Beskyd, Antin

Beskyd, Antin [Бескид, Антін], b 16 September 1855 in the village of Hankivtsi (Hanigovce) in the Prešov region, d 16 June 1933 in Uzhhorod. Politician and lawyer in Transcarpathia who from 1910 to 1918 represented the opposition People’s party in the Hungarian parliament. In 1918–19, as head of the Ruthenian People's Council in L’ubovňa he strove for the unification of Transcarpathia and Czechoslovakia; he was a member of the Czech delegation to the Paris Peace Conference (September 1919). In October 1919 Beskyd became head of the Russophile faction of the Central Ruthenian People's Council in Uzhhorod and cofounder of the Subcarpathian Bank. He was the first president of the Dukhnovych Society. In 1923 he was made governor of Subcarpathian Ruthenia by the government of Czechoslovakia; he retained this prestigious but nominal post (the power was in fact in the hands of the Czech deputy governor) to the end of his life.

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 1 (1984).]