Memoirs of archduke Franz Ferdinand

                                As we have been taught in our high school history classes, Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in Sarajevo on June 28th, 1914 and that was the instance Which sparked the initiation of world war one.

 

Here , on This blog , you get to know about the Great War ( ie : - world war one ) ; more than 100 years later. Talking about Franz Ferdinand himself, I shall quote a very brief bio about him.

He were born in 1863, as one of the Austria’s 70 archdukes ; by then , it was not the austro-hungarian empire. He had became quite opulent , just before reaching his teens ; just because when his kinsman passed away and he was chosen to inherit a vast estate ; as his replacement . Then , suicide of his cousin Crown Prince Rudolf ; altered his fate massively.

This led to Ferdinand’s father  becoming heir to the dignity and Cathedra  of Austria-Hungary, but he immediately repudiated his position, leaving Franz Ferdinand next in Queue to rule the government . He held this position even when he were assassinated, by which time emperor Franz Josef had come of age ( ie :- 84 years old ) and Ferdinand was 50.

If you read any bio, no matter how long or short it may be, of Franz Ferdinand, you’ll sooner or later find out that not a whole lot of people actually liked him; other than his wife, the Duchess Sophie Maria Josephine. She was a deviant aristocrat, but without royal ancestry, hence , the royal house decided that None of the two , of Sophia or her children would take over the throne.

This also led to the conclusion that they weren’t that much acceptable by the Austrian aristocracy, despite he having held the place as the next possible Monarch, and a lot of populace changed the course of their way , to handle the Archduke and his consort like trash .

 

Add another thing that every life story of his , is sure to mention that Ferdinand’s zeal for hunting- he seemingly wrote down over 250,000 animals and beasts killed in his 50 years on this planet.

I assume that’s indeed not all over, but what actually IS everywhere ; are Franz Ferdinand’s faiths . He was very orthodox and stable , and let’s quote “unworded” to be polite.

He despised the Hungarians, he thought the Slavs were inferior in status than humans, and he actually turned to Serbs , as “pigs”.

He was also very firmly Catholic, which carried with it the anti-Jewish bags and suitcases of the times. 

He did adore and care for , his wife with a great zest, though... and the protection and care of the Austrian Empire, and THAT is something we’ll get back to in a while.Before that, let’s talk about his executioner ; Garvilo Princip .Princip was a member of the Young Bosnians, which was one of several violent secret communities , of it's time, and it were actually the one who decided to assassinate Franz Ferdinand when he declared his June visit to Bosnia in March 1914.

Hence in May, Princip and two associates visited Belgrade, Serbia, where they were provided with four pistols and six hand grenades by the Black Hand,and Princip had a bit of shooting exercise in a city park.

That’s not particularly relevant, I just thought I’d like to mention that . People did undergo shooting practices in city parks , back then. So, by the end of May ; Princip and company went to an eight-day trip to Sarajevo, to butcher the Archduke. It’s important to write that the Austrian authorities and the Archduke himself were aware of the hazard of some sort of the murder attempt, since these sort of things were pretty main stream in the empire and particularly in the Balkans.

Here’s a quote from Ferdinand ; on the solar day he began his journey to Sarajevo and his car heated  : "Our journey starts with an extremely promising omen. Here our car burns and down there they will throw bombs at us."

So , the evening before they were presumed to reach Sarajevo, Franz Ferdinand and Sophia shocked everyone by showing up early, just on impulse, and indeed head a good time .

Roaming around the town, which was a pretty non native place back then, and later on that evening came one of the great presage moments of all time; a member of the parliament of Bosnia who had desired Ferdinand and Sophia to not take the whole trip , for security reasons , was granted to Sophia, and she said this:

“Things do not always turn out the way you say they will. Wherever we have been, everyone, down to the last Serb, has greeted us with such great friendliness, politeness, and true warmth, that we are very happy with our visit.”

So far, so good. Then the person , named Sunaric, replied : “Your Highness, I pray to God that when I have the honor of meeting you again tomorrow night you can repeat those words.” truly.

         Then they had a big feast that night, and late the next morning- coincidentally their 14th wedding          commemoration - the archducal procession left Sarajevo terminal. Speaking of the numbers ,                 seven         Young Bosnian triggermen were positioned on the town’s bridges, the one which  the             Archduke had to pass . One of the Young Bosnians threw a incendiary bomb at his car, but it                 rebounced off the cowl before it detonated , injuring two of the Archduke’s guards. 

The motorcade drove on to the town hall and they listened to a bunch of the usual articulations, and after that, Franz Ferdinand altered his idea. He decided to visit the men who’d been injured by the explosive to see if they were all right, so he decided to go to the hospital. 

But there was a lot of uncertainty and indecision over the new route and who was told what to do and who wasn’t,so when the Archduke’s motorist turned off the Appel wharf , the general sharing Ferdinand’s car told the driver that Not to back up and continue on Appel Quay .

So the driver put the brakes on the car, which had no working commute gear, right next towhere Gavrilo Princip was positioned.

So Princip lifted his pistol and shot twice from hardly a few feet away. Sophie expired instantly, and Franz Ferdinand’s dernier cri were “Sophie, Sophie, don’t die- stay alive for our children.” He passed away after.

It’s pretty surprising when you consider that this whole enterprise could have possibly succeeded. It was so unbelievably unprofessional, and had the Austrian dominions taken any precautions quite well, I mean, that just think about it, there are scores of people who think the Black Hand was more associated with it, but you’d consider they’d plan a little better, or hell, plan in any case.

Anyway , the immediate results were , that the word of the assassination unrolled immediately throughout Europe, and in Bosnia , the time July had passed ; more than 5,000 Serbs had been imprisoned , many of whom were later sentenced to death , when the war broke out. Princip was detained, being 27 days to young to undergo the death penalty as per the Austrian law. Now, there were a certain number of , European leaders who were seriously concerned about the political results of the act, but most of Europe responded by being of the opinion that it was more of the same- the conventional Balkan business, another Balkan killing. 

There was very little sorrwoing and lamentation, even in Vienna, for the unloved Franz Ferdinand, and his funeral service only continued 15 minutes, but there was one thing that became obvious only years later....You see, Princip, or the Serbs, or the Black Hand, or no matter who you like to say was behind the extermination of archduke, really got the wrong guy.

Franz Ferdinand, for all his discussion about Serbs being pigs, or Russian autocracy being a good role model for the coming time , for all his backward and outdated concepts, had firm opinions on two very significant things :

i. In contrast to most of the realm , he was altogether against any war with Russia, and repeatedly gave out the statement , that he would do anything in his power to avoid it, and

 

ii. hence he put the empire above his personal credence, and to make the Kingdom work once again, he had sympathy to the notion of transforming the bi-partite state of Austria-Hungary into a tri-partite state of Austria, Hungary, and a union of the Slavic peoples as the third share of the empire.

So when a Serb exterminated Franz Ferdinand, it was an assasination that was not only against Serbian interests , but since the Austrian Empire used the killing as a reason to invade Serbia, even if it lead to war with Russia-Princip killed the one and only person in the empire who was intent on,  and able to prevent that war , that is Franz Ferdinand.

That was our Great overture Prelude to war Special. thanks for the read .