The assassin, Gavrilo Princip, was caught. Upon observing two good hits from his two shots he had tried to turn his gun on himself but it was grabbed from him. He had tried to get at his cyanide capsule, had managed to bite into it, but a policeman's baton had knocked it from his mouth and, like Cabrinovic barely forty minutes earlier, he was bundled away. All his co-conspiritors were caught within the next four days. Several hundred more Mlada Bosna members and other known sympathizers were rounded-up by the police. A week-long anti-Serb Hetze by Sarajevo and Bosnia-Herzegovina's non-Serb elements occurred, smashing Serb-owned properties, intimidating and in some 200 cases killing innocent Serbs in quite brutal mob-mentality manner. All seven conspiritors spoke freely during their interrogations, limiting the conspiracy to themselves only. But none mentioned 'Apis' and the Cerna Ruka in Belgrade. Nedjelko Cabrinovic, who had thrown the bomb, made eloquent statements in court (23^rd October, 1914). "We thought that only people of noble character were capable of committing political assassinations. We heard it said that he [Archduke Franz Ferdinand] was an enemy of the Slavs. Nobody directly told us to "kill him;" but in this environment, we arrived at the idea ourselves." After clearing his throat he added, "I would like to add something else. Although Princip is playing the hero, and although we all wanted to appear as heroes, we still have profound regrets. In the first place, we did not know that the late Franz Ferdinand was a father. We were greatly touched by the words he addressed to his wife, "Sophie, stay alive for our children." We are anything you want – except criminals. In my name and in the name of my comrades, I ask the children of the late successor to the throne to forgive us. As for you, punish us according to your understanding. We are not criminals. We are honest people, animated by noble sentiments; we are idealists; we wanted to do good; we have loved our people; and we shall die for our ideals."

The other conspirators were also asked why they had involved themselves in a plot that killed Sophie, to which they also expressed regret. Her death outraged the people of Austria perhaps even more than the Archduke's; whereas he was something of a target, she was an innocent woman, one already very much put-upon by the family and hierarchy she had married into. During the trial of the conspirators, Princip was asked by each judge as to why he killed the Duchess. He replied that it was an accident for which he was truly sorry; he claimed he had not expected the sight of a woman with the Archduke. He apologized to the orphaned children, but he did not apologize for murdering Archduke Franz Ferdinand. But regret after the fact is easy: given sufficient arm-room he would have used his bomb and so clearly did not consider any other persons in the motorcar – in those few seconds of deliberation to use his gun instead he cannot have failed to notice others, including the Duchess. And it was his first shot that hit Sophie in the abdomen ... it is the first shot that is usually the best-aimed. Perhaps she was slightly in the way of a good shot at Franz Ferdinand – this could be possible – and so Princip then shifted his aim higher up at the Thronfolger's head? Whichever, examples had to be made, of course, and the evidence was pretty damning. Nevertheless, given the circumstances, the sentences would appear to be lenient – Princip, Grabež and Cabrinovic were under-age and so escaped the mandatory death penalty of hanging.

• Nedjelko Cabrinovic was sentenced to 20 years hard labour at Theresienstadt prison in Bohemia, with a fast once a month; one day a year – 28^th June, the date of the assassination – he was to spend on a hard bed in a darkened cell. He died there of tuberculosis 23^rd January, 1916.
• Vasco Cubrilovic was sentenced to death. Released by the Allies in 1918, in later life he became a history lecturer.
• Trifko Grabež was sentenced to 20 years hard labour at Theresienstadt with a fast once a month; one day a year – 28^th June, the date of the assassination – he was to spend on a hard bed in a darkened cell.. He died there of tuberculosis 21^st October, 1916.
• Danilo Ilic, the oldest, was executed 3^rd February 1915.
• Mohammed Mehmedbasic returned to Sarajevo 1919 and was pardoned for his rôle in the Attentat. In later life he became a gardener and carpenter.
• Cvijetko Popovic (the motorcar procession lookout) was sentenced to 13 years in prison. In later life became a school principal.
• Gavrilo Princip was sentenced to 20 years hard labour at Theresienstadt with a fast once a month; one day a year – 28^th June, the date of the assassination – he was to spend on a hard bed in a darkened cell. He died there of tuberculosis on 28^th April, 1918.

