FULL FEATURE: Franz Ferdinand

The Man Who Could Have Stopped the First World War?

Nobody actually went to war to avenge the murder of the Archduke Franz Ferdinand. His death was a convenient excuse to open fire on a neighbour who needed putting in their place. By August 1914, he was already an afterthought. By the end of the decade, the world was aflame, and with the outbreak of a pandemic to add to political, cultural and social Armageddon; his life, death, his stolen future and his legacy were all irrelevant. And the irony? If he had not had been murdered, he just might have been the man who could have stopped it all from happening.

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In Serbia, 28th June was a significant date. It was the anniversary of the worst day in history. In 1389, the Serbian kingdom, led by Prince Lazar onto the Kosovan plain, had succumbed to the Turk. To mark the anniversary in 1914, 15-year-old Stevan Idjidović was going to make the pilgrimage to the monastery at Ravanica for the first time. An ethnic Serb, he lived just inside the Austro-Hungarian Empire. His village was on banks of the River Sava, and on the other bank was the Kingdom of Serbia. A little under 40 miles upstream was the border with Bosnia-Herzegovina, downstream the Sava flowed into the Danube and through Belgrade.

With the family’s coachman, Rada, he rattled out of the courtyard with his mother calling behind him not to stay out too late. They set out early, the sun still lying low on the Eastern horizon. Hordes of people were converging at the monastery. On foot, in carriages, they all crossed a little stone bridge across the ravine and passed through wrought iron gates set into the white-washed walls surrounding the church.

Stevan was moved. ‘The monks’ deep rich voices accompanied by the fervent chorus of the reverent pilgrims sent shivers through me.’ There was something holy about it. At the end of the service, they waited to see the mummified remains of Prince Lazar:

’An ancient purple brocaded robe covered the entire surface, exposing a withered forearm with jewelled rings on leathery fingers. Where the head should have been, there was only a depression. The head had been lost on the battlefield. I wondered about the rest of the body… It was, for me, a moment wrought with emotion. Although it all happened in the distant past, for us Serbs time stood still. When the Battle of Kosovo was talked about, its significance to us was so meaningful that it might have taken place last year.’

Outside in the sunshine he took in the diverse sight of the other worshippers: ‘The colourful women’s dresses, worn with golden jewellery around the neck, [belonged to our] women… in the southern provinces of Austria-Hungary. The women in sombre colours and the men in red fezzes had come from Bosnia-Herzegovina. From Serbia came women wearing white homespun dresses… They were accompanied by men in dark brown baggy trousers and boleros edged in black braid.’

The soundtrack to the afternoon was the low, mournful wail of the gajda, the Serbian bagpipe. ‘A middle-aged man with sandy hair and drooping moustaches puffed up his cheeks and blew air through a reed into a skin tucked under his arms. His melodies were in a minor key; sad love songs reflecting tragedy and fatalism.’ In another area a group stood around using an aging Gislar, a white-haired man ‘wearing a black sheepskin cap who played on his one string instrument, retelling the ancient ballads, and the epic of the battle of Kosovo.’ Monks dispensed plum jam and water, villagers passed around cakes and pastries filled with meat and cheese.

Stevan and Rada were reclining under a tree when the crowd fell silent. ‘Two gendarmes appeared out of nowhere. A worried young student strode along without stopping, electrifying everyone. “The Archduke Franz Ferdinand was killed this morning in Sarajevo by a Serb!”’ The festive mood was crushed instantly. Anxious whispers rippled through the crowd. The church bells began to toll and immediately the crowd began to disperse. Everyone was in a great hurry to get away. Traffic across the bridge was congested. ‘Thick clouds of yellow dust rose up under the horses hooves and the churning carriage wheels, enveloping the countryside.’

