Miklós Wesselényi
Nicholas Baron Wesselényi of Hadad [ vɛʃɛle ɲi ː ] (Hungarian Miklós Wesselényi, slow Mikuláš Vešeléni. ) ( Born December 30, 1796 in Jibou (then Zsibó ), Transylvania, Kingdom of Hungary); † April 21, 1850 in Budapest (then plague ) was in the Kingdom of Hungary a baron, politician, landowner, member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and one of the leaders of the liberal Hungarian and Transylvanian nobility opposition from 1825 to 1840.
Together with Ferenc Deák, Francis A. Pulsky and others, he was (especially at first ) member of a group of Hungarian reform politician István Széchenyi, on the one hand in the backward Kingdom of Hungary liberal reforms (especially the abolition of serfdom ) wanted to impose, on the other hand, however, for the conversion of the state in a purely Magyar state was ( Magyarization ). However, in contrast to the more radical group around Lajos Kossuth they were for a slow, non-violent assimilation of the non- Magyars in the Kingdom.
Nicholas commanded as early as age 15, a small section of the insurrection ( the banns ) from 1809 and participated in the Austrian army during the last campaigns against Napoleon Bonaparte. The Kingdom of Hungary was at that time part of the Austrian monarchy. On the political scene, he first appeared in 1818 on the county assemblies, where mainly the political situation was discussed. After a long pause, he became active again in 1823. 1823 his main work Szózat a magyar és szláv nemzetiség ügyében published in Leipzig (Call in the matter of the Hungarian / Magyar and Slavic nationality), in which he summarized his views on liberal reforms and Magyarization and to the major works of Hungarian nationalism before 1848 counts.
In 1823 he met his friend István Széchenyi know and made with it a study trip through Western Europe (England and France). 1829 plague appeared in his second work A régi Híres ménesek egyike megszünésének okairól ( about the causes of the end of one of the old farms).
From 1830 to 1833 he appeared in the upper house of the Diet in Pressburg ( now Bratislava ), where he brought in his fiery speeches of 1830 and 1832 great authority and popularity. Published in 1833 in Bucharest, his long time forbidden Balitéletek ( miscarriages of justice ). His ideas were gradually more radical, he was the most zealous promoters of the issued by Kossuth lithographed newspaper, and he demanded a separation of Hungary from the Austrian monarchy. In 1834 he took part in the Diet in Cluj / Kolozsvár. In 1835 he was tried for a speech that he gave in terms of basic detachment at the meeting of the county of Satu Mare in court and defended by the politicians Kolcsey. In the summer of 1837 he and Kossuth were sentenced to three years in prison in Buda / oven. The prison, he went to in 1838 and spent her later voluntarily in Grafenberg, where he lost his eyesight. After he was pardoned in 1840, he retired to his castle Zsibó. He then became the advocate of assimilation of the non- Magyars of Hungary and spoke in particular against an emancipation of the Slovaks.
As a result of the events of 1848 he went to after a long hiatus in the state legislature to stand up against the precipitations. But he could hardly make a difference, and then withdrew again to Grafenberg. On the way home after the plague, he caught a severe cold and then died in the plague.
Wesselényi has rendered outstanding services also to the spread of kindergartens and the introduction of sericulture in the Kingdom of Hungary, as well as to some issues in agriculture and animal breeding.