Szeged (Csongrád County) was a town located in southwestern Hungary, approximately 161 kilometers (nearly 100 miles) southeast of Budapest and nearly 63 kilometers (39 miles) northeast of Bačka Topola, Serbia (Hungarian: Topolya). According to the 1941 census, the last taken before the Holocaust in Hungary, there were 4,161 Jews (3%) and 781 Christians of Jewish descent (0.6%) living in Szeged. A ghetto was set up in Szeged. German troops occupied Szeged in March 1944. Between April 3 and 22, 170 prominent Jews and suspected communists from Szeged were interned in the Topolya camp. Preparations for the establishment of the Szeged ghetto began at the start of May 1944, and the ghettoization of Szeged’s Jews took place on May 31. Some 3,827 Jews and 500 Christians of Jewish descent were ordered to move into the ghetto. The Catholic Church managed to save approximately 200 Szeged Jews from ghettoization. Four to five families lived in each apartment. A Jewish Council and a ghetto polic...