1946 - present

Thomas Wolf was born Wolf Tamas in Budapest, Hungary on 7 August 1946, one year after the end of WWII.

During the war, Thomas’ mother and sister were forced to live in the Budapest Ghetto and his father was sent to Mauthausen concentration camp. His mother and sister lived in a residence protected by the Swedish Red Cross, the Swedish Red Cross and the Swedish Consul General Raoul Wallenberg saved as many as 100,000 Jews in Hungary during the war.

His father survived the concentration camp and returned to Budapest where he worked in the textile industry until 1956, when tensions with the Russians in Hungary increased, so “my father didn't feel safe because whereas pre-revolution, it was Communism ‘A’ and after the revolution it was obviously going to be Communism ‘B’ and inevitably there was going to be a purge of sorts, so we had to get out”.

The Hungarian Revolution broke out on the 23rd of October in 1956 and in December that same year, 10 year old Thomas, his father, mother and sister walked (and sometimes crawled) across the border to the Austrian village of Nickelsdorf before going to Vienna. The family were assisted by HIAS, a Jewish welfare agency, who put them into refugee camps in Austria before assisting with visas for migration. Although the family had visas for Israel, due to the Suez crisis, Thomas’s father decided that this was not for them, so they applied for visas to Canada and Australia.

The Wolf family were granted visas to live in Australia, so they made the journey to Naples where they boarded the ship, MS Flaminia which brought them to Sydney. On arrival they were taken to the migrant lodgings ‘Chip Chase’ in Greenwich, before moving to Waverley and then settling in Bondi.

Thomas was involved with the 3rd Rose Bay Judean Scouts and in various other capacities in Scouts Australia where he dedicated 36 years to the development of youth leadership in the community.

Now retired, Thomas is the current President of the Waverley Community Men’s Shed and works as a volunteer at the Mark Moran Village at Vaucluse. He continues his community service, but now works with the elderly.

The Hungarian Revolution of 1956 against the Soviets sparked the second wave of Jewish Hungarian migration. As a result of this conflict approximately 20,000 Hungarian Jews fled to Canada, USA, Australia, and Israel between 1956 and 1957. Of those who came to Australia, an estimated 70% of these immigrants settled in Sydney.

Courtesy of Tom Wolfe and Eat, Pray, Naches.