-
Crown Prince Franz Ferdinand is assassinated
Two gunshots in Sarajevo June 1914 ignited the fires of conflict and sucked Europe into World War One. Mere hours after narrowly escaping a separate assassination attempt, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir to Austro-Hungarian throne and his wife, the Duchess of Hohenberg, were killed by Bosnian Serb nationalist and Black Hand member Gavrilo Princip. -
War is declared
The Austria-Hungarian government made harsh demands on the Serbians, which the Serbians rejected, prompting Austria-Hungary to declare war against them in July 1914. Mere days later, Russia began to mobilise its army to protect Serbia, prompting Germany to declare war on Russia in order to support its ally Austria-Hungary. -
The First Battle of Ypres
Fought between October and November 1914, the first battle of Ypres in West Flanders, Belgium, was the climactic fight of the 'Race to the Sea', and attempt by the German army to break through Allied lines and capture French ports on the English Channel to gain access to the North Sea and beyond. -
The Gallipoli Campaign Begins
Urged by Winston Churchill, the Allied campaign landed in the Gallipoli peninsula in April 1915 with the aim of breaking through German-allied Ottoman Turkey's Dardanelles Strait, which would allow them to attack Germany and Austria from the east and establish a link with Russia. -
Germany Sinks HMS Lusitania
In May 1915, a German U-boat torpedoed the British-owned luxury steamship Lusitania, killing 1,195 people, including 128 Americans. On top of the human toll, this deeply angered the US, as Germany had broken international ‘prize laws’ which declared that ships had to be warned of imminent attacks. Germany defended their actions, however, stating that the ship was carrying weapons intended for warfare. -
The Battle of the Somme
Widely acknowledged to have been the bloodiest battle of the First World War, the Battle of the Somme caused more than a million casualties, including around 400,000 dead or missing, over the course of 141 days. -
The US enters the War
In January 1917, Germany stepped up their campaign of attacking British merchant vessels with U-boat submarines.The US was angered by Germany torpedoing neutral ships in the Atlantic which often carried US citizens. In March 1917, British intelligence intercepted the Zimmerman Telegram, a secret communication from Germany which proposed an alliance with Mexico if the US were to enter the war. -
The Battle of Passchendaele
The battle of Passchendaele has been described by historian A.J.P. Taylor as 'the blindest struggle of a blind war.' Taking on a symbolic significance far greater than its strategic worth, predominantly British Allied troops launched an attack to seize key ridges near Ypres. It only ended when both sides collapsed, exhausted, in the Flanders mud. -
The Bolshevik Revolution
Between 1914 and 1917, Russia's poorly-equipped army lost more than two million soldiers on the Eastern Front. This became a hugely unpopular conflict, with rioting escalating into revolution and forcing the abdication of Russia's last Tsar, Nicholas II, in early 1917. -
The signing of the Armistice
In early 1918 the Allies were suffering, having been hit hard by four major German attacks. Supported by US troops, they launched a counter-attack in July, using tanks on a large scale which proved successful and constituted a vital breakthrough, forcing a German retreat on all sides. Crucially, Germany's allies began to dissolve, with Bulgaria agreeing to an armistice by the end of September, Austria being defeated by late October, and Turkey halting their movements a few days later.
