The first shot - Kossuth Square, October 25, 1956

The firing on Kossuth Square on October 25, 1956 was the bloodiest event of the revolution and the war of independence, which took place in hitherto unclear circumstances. An unknown number of peaceful, unarmed protesters were killed and hundreds injured in the gunfire. In October 2016, the Parliamentary Museum launched a research program to further explore the circumstances of the volley. The aim of the research was not only to investigate the incident, but also to identify the hitherto unknown victims of the tragedy and to explore the biographies of the previously known victims. With this volume, we want to present the results of the research program: new sources related to the volley, interviews conducted by members of the research team, and clarifications of previous, erroneous data. In this volume, we publish all the photographs known and newly discovered that can be linked to the tragedy in a more accurate way than before, and we provide an authentic and complete list of civilian and professional victims. We are reconstructing the carefully prepared basic concept of the distorted and silenced memory of the firefight, during which we also get an answer to the question of who was silenced by the authorities and why.