In 1944, a twenty-three-year-old woman with an agricultural school diploma stood before a Hungarian military court and delivered a statement so defiant the judges had to interrupt the proceedings. A few hours later, she refused to beg for mercy.
Double Tuition
1930s Budapest presented Jewish families with a strange paradox. You could be wealthy, assimilated, have a father who was a famous writer and journalist, and yet still pay more for school than Catholic or Protestant students. Hanna was fortunate in this regard; she only paid double the standard tuition. Other Jewish pupils paid triple. The reason for this relative relief was that she was recognized as particularly gifted. The absurdity of this situation is almost poetic.
Hanna’s father died when she was a child, so she was raised by her mother Katalin and her brother György in the shadow of her father’s literary fame. This fame would later become something she desperately tried to escape. The antisemitism Hanna experienced at school was not brutal or spectacular. It was administrative, embedded in the system, written into the rules. Perhaps that is why it so effectively pushed her toward Zionism.
Escaping Her Father’s Name
In 1939, right after finishing high school, Hanna made a decision that looks prophetic in retrospect. She emigrated to the British Mandate of Palestine and enrolled in the Nahalal Girls’ Agricultural School. Choosing an agricultural school for a famous writer’s daughter may seem odd, but Hanna had her reasons. She wanted anonymity. She did not want to be Bela Szenes’s daughter, automatically assigned to Hungarian groups in the kibbutzim.
After two years, she joined Kibbutz Sdot Yam near ancient Caesarea. She worked in the kitchen and the laundry. This detail is important, as it shows that Hanna was not seeking heroism or glory. She wanted an ordinary life in a place where her background wouldn’t matter.
Yet, at the same time, she joined the Haganah, the Jewish paramilitary organization. Clearly, ordinary life was not enough.
Unending Struggle
In 1943, officers from the Jewish Agency knocked on the doors of the kibbutz with a proposal that sounded like a thriller plot. They needed volunteers for a parachute drop over occupied Europe to support resistance movements. Hanna volunteered. She enlisted in the British Women’s Auxiliary Air Force and underwent parachute training in Egypt as part of the Special Operations Executive.
In March 1944, she landed in German-occupied Yugoslavia. There, in May, she wrote a poem about a blessed match that burns out amid the flames. By then she knew her mission had a minimal chance of success. Hungary had just come under direct German occupation, and the deportation of Jews to extermination camps was in full force. Nevertheless, Hanna crossed the border in June.
The Trial That the Judges Lost
She was arrested almost immediately after entering Hungarian territory. The authorities also imprisoned her mother, hoping this would break the young parachutist’s spirit. They miscalculated. Hanna was tortured but divulged nothing about her mission or collaborators. At her trial in November 1944, she made a speech that, according to witnesses, left the judges bewildered.
She was sentenced to death. She was offered the chance to beg for mercy. She refused. On November 7, 1944, she faced the firing squad. She was twenty-three years old. Budapest would be liberated by the Red Army less than three months later. Hanna did not know this, but she likely would not have agreed to plead for mercy regardless.
In 1950, Israel brought her remains to Mount Herzl in Jerusalem. Her poem about the match became one of the most frequently quoted texts in Israeli schools. The paradox is that the woman who spent her life running from her father’s fame became a symbol herself. But this time, a symbol of something much greater than literature.
Marcus Renfell
Marcus Renfell is a historian driven by curiosity and passion. He refuses to accept the “safe,” polished versions of the past. Instead, he brings forgotten, overlooked, and distorted stories back to life. His work blends scholarly precision with the art of storytelling, turning historical narratives into vivid, page-turning experiences.
His mission is simple: to prove that history can be gripping, alive, and deeply personal.
His debut book: Women of Science. Stories You Were Never Told
In his first publication, Marcus Renfell shines a light on the remarkable women who shaped the world of science — both the pioneers whose names we know and the brilliant minds history forgot. It’s an inspiring journey through untold stories, groundbreaking achievements, and the resilience of women who changed our understanding of the world.
? Discover Women of Science. Stories You Were Never Toldon Amazon.com.