These men took up arms and formed an estate within society that received charters, rights and privileges over the centuries, mainly from the princes of Transylvania,[5] but which were eventually recognised by the Habsburg kings of the Kingdom of Hungary.

Following the peace Treaty of Trianon,[6] which banished the ruling House of Habsburg from Hungary, a constitutional assembly decided to return to the monarchical form of government and replace the incumbent Habsburg regent, Archduke Joseph August of Austria, with Vice-Admiral Miklós Horthy de Nagybánya.

[7] Membership replaced the titles of nobility; since Horthy was only the regent of the Hungarian Kingdom, he had no rights to make people knights or noblemen.

[11] László Ferenczy, a Lieutenant colonel in the Hungarian Gendarme who worked under Endre to first establish the ghettos and later the deportation of the Jews of Hungary in 1944, gathered thousands of Jews at the Obuda brick factory and sent them on a death march towards Hegyeshalom near the Western border to build a line of defense, and indicated in reports that he was aware of what was taking place at Auschwitz.

[11] The majority of the real estate owned by Jews that were deported after the German occupation of Hungary went to organizations supportive of the collaborationist regime, including the Order of Vitéz and some of its members.

[18] The most famous of them[citation needed] was Vilmos Nagy de Nagybaczon, who was awarded the title of Righteous among the Nations for saving Jews.

[19] Vitéz[citation needed] Colonel Ferenc Koszorus deployed his troops to stop Jewish deportations, allowing the escape of perhaps as many as 250,000 Jews concentrated in Budapest.

[25][26] Lieutenant-General Vitéz Szilárd Bakay was deported to a Nazi concentration camp for his activity during Horthy's armistice attempt on 16 October.

[9] Under the Armistice signed between the Allies and the Provisional National Government of Hungary (hu:Ideiglenes Nemzeti Kormány), which was set up in the liberated part of Hungary from the fall of the Nazis until 1945, the Government undertook "to dissolve immediately all pro-Hitler or other fascist political, military, para-military and other organizations on Hungarian territory conducting propaganda hostile to the United Nations and not to tolerate the existence of such organizations in future.

The reasons behind the multiple seccessions After the first one, which happened in 1997 under the guidance of Archduke Joseph Árpád of Austria,[31][32] are (According to the group called "Kárpát-medencei Vitézi Rend") mainly the following: the practice of granting the title to foreigners, the decision to make the office of captain general hereditary and distance from the demands of the Hungarian members of the Order.

[33] The Order recognized by the ICOC since 1964 had Joseph Árpád as its head since 1977 to 2017, while the Vitézi Rend under gróf Molnár-Gázso János claims that the archduke was Captain General until 1993 and "Grand master" until 1997,[34] year of the seccession of the two groups.

(1960– ) The Order led by the Hungarian branch of the Habsburgs, recognised by the I.C.O.C., still has some prestige among the nobility, showing as most notable members: