guerrilla princip and the assassination of archduke franz ferdinand on sunday june 28 1914 serbian nationalist nadelko chabrinovich threw a bomb at the back of a car carrying archduke franz ferdinand the bomb rolled off wounded around 20 people behind the archduke instead not the best start to an assassination that would lead to world war one in 1914 europe looked a little different from today most of the continent was divided between three major powers the german empire russian empire and the austro-hungarian empire with france italy and a few other countries squashed in it was that last one the austro-hungarian empire and its strained relations with its southern neighbor serbia that is key to understanding why the assassination occurred serbia had grown to detest austria-hungary after it occupied its neighbor called bosnia-herzegovina first in 1878 and formerly in 1908 bosnia-herzegovina contained a sizable serb minority and was therefore believed by serbian nationalists that it ought to be part of their own country serbia overthrew their pro-austro-hungary rulers some years earlier in 1903 and had established a government that wasn't too fond of the empire by 1914 these tensions only increased as serb and bosnian serb nationalists stoked the flames of the slowly growing fire by creating militant organizations to obtain their territorial objectives and franz ferdinand's political desires significant as he was next in line as the emperor of austria-hungary only fueled their anger ferdinand was in favor of a more unified empire where its slavic citizens in southeastern europe would get better political representation while sounding great on paper to serbian nationalists it would accomplish nothing but weakening their goals for a separate larger serbian nation and so sought to prevent it in may 1911 the black hand was formed although back then it was better known as unification or death it was a secret revolutionary organization whose name tied in with its ultimate goal to break the southern provinces from the austro-hungarian empire and create an enlarged supposedly ethnically united kingdom of serbia although not part of the black hand young poor bosnian serb gavrilo princip who had been radicalized since his youth shared their sentiments and had befriended other radicals determined to change the tide of history later being introduced to the young bosnia group like many others he believed serbia had a moral duty to free yugoslavs still under austro-hungarian control princip was just 19 when he met other bosnian serbs like himself after traveling to and living in belgrade some of these later co-conspirators were students others were already revolutionary exiles because of their socialist beliefs over the last 10 years leading up to 1914 there had been multiple attempts on government officials lives by other nationalists the most notable of this was bogdan zaraich who attempted to assassinate general marian varshani governor of bosnia in sarajevo in 1910. he shot five times in his direction before turning the gun on himself this is one of the events that spurred on princip and his co-conspirators just a few years later in 1913 relations between bosnia and the rest of the empire had reached an all-time low a state of emergency was declared by general oscar patilrec leading to the dissolution of the bosnian parliament the imposition of martial law and the shutdown of serbian cultural and educational societies this of course only incited princep's rage further and he formed a group with two other friends nadelko chabrinovich and trifco grabbish whose goal was to ultimately follow the earlier zaraiich's example but with more successful results they were not the only ones who had such designs the black hand who princip was already friendly with were already busy forming their own plans in sarajevo a prominent member of the organization daniel irich sent chabrinovich a note a newspaper clipping regarding the archduke's planned visit and a single word in the margins greetings chabrinovich showed the paper to princip who had the same thought this was their opportunity this was not the young men's first encounter and princip were already friends along with chabrinovich and all members of the young bosnia group a revolutionary anti-austro-hungary group elitch would later claim he coordinated the attack completely although in truth he had been less the puppeteer than the puppet from there the three boys consulted major tankosic a serbian officer and one of the founders of the black hand who agreed to provide the group with weapons to carry out the attempt they sent ward to elij who immediately organized things in bosnia itself arranging to send three other young revolutionaries to meet the others in sarajevo their names were sejetko popovich vasso chubbulovich and mehmed mehmet armed with six bombs four pistols and a cyanide pill each to be taken immediately after the assassination the seven young bosnians began their attempt it was june 28 1914 archduke franz ferdinand and his wife the duchess sophia were to inspect a military garrison before traveling towards the city hall to open a new state museum daniel illich had positioned the assassins along their route each young man armed with a bomb but it turns out killing is a lot easier in theory than in practice first the motorcade went past mehmed bashtit who lost his nerve and failed to throw his bomb the same happened next with chuberlovich who also failed to act when he saw the car coming but the same cannot be said of chibrinovic when the car came down his part of the route he summed up all the courage of a 19 year old who had never seen war and threw his bomb which promptly rolled off the back of the archduke's car and under the wheels of the one behind in the motorcade injuring around 20 people but killing none what followed was more like a looney tunes episode than real life chabrinovich immediately swallowed his cyanide pill before jumping in the river unfortunately the pills were old and ineffective so rather than kill the young student all it did was make him vomit and rather than the river washing him away chabrinovich found himself standing in 13 centimeters of water as the river had dried up in the heat before being dragged out by police and beaten up before being taken into custody the rest vanished into the crowds in the confusion disheartened and angry their attempt had failed but unexpectedly for all of them that wasn't the group's last chance at the archduke after hearing others had been injured by the bomb ferdinand changed his plans to visit the museum deciding instead he wanted to travel to the hospital and check on the injured but that message did not reach the archduke's drivers who continued with the original plan meanwhile cabrillo princip was lamenting the group's failures at the nearby moritz schiller cafe when a twist of fate changed the course of history almost directly in front of the young rebel the car carrying the archduke was told to stop the driver being told of his error when the car came to a stop and put into a slow reverse princip saw his chance summoning his courage he pulled out the pistol tanko said she'd given him and at point-blank range shot arched franz ferdinand in the neck and his wife sophia in the abdomen immediately after both were dead before they reached the hospital in the aftermath 25 persons were implicated in the assassination mehmet bastich escaped to serbia but the others were not so lucky being over 20 years old trebilovich ilyich and fellow conspirator jovanovich were executed and princip chabrinovich and grebsche found themselves imprisoned at tresinstadt where all three would die in the next four years interviews with princip gibrnovich and popovich during their trials showed that these three at least did not regret their actions but they also didn't anticipate what would come next just a month later diplomacy and civility between serbia and the austro-hungarian empire had broken down completely serbia with the knowledge of new support from the russian empire still acquiesced to some of these demands by austro-hungary that included suppressing propaganda against the empire and allowing their officials to join the serbian inquiry into the assassination but without a complete agreement austro-hungary responded by breaking diplomatic relations the serbian army mobilized assured of russian support behind it austria-hungary 2 did not stand alone however having nurtured a pact of alliance with the german empire seeking to assure their ally kaiser wilhelm ii and his administration issued the infamous blank check to the austro-hungarian government promising uncompromised assistance in their endeavors in the balkans emboldened by their ally on july 28 1914 austria-hungary declared war on serbia shelling the national capital of belgrade that very night what occurred in the days that followed was a near domino effect of hostility as european powers and nations scrambled to honor pacts of friendship and alliance europe as historian christopher clark is written sleepwalked into war triggered in earnest by an angry 19-year-old boy gabrillo princip