The Shot Heard ‘Round the World

7 Jul
Gavrilo Princip assassinates Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife in Sarajevo, 1914
Gavrilo Princip assassinates Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife in Sarajevo, 1914

When people hear the phrase “shot heard around the world” they immediately think of the shot that was fired by an unknown person at the battle of Lexington in 1775 at the beginning of the American Revolution. This mysterious shot had enormous consequences and those consequences spread across the globe. That is why we call it the “shot heard around the world”.

There is another shot that was fired 139 years after the shot at Lexington which can also be described as a “shot heard around the world”. This shot was the shot fired by Gavrilo Princip in Sarajevo, Bosnia in 1914. Gavrilo killed an Austrian dignitary and his wife and this assassination changed the world forever. The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand set into motion the First World War and this led to the unraveling world. The following is an excerpt from my work-in-progress, “World War I: The Unraveling of the World”. In this excerpt I will explain the story of the assassination as well as its consequences.

“If there ever was a “shot heard around the world” it was the shot that killed Austro-Hungarian heir to the throne, Archduke Franz Ferdinand in Sarajevo, Bosnia on June 28, 1914. This shot culminated in the unraveling of the world and the end of the Napoleonic age and the dawn of the modern age.
The Archduke was on an official visit to the city of Sarajevo and went touring the city with his wife Sophie and members of his staff. Unknown to the Archduke and his assistants, however, the Serbian terrorist group called the Black Hand had plotted to kill the Archduke while he was in Sarajevo. The day was bright and filled with pomp and circumstance as the Archduke and his retinue wove through the streets of Sarajevo. Suddenly, a young Serb by the name of Cabrinovic jumped from the crowd and threw a bomb towards the stately couple’s car. It bounced off the Archduke’s car and exploded under the car behind his. Cabrinovic then jumped into the Miljacka River after swallowing a pill of cyanide. In a cruel turn of events, he survived the jump and the only effect of the cyanide was his vomiting. He was arrested by police.
The Archduke continued his tour of the city but made a slight, yet fatal change of plans. He decided to visit the hospital to see those who had been injured by the bomb blast. On the road to the hospital, his driver took a wrong turn. Providentially, the driver drove down the street on which another Serb terrorist, Gavrilo Princip, was waiting. Princip, acting fast, stepped into the street and fired two shots, mortally wounding the Archduke and Sophie. They both died soon afterwards.”

The assassination in Sarajevo was the spark that ignited the years of tense and hesitant rivalry which had festered under the skin of the great European powers for decades. Years had been spent adding wood and oil to the pyre and the Archduke’s death was all it took to set the world aflame. The shot was heard around the world and its consequences were felt around the world for generations.

Note: This post is part of a series of blogpost on the First World War, leading up to the release of “World War I: The Unraveling of the World” by Jace Bower in the Fall of 2014. To see other posts in this series, type “Unraveling” in the search bar located in the top right corner of this page.