Mária Wittner

Mária Wittner (Gazdagh-Wittner; born 9 June 1937) is a Hungarian revolutionist and politician, who participated in the Hungarian Revolution of 1956.

She participated in the demonstration on 23 October 1956 and joined the revolutionaries during the siege of the Magyar Rádió building. She get acquainted with Katalin Havrila and on the following days they together helped the provision of the wounded. Later she became a member of the Vajdahunyad Street resistance group and with her companion they occupied the Police station of the X. district to find weapons on 30 November 1956. She was wounded by shrapnels during the invasion of the soviets in Üllői út on 4 November.

She was treated in the Péterfy Sándor State Hospital. She tried to escape from the invaded country but she was arrested. After the questioning she was set free and tried to flee the country once again and spent a few weeks in Austria. Then she came back to Hungary and began to work as an unskilled worker. She was arrested on 16 July 1957. She was sentenced to death on 23 July 1958. The sentence was modified to life imprisonment by the second appeal court on 24 February 1959. She was released from prison on 25 March 1970.

Firstly she worked in a dressmaker's room and later as a cleaner. From 1980 she is a disability pensioner. After the change of the political system in Hungary she has been actively involved in the work of different veteran organisations of the 1956 revolution. She was awarded with the Grand Cross Order of Merit of the Republic of Hungary in 1991.

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