No doubt prison conditions and malnutrition hastened the deaths of the young tuberculosis sufferers.

The event lit the fuse to the powder-keg, although the fuse kept burning for another month. Messages of condolence came in from the crowned heads of Europe – whatever differences may exist between the great dynasties, assassination was a heinous personal threat which menaced all in common. At least outwardly some of the 1815 spirit of the Concert of Europe still sought to prevail: to preserve as much as possible an harmonious balance between the Great Powers. Not so in Vienna where, ironically, Prinz Metternich's Congress had given birth to the concept ninety-nine years earlier. With Franz Ferdinand 'the moderator' now out of the way, the war parties of General Conrad von Hötzendorff and Graf Berchtold became sole counsel to the Emperor at the Hofburg and at his villa at Bad Ischl. The Thronfolger's very death by a young Serb – nay, a group of six Serbs and therefore very clear A Conspiracy – "is the very last straw, Your Majesty, this time Serbia really has gone Too Far ..." But Franz Josef needed little prompting; this was a direct attack on the House of Habsburg – it would not go unpunished. Only the kind of punishment and the method of its delivery needed to be discussed. Deliberations to that end followed, however, until the 'hawks' felt certain of Germany's support. Then, on 23^rd July, Berchtold made the Habsburg Emperor initial a deliberately unacceptable "demarche with a time-limit" (effectively an ultimatum) to Serbia, which she must accept within only two days. Its salient points were:

• Serbia must immediately publish (in the media and as an Order of the Day to the Serbian Army) an official declaration expressing regret, condemning and repudiating all acts of terrorism, both official and non-official,
• Serbia must suppress and dissolve any and all organizations and societies engaged in propaganda, subversion or terrorism against Austria-Hungary,
• acceptance of Austrian police participation on Serbian soil in the suppression and apprehension of any and all members of such anti-Austrian subversive groups, particularly those involved in the Sarajevo crime,
• dismissal and arrest of Serbian officers Majors Milan Ciganovic and Major Voija Tankosic, as well as others to be named.

Following frenzied cabinet meeting debate in Belgrade, along with febrile consultations with the Russian and French embassies, Serbia – against all expectation – accepted the demands of the ultimatum (bar item 3 on the above list; Belgrade would not surrender sovereignty, however tacitly) just fifteen minutes after its expiry at 6pm 25^th July; a selfless act which a by then nervous Kaiser Wilhelm admitted "dissipates every reason for war." Nevertheless, "with the bellicose frivolity of senile empires," Austria sought to absorb upstart Serbia into the Habsburg Empire, as she had done with Bosnia and Herçegovina in 1908/09, and rejected Serbia's response on 26^th July. War on Serbia was declared on 28^th July, 1914, and Austrian gunboats and river monitors started shelling Belgrade from the Danube. The much-vaunted alliance system, as had been feared by the dead Franz Ferdinand, then domino-ed Europe, many of Europe's overseas colonies, and the high seas into the misery that was The Great War of 1914–1918.

The spate of mobilisations that followed may have been intended as a bluff to cow the opposition, but in the ossified social codex of the day they were perceived as national insults which popular hysteria of the time would not allow to pass unchallenged. Besides, once mobilisation neared completion, no one army could stand down whilst leaving another fully-mobilised near its borders. Furthermore, the complexity of the many railway timetables (keen prizes for pre-war spies) allowed for full mobilisation but not partial mobilisation if the trains were to keep running. With international tensions at an all-time high, the frenzied media in each country felt that a quick sharp war would 'clear the air.' Such a conflict was welcomed for more than rational, or rational-seeming reasons. To many it seemed not a disaster but a fulfilment, one which was personal rather than national. It brought release from the frustrations, the artificialities, the compromises of peacetime. It confronted the individual with clear, inescapable and apparently ennobling duties. "War, what an exalting thing!" exclaimed a young lieutenant to King Albert of the Belgians on the presentation of the German ultimatum in 1914. And even after warfare on the Western Front bogged-down into the stalemate attrition of trench sieges, and no matter how disillusioned the troops became, neither politicians nor the majority of the populations who carried out their directives ever lost the will to fight their corner.