It was a long journey home, and Stevan had hours to think:

‘Killed by a Serb kept running through my mind… it was a disturbing thought to me that, of all the multinational subjects of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, it had to be a Serb. I recalled that as a high school student, we had demonstrated against the increasing encroachment of the state upon rights given to our forefathers when they settled in the under-populated regions of Austria… I also kept thinking that if certain things had not happened in the past, the future might have been totally different. In my schoolboy way I kept thinking, “If Tsar Lazar had won on Kosovo Field… Serbia would have continued as a kingdom… no opportunity would have been created for Austria to annex Bosnia-Herzegovina; and Archduke Franz Ferdinand would not have been assassinated this day by a Serb.”’

It was late afternoon when they reached home. The streets were empty. ‘We were greeted only by our two dogs wagging their tails. At this point, a single bell pealed from the church steeple next door.’ Dinner that night was a solemn affair. Stevan’s father led a discussion about what the assassination might mean for Serbs within the empire. Could it mean open conflict with their kin across the river? ‘The wars along this border had occurred before the memory of the present living inhabitants. Not even my grandfather… whom I considered very ancient, could recall any such incidents.’

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200 miles to the west in Sarajevo, there was chaos. The mood festered overnight. Posters were put up encouraging anarchy. Elements of the church, the civil authorities, they encouraged disorder. A pogrom swept through the city. The Hotel Europa, owned by Serbs, was ransacked by a screaming mob; cars in the garage were torn apart and the battered chassis kicked around on the floor. In the city’s famous bazaar goods were grabbed, ripped, thrown on the pavements in piles. The windows of a Serbian school were smashed, the building vandalised. Shops. Houses. Anything with a Serb connection was a target and aggression escalated. Terrified Serbs were singled out and beaten. To try and protect themselves they waved flags. They sang loyal songs at the top of their lungs. They resorted to chanting Franz Ferdinand’s name as they watched their property destroyed by Christians and Muslims alike. The hysterical German consul described the lowest rung of society, goaded into action by the police, rampaging through the city. Those participating were certainly in a minority, but violence spread throughout Bosnia after the shooting. The Governor declared a state of siege throughout the entire province. Unrest took hold further afield in the Austro-Hungarian empire. In Croatia, the desecration extended to Serbian graves. From Dubrovnik to Zagreb people shouted, plundered and destroyed. The Slovenes called for war, promising that the ‘heavy fist of the Slovene Soldier ... would shatter the skull of that Serb in whom voracious megalomania lived.’

And yet. Though violence, where it occurred, was terrifying, as well as allowed, if not encouraged by certain authorities, not everyone was disappointed at the Archduke’s demise. In certain Viennese quarters people were actually pleased that he was gone. Count Ottokar Czernin noted that there was “no atmosphere of mourning; in the Prater and out here where we are in Grinzing, there has been music playing everywhere.” It was even more so in Budapest, for Franz Ferdinand was an established enemy of Hungarians. He was despised and the mood was one of relief, even celebration.

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Who was this man whose death provoked such visceral, contradictory reaction the length and breadth of an empire he was destined never to rule? Archduke Franz Ferdinand was not born to be Emperor, and so his life as a young man was one of enviable, lazy comfort as he took up cursory military service, travelled, hunted, and carried out light royal duties. Then, the monarchy was struck by tragedy. In 1889 the Emperor Franz Jozef’s only son, Crown Prince Rudolph murdered his teenage mistress and then blew his own brains out. The philandering prince had managed to pass on gonorrhoea to his unfortunate wife, Princess Stephanie of Belgium, rendering her infertile at 22 having produced a single daughter. Unable to divorce her, or to have any more children himself, Rudolph and his latest concubine decided that life was not worth living and formed a suicide pact. The elderly Franz Jozef, with his hangdog expression, accentuated by an impressive set of droopy whiskers, had at this point reigned for six decades. His brother, the Archduke Karl Ludwig, became his heir, and his nephew, Franz Ferdinand, reluctantly joined the imminent line of succession at the age of 25. His life was no longer his own.

