but they ordered him to undress, then climb a tree. The amused guards ordered him to crow like a rooster, and sprayed him with water. Frozen from the water, he died shortly after.”[15][12][16][17]

A fictionalized account of his life and death were dramatised in the 1999 film Sunshine, starring Ralph Fiennes.[10][18]

Hall of Fame

He was inducted into the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in 1985.[14]

Memorial event

The Attila Petschauer Event was begun in 1995 as a memorial to Petschauer by his descendant, Dr. Richard Markowitz.[16] It is known across the United States as one of the top sabre events.[19]

See also

References

  1. ↑ "Attila Petschauer Olympic Results". sports-reference.com. Retrieved April 27, 2010.
  2. ↑ Paul Taylor. Jews and the Olympic Games: The Clash Between Sport and Politics - With a ... Retrieved January 23, 2013.
  3. ↑ The International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame - Joseph M. Siegman
  4. ↑ Day by Day in Jewish Sports History - Bob Wechsler
  5. ↑ Encyclopedia of Jews in Sports - Bernard Postal, Jesse Silver, Roy Silver
  6. 1 2 3 4 Jews in the Gym: Judaism, Sports, and Athletics
  7. 1 2 Masquerade: Dancing Around Death in Nazi-occupied Hungary - Tivadar Soros
  8. ↑ Jews and the Olympic Games: the clash between sport and politics: with a ... - Paul Taylor
  9. ↑ By the Sword: A History of Gladiators, Musketeers, Samurai, Swashbucklers ... - Richard Cohen
  10. 1 2 3 "Petschauer, Attila". Jews In Sports. Retrieved 11 March 2016.
  11. ↑ Not Just a Game - Doug Zipes
  12. 1 2 3 In the Darkroom - Susan Faludi
  13. ↑ "Olympians Who Were Killed or Missing in Action or Died as a Result of War". Sports Reference. Retrieved 24 July 2018.
  14. 1 2 "Attila Petschauer". Jewishsports.net. Retrieved April 20, 2010.
  15. ↑ Lipman, Steve (August 8, 2008). "In Attila's Memory". New York Jewish Week. Retrieved April 17, 2009.
  16. 1 2 Who Betrayed the Jews?: The Realities of Nazi Persecution in the Holocaust - Agnes Grunwald-Spier
  17. ↑ Jewish Jocks: An Unorthodox Hall of Fame
  18. ↑ London, Europe and the Olympic Games: European Perspectives
  19. ↑ "fencingcenterli.com". fencingcenterli.com. Retrieved April 20, 2010.
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