Posted on 06/22/2004 10:07:58 AM PDT by Chi-townChief
BERLIN -- The Browning pistol that killed Archduke Franz Ferdinand and sparked the crisis leading to World War I has been discovered gathering dust in a Jesuit community house in Austria.
The weapon is going on display in the Vienna Museum of Military History in time for the 90th anniversary of the assassination of the heir to the Austrian empire and his wife, Sophie. Gavrilo Princip, a student from Belgrade, fired seven shots as they were driven through Sarajevo on June 28, 1914.
The shooting led to World War I, which by one estimate resulted in 8.5 million deaths.
For decades the murder weapon, serial number 19074, was in the possession of a community of Jesuits in Styria, southern Austria. They inherited it from a close friend of the archduke and his wife.
A Jesuit priest, Anton Puntigam, gave the couple the last rites and later made public his intention of opening a museum in memory of the archduke. But the chaos of the war foiled his plans.
On the priest's death in 1926, the objects were offered to the archduke's family, which declined to take them. They remained out of sight until recent publicity about the 90th anniversary.
Daily Telegraph
Yeah, they better have Arlen "Scottish Law/Not Proven/Magic Bullet" Specter.
Well, there was that tiz over some guy wanting to buy the estate of Jeff Dahlmer, and put his cooking utensils on display.
WWI was going to happen sooner or later. The underlying causes were in place. The Archduke's assasination is what you would call the "proximate cause" of an otherwise inevitable conflict.
The British-German naval arms race is really a function of the Kaiser's desire to have a fleet for its own sake. A different Kaiser might not have built the High Seas Fleet, and in so doing, antagonized the British.
I don't know about that -- the roots of the war had been bubbling in the Balkans since at least 1912 (the two Balkan Wars), not to mention the effects of German militarization and expansionism, and the Russian/British/French reaction to it.
The assassination was certainly a pretext for war, but it would have happened anyway. The Germans, especially, were eager for war.
Or, it could just be a catchy headline.
bttt
Is that the same novel as "The Good Soldier Schweik" -- it sounds like it. That is one of the funniest books I've read.
Venerate it all you like. It really doesn't matter to me.
In fact have a priest parade around with it during mass since it is such a fascinating object.
I must say though that I prefer the Cecil Parrott translation of the opening sentence, which is closer to the original Czech anyway, even if it doesn't convey the idea that "they" had done it to "us":
'And so they've killed our Ferdinand,' said the charwoman to Mr Svejk, who had left military service years before, after having been finally certified by an army medical board as an imbecile, and now lived by selling dogs -- ugly, mongrel monstrosities whose pedigrees he forged.
Goodness gracious, what an idiot.
not true - more likely the WW! would have been fought later. WW1 was waiting to happen.
yup. give or take a decade.
I recall the Kaiser famously said "when I hear the word INTELLECTUAL I reach for my revolver". I always could relate.
"more likely that WW1 would have been fought later" We can at least be sure that it would have occured prior to WW2.
I thought Goering said that.
If he did he add plagerism to the his Nuremburg docket
That of course depends upon who wins the war, Absolutely FANTASTIC picture, What is the biplane do you know?
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