He dealt with this depressing reality by bucking against it. He was wrapped in cotton wool. He sulked. With the death of his father in 1896 and the strain of all that was expected of him as the heir apparent, an emotional collapse seemed on the cards. In these circumstances, an oft preferred royal solution was to find a bride for the wayward prince in question and get him settled down. It was not unreasonable, for Franz Ferdinand was now 35 and harboured dreams of a happy domestic situation. Yet, after years of rumours, the odd mistress, and hopeful women throwing their daughters at him, he was mostly unmoved, and a little repulsed by people’s endeavours to land him a wife. He doubted that he would ever love his bride, and it was for that reason that he demurred. ‘When one of my position loves somebody,’ he wrote, ‘some trifle in her family tree which makes a marriage impossible is sure to be found. So it comes about that with us, man and wife are always related to each other twenty times over. The result is that half of the children are idiots!’ When the right woman came along, he was blown away, but his grim prophecies played out.

Sophie Chotek boasted all the aristocratic pedigree required, and then some, and yet it was not enough for her to make the grade as a Habsburg bride. The Archduke watched as the Emperor recoiled in horror at the thought of the match. Franz Josef gave him a week to come to his senses. He did not. Franz Ferdinand was determined. His uncle warned him that the marriage would be morganatic, that his subsequent children would have no place in the succession. Bribery did not work, nor threats, and eventually, with precious few heirs left available to him, the Emperor capitulated. But not until he had rewritten Habsburg statutes to make it illegal for Sophie to become Empress, even after he was dead and gone. Franz-Ferdinand and Sophie’s married life became a feat of defiance carried out in the face of petty slights designed to humiliate them.

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So much for the man. But what sort of Emperor did he look like becoming? As a Habsburg prince, his upbringing was predictably conservative and predictably catholic, but despite this, Franz Ferdinand realised that for Austria-Hungary, things could not continue as they were. Nationalism was too great a threat. While it was not yet definitely shaped in his mind, he planned a massive overhaul of the Empire when his uncle died. He toyed with ideas such as a triple state, inaugurating a Slavic kingdom, or once he’d visited America, a federal system, whereby the different elements of the Empire would operate autonomously on a local state level, but ultimately answer to Vienna.

One thing he absolutely was not, was a warmonger. Instead of being fiercely determined to maintain the existing integrity of the Dual Monarchy and the territories within it by force, Franz Ferdinand accepted as a foregone conclusion that some level of compromise was going to be necessary to drag Austria-Hungary into the modern era. He believed that he, Kaiser Wilhelm and Tsar Nicholas could forge a powerful triumvirate to bring stability to Central and Eastern Europe.

Within his own borders, however, the Archduke was prevented from growing into his future role. The Emperor was a nightmare for compartmentalising influence. Austrian ministers had nothing to do with Hungarian issues, and cross-departmental debate and engagement was minimalised as a result. Everyone operating in isolation stunted Imperial politics completely.

But what is key in assessing how Franz Ferdinand’s presence might have shaped events in July and August 1914, is the fact that his strongest influence was in the military arena. This was the field in which he spent the vast majority of his considerable energy after 1898. He had certain command responsibilities when the army was on manoeuvres, and the right to stick his nose in to military and naval affairs, and to have documents made available to him from both halves of the Dual Monarchy. He was even given a military adjutant to help him organise these prerogatives. Later, the Emperor also permitted to form an office to exercise this power at the Belvedere, Franz Ferdinand’s opulent Vienna home. His Militärkanzlerei became famous, a hub from which all manner of stakeholders: generals, bureaucrats or even journalists could come together to shape, debate and influence Austro-Hungarian military affairs. In 1908, Franz Jozef ratified this setup by making the office official alongside the existing military infrastructure.

