Cited from the book of Paul Bernhard Meyer from 1840. In this book, we can read that Serbian troopers would torture their opponents to death, throw the wounded into wells, and burn other civilians alive. The Hungarians, on the other hand, were not known to commit such crimes.
“The Serb is full of cunning and deceit, whereas the Magyar prefers to resort to open acts of violence; the former is grasping and fawning—the latter, by contrast, is magnanimous to a fault; the former is servile and obsequious, especially toward those of greater strength or higher station, while the latter is proud to the point of recklessness.
In the ordinary course of life, the Serb therefore easily outwits his Magyar neighbor; the latter, embittered by this, makes the Serb feel his national superiority and often responds to these shrewdly calculated slights with acts of violence or brutality—driven more by a sudden surge of emotion than by any natural instinct.
Yet even in acts of violence, the Hungarian displays generosity, whereas the Serb reveals the perfidious baseness of his character. The Hungarian strikes down his opponent or hangs him from the nearest tree; the Serb, conversely—given the power to do so—tortures him slowly to death.
Moriz Bezerédj ordered the burning of numerous Serbian villages in the Bácska region, as well as the execution by shooting of several thousand Serbian irregulars and the hanging of others; yet atrocities such as those committed by the Serbs—who threw the wounded and prisoners alive into wells or slowly roasted them to death—were never perpetrated by any Hungarian general or Honvéd soldier.
Not even all the cruelties of a Haynau could drive the Hungarians to exact reprisals upon the many high-ranking prisoners held in their hands. Even amidst the tumult of battle, this noble trait of the Magyar character manifested itself in their treatment of wounded and fallen enemies.
While the Austrians stripped the fallen Honvéd officers of their uniforms and left them unburied in the open field, Görgey buried the fallen Austrian General Göz in Vác with all the honors befitting his rank. National sentiment plays a significant role in this trait of the Hungarians, for the underlying motive is always: “Look, this is how a Magyar acts!” An Austrian officer died after the battle.”
Source
Meyer’s Geschichts-Bibliothek für allgemeine Kunde des Kultur- und Völkerlebens Volume 21. Edition 1. 1840. p. 137 (Historical Library for General Knowledge of Cultural and Ethnic Life — With Illustrations — Volume Twenty-One, Part One — With a View of Sevastopol — Hildburghausen: Printed by the Bibliographisches Institut — New York: Paul Bernhard Meyer).
