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Wait, didn’t that happen though? I thought the arch duke was originally supposed to be killed in a failed bombing, and the handgun was a second and happenstance

Wait, didn’t that happen though? I thought the arch duke was originally supposed to be killed in a failed bombing, and the handgun was a second and happenstance scenario.

marcusverus 7y ago
There was a royal procession to City Hall in Sarajevo, during which a grenade was thrown at the Archduke. It (barely) missed, they drove off, and had a meeting with some local magistrate. After the meeting, Franz wanted to travel to the hospital to visit the civilians who'd been wounded by the errant grenade. En route, his driver, confused, took the same route from the morning procession. When they realized what was happening, they told him to turn around and get the out if there. When the driver stopped to turn around, they were ~1 block from the site of the first assassination attempt. One if the co-conspirators (who had lost his nerve the first time, and had been milling around and hoping that Franz would come back by), was standing where the car came to a stop. Two shots killed Fran's Ferdinand and his wife. Fun fact about this--Franz Ferdinand's death was not the cause of the Great War in the way that people tend to think it was. The assassination caused the war in the sense that it was a convenient excuse for a war that the Austro-Hungarians already wanted, but not because (Austro-Hungarian Emperor) Franz Joseph wanted revenge or anything like that. In fact, Franz Joseph's secretary later said that he "almost seemed grateful" that Ferdinand (whose marriage was so problematic that he had been forced to proactively abdicate on behalf of his children) was out of the way.
- SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
  Thought so, that (in much less detail) was my recollection. Thanks for that.
- filoleg 7y ago
  My middle school history teacher always stressed the point about reasons vs. triggers for events, and it has stuck to me since then, as it makes looking at things like this much easier. Basically, there is a giant list of political reasons for the Great War, I am not gonna list all of them here, but I fully agree with you that the assassination was not one of them. Franz Ferdinand's assassination was the trigger.

Wait, didn’t that happen though? I thought the arch duke was originally supposed to be killed in a failed bombing, and the handgun was a second and happenstance scenario.

marcusverus 7y ago

There was a royal procession to City Hall in Sarajevo, during which a grenade was thrown at the Archduke. It (barely) missed, they drove off, and had a meeting with some local magistrate. After the meeting, Franz wanted to travel to the hospital to visit the civilians who'd been wounded by the errant grenade. En route, his driver, confused, took the same route from the morning procession. When they realized what was happening, they told him to turn around and get the out if there. When the driver stopped to turn around, they were ~1 block from the site of the first assassination attempt. One if the co-conspirators (who had lost his nerve the first time, and had been milling around and hoping that Franz would come back by), was standing where the car came to a stop. Two shots killed Fran's Ferdinand and his wife. Fun fact about this--Franz Ferdinand's death was not the cause of the Great War in the way that people tend to think it was. The assassination caused the war in the sense that it was a convenient excuse for a war that the Austro-Hungarians already wanted, but not because (Austro-Hungarian Emperor) Franz Joseph wanted revenge or anything like that. In fact, Franz Joseph's secretary later said that he "almost seemed grateful" that Ferdinand (whose marriage was so problematic that he had been forced to proactively abdicate on behalf of his children) was out of the way.

SlowRobotAhead 7y ago
Thought so, that (in much less detail) was my recollection. Thanks for that.
filoleg 7y ago
My middle school history teacher always stressed the point about reasons vs. triggers for events, and it has stuck to me since then, as it makes looking at things like this much easier. Basically, there is a giant list of political reasons for the Great War, I am not gonna list all of them here, but I fully agree with you that the assassination was not one of them. Franz Ferdinand's assassination was the trigger.