Both attempts unsuccessful Free-electors Supported by: On 13 November 1918, Charles issued a proclamation in which he relinquished his right to take part in Hungarian affairs of state.

The continued Allied occupation made Károlyi's situation untenable, and in March 1919 he was pushed out of office by a Social Democratic-Communist coalition that proclaimed the Hungarian Soviet Republic.

This was Holy Saturday that year: the diet was not in session, the diplomatic corps was away in the country, and Regent Horthy planned a quiet holiday with his family in the royal palace.

Shorn of his moustache and armed with a forged Spanish passport, Charles left his Swiss villa and arrived undetected at Szombathely on 26 March.

Charles said he had "burned his bridges", and, speaking in German, spent the rest of the meeting using numerous arguments to break down the flustered Horthy's resistance.

He reminded Horthy of his tearful pledge of loyalty made at Schönbrunn Palace in November 1918, and of the sworn oath of obedience to the Habsburg monarch from which he had never been released.

[7] Horthy was created Prince of Otranto & Szeged and was awarded the Grand Cross of the Military Order of Maria Theresia, both distinctions which he didn't use.

Leaving by a back door and catching cold (he was given no overcoat), Charles was driven to Szombathely while Horthy spent the evening recounting the meeting in ever more dramatic fashion.

[10] Charles left Hungary with a deep antipathy toward Horthy, persisting in his belief that the great powers would not oppose a restoration and that (notwithstanding the vote in Parliament), the Hungarian people truly yearned for his return.

[11] In June, the legitimists, sensing that the government was taking no real action to bring Charles back, launched a major offensive against Horthy and Bethlen.

In response, Horthy and Bethlen began secret discussions with legitimist leaders in early August (preferring to deal with them rather than with the pro-democracy Smallholder faction of István Szabó de Nagyatád).

[12] Free-electors Supported by: On 21 October, Bethlen, having reached an agreement with the legitimist leader Andrássy, made an ill-timed speech to moderate legitimist aristocrats in Pécs, declaring that "the exercise of royal power is not just a right but a necessity"; that Charles' declaration of November 1918, forfeiting participation in the conduct of state affairs, was made under duress and therefore invalid; and that he would begin negotiations with the Great Powers at the "appropriate time" in order to convince them to accept a restoration.

[13] The previous day, after dictating his will, Charles had made a daredevil flight from Dübendorf airport in an Ad Astra Aero Junkers F 13 monoplane,[14] landing surreptitiously in western Hungary.

Having no intention to seek compromise with Horthy, whose cabinet he considered illegitimate, he formed a provisional government: On the afternoon of 21 October, while Bethlen was speaking, a group of armoured trains was being equipped in Sopron.

This royal armada was guarded by Ostenburg's troops, who were apparently told that communism had erupted in Budapest and that Horthy had called for Charles' help to restore order.

Departing for Budapest (some 190 kilometres (120 mi) away) late that morning, the armada proceeded more like a ceremonial excursion in the countryside than a relentless military advance, stopping at each village station to have the local garrison and public officials take the oath of loyalty and to allow groups of loyal peasants to chant "long live the King!"

Many officers, especially older ones, preferred a "wait and see" strategy, and most of those whose units were stationed along the royal armada's path found it impossible (or inexpedient) to be disloyal to Charles.

The Entente powers reaffirmed their opposition to a restoration, while the Czechoslovak, Yugoslav and Romanian ministers declared that such a move would be regarded as a casus belli.

Gyula Gömbös did however manage to assemble a ragtag battalion of 400-500 poorly equipped volunteers (many University of Budapest students) to be used for bolstering meagre army support.

In the only significant military engagement of the restoration attempt, 14 government troops and five of Ostenburg's were killed in the Battle of Budaörs (a village close to the capital).

Word of the skirmish (which resulted in a government victory) electrified the ex-king's officers, for they had assumed to march on Budapest would be bloodless; civil war was now quite possible.

That afternoon, as Hegedűs returned to the royal military headquarters just east of Kelenföld, the mood in the Hungarian officer corps also grew more pro-Horthy.

The King and Queen, temporarily sheltered on the estate of Count Móric Esterházy, were arrested at Tata and placed under military custody in a monastery in Tihany.

[23] Bethlen's maneuver, Horthy's plea, the departure of Charles and Zita on 1 November, and stern British and French warnings to Beneš defused the crisis.

It was clear that his 10-year-old son and heir Otto would not play an active political role for years, and the Hungarian royalist movement was never to recover its former influence.

To the surprise of many, though, Horthy appeared at a memorial service held for Charles at the Matthias Church in Budapest shortly thereafter, discharging a final duty to his former king.