Wallenberg, Raoul

A Swedish businessman recruited by the U.S. War Refugee Board in 1944 to travel to Hungary to aid and rescue Hungarian Jews. Wallenberg was assigned to the Swedish embassy and given diplomatic status, enabling him to provide protective documents to Jews in Budapest and to create a system of safe houses. He saved tens of thousands of lives. After the Red Army reached Budapest in January 1945, Wallenberg was detained by Soviet officials and disappeared. The circumstances of his disappearance were never clarified.