This work far superseded any influence, official or not, that the Archduke ever had on other matters such as foreign policy or domestic affairs. It went without saying that in the event of a war, his role would be significant. In military matters Franz Ferdinand, by the time of his assassination, was officially at the head of the governing process, with only the Emperor above him. Whilst victories over his uncle’s stubbornness might have been few, they included having his candidates installed as both War Minister and as Chief of the General Staff. His uncle may still have made appointments that he knew disgusted Franz Ferdinand, but he was achieving some kind of balance. Added to that, it was not only victories that cemented his influence. Even if he didn’t get his own way, Franz Ferdinand had fully planted himself into the process. In defence matters, it became routine that his opinion was solicited, or at the very least considered. People were not stupid. At the onset of the war, Franz Jozef would turn 84. It was anticipated that sooner, rather than much later, his nephew would succeed him.

After 1912 the Archduke had also demonstrated how he would react to the threat of war. During the Balkan Wars he demonstrated that he favoured peace. He had a solid and hugely beneficial friendship with the Kaiser and proved that he could comfortably sit at a table with the Germans and wield influence in decision making on an internation stage.

He was on the periphery of the decision making process when trouble flared again the following spring, but was greatly relieved when Austria-Hungary did not go to war. The Second Balkan War began in June. Once again, he was a strong advocate for peace. When Austria-Hungary sent an ultimatum to Belgrade in October demanding Serbia withdraw from Albania, Franz Ferdinand was furious. ‘I absolutely would not undertake war action now since I do not believe the necessity exists.’ As it was, Serbia capitulated, but once more, Franz Ferdinand had proved that he was not ready to stand by and see the Dual Monarchy embroiled in a war over a power struggle in the Balkans.

Where did this leave people’s perceptions of the man? Archuduke Franz Ferdinand was a polarising figure. There were those that loved him. For some, they saw in him their saviour. In military affairs, already he was in a useful position should someone want to circumvent the compartmentalised way of doing things in Vienna. As for the future, much of the Empire’s complex population wanted reform, and here was a man promising to offer that. The Belvedere set, emanating from the Militärkanzlerei, were primed to come to power with him and included high profile men from across business, military, government, press and church sectors. He was seen as a man ready to breathe new life into the Empire.

But not everyone welcomes change, and not everyone found their interests represented by him, and so the Archduke was not without enemies. Far from it. His increasingly caustic relationship with the ageing Emperor did the Dual Monarchy no favours. Generally, Franz Jozef repeated all of the mistakes that he had made with his son, Crown Prince Rudolph, jealously guarding his influence. He thought his nephew was power hungry, too liberal and did not like his independent train of thought. Those loyal to the Emperor feared the changes that would come with his accession, and so a large proportion of the establishment was deeply suspicious of the Archduke.

Franz Ferdinand was a direct enemy to some. He possessed a vitriolic hatred of all things Hungarian.

His bigotry was born out of his own army experiences in which he reviled the Hungarian officers he was exposed to. He never forgot, either, that the Hungarian press rejoiced on the death of his father. He thought Budapest was trouble, a hotbed of sedition and that nationalism emanating from the Hungarian capital threatened the monarchy. He also thought that Iztván Tisza, twice Prime Minister of Hungary and the dominant political figure by a mile, was a positive danger when it came to the integrity of the Empire. To be fair to him, he was not necessarily wrong about Tisza, but all of this meant that of the limited influence he was able to wield before 1914, Franz Ferdinand had almost no contact with Hungary. The hatred was mutual. Any of the Archduke’s plans to reformat the Empire meant depriving Hungary of the power it currently held. He had intimated that he was willing to carry out his federated states plan by force if necessary, which meant that Hungary potentially stood to lose a lot when he fully came to power.

By 1914, then, it was not possible to make an important decision on anything to do with the defence of the Empire without consulting the Archduke. When it came to the threat of war, he proved that he was an advocate for peace, and that he could remain so even if it meant opposing the Emperor and the establishment. The changes to the Empire that he wanted make could be derailed by a large-scale conflict, and he showed that by no means did he take for granted that any scrap in the Balkans would either have the desired result, or be able to take place without other major powers becoming involved and the whole thing escalating. Perhaps most of important of all, he recognised the potential for disaster if the Dual Monarchy went up against Russia.

To read the second half of this feature go here:

FULL FEATURE: Franz Ferdinand Pt.II

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