Although hostilities were initiated by the Central Powers, there was no question of it being a war of outright territorial conquest. Each country genuinely believed it was acting defensively, to protect its own interests, even if the 'defence' necessitated the 'punitive' invasion of another country. Therefore, it was regarded as a patriotic duty to defend the Fatherland, Holy Russia, la Belle France, or whatever. German troops marched off to a frische fröliche Krieg with the Kaiser telling them they "would be home before the leaves had fallen from the trees," whilst French troops, believing the war may last just a little longer as Berlin was further from the French border, cheered that they "would be home before Christmas." Only Britain did not feel under any immediate threat, but acted from somewhat higher motives in the protection of a smaller nation – 'plucky little Belgium' – and ultimately to wage a 'war to end war.'

The eventual fate of the three Serbian characters, including the éminence grise, was as follows:

• Milan Ciganovic had supplied the hardware: four automatic pistols, ammunition, six bombs (hand-grenades), and later poison capsules. Ciganovic had trained the assassins in the use of the grenades and in pistol-shooting in Belgrade's Topcider Park. The Serbian government sent Ciganovic to the United States for the duration of the war – to have him 'out of the way.' He returned in 1919 and received a small grant of land from the government, married and settled down, dying in 1927.
• Major Voija Tankosic served in the Serbian Army during the war and was killed in action during the heroic Serbian retreat across Albania in the winter of 1915/16.
• Colonel Dragutín Dmitrijevic – 'Apis' – was arrested in March 1917 by the Serbian military, sentenced to death on trumped-up charges of treason (he had by now become 'embarrassing' to the State), and was shot at sunrise on 24^th June, 1917.

And Franz Ferdinand's Militärkanzlerei? Long suspicious of its operations, the assassinations in Sarajevo on 28th June, 1914, gave the Austro-Hungarian senior command the golden opportunity it wanted: the office was stripped of all powers and authorities it had been attributed. The day after the Attentat all pending mail was returned unopened. On 30th June all the files and documents were sealed and the inventory remitted to the Emperor's own military chancellery at the Hofburg, and all officers and civil functionaries were returned to their earlier duties. The Unteres Belvedere would remain virtually empty until 1917. It was Emperor Franz Josef's express wish that the documents remain sealed until 1958, when they were to be opened in the presence of a member of the Ducal family of Hohenberg. But this wish would not be respected, and the documents were unsealed on 28th September, 1920.

But before the outbreak of hostilities the bodies of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and Duchess Sophie were transported back to Vienna. First they lay in state together at the Town Hall for most of Monday 29^th June. The Armed Forces accorded both of the deceased every military honour from the moment their embalmed remains were put aboard a funeral train at Sarajevo during the evening of 29^th June. It puffed its mournful way through the Bosnian night without halting. Army regiments stood to attention with colours lowered at every station it passed. The train rolled on to the Adriatic coast from where, early on 30^th June, the foremost dreadnought of the Empire, Franz Ferdinand's prized SMS Viribus Unitis, steamed slowly and solemnly northwards escorted by other battleships, cruisers, destroyers, civilian yachts, motorboats, fishing-boats, even ferries, all under black pennants, black ensigns and flags at half-mast. On the evening of 1^st July the dolorous armada put-in at Trieste where the funeral caskets were transferred from the black-garlanded ship to a black-garlanded special train, to the accompaniment of booming gun salutes, regiments presenting arms, and lowered colours. Twenty four hours later, and after several enforced delays, the train came to a halt at Vienna's Südbahnhof. Here the responsibilities of the military ended, and with them the honours due to both of the deceased.

For here began the jurisdiction and continuing spite of Fürst Montenuovo, who ensured that even in death the couple would remain beyond the Imperial pale. For the heinous indiscretion of his misalliance with his Bohemian countess – for 'marrying below his station' and so tainting the All-Highest, the House of Habsburg – the inert dead body of Franz Ferdinand would continue to suffer the implacable hostility of the Court cabal. The train bearing Franz Ferdinand and Sophie's coffins had been deliberately delayed so that it arrived late at night. No members of the Habsburg dynasty were at the station to meet the funeral train, with the sole exception of Archduke Karl, now reluctantly Kronprinz and Thronfolger, who escorted his predecessor and his spouse through the dark and empty streets. Next morning the deceased lay in state at the Hofburg's Royal Chapel from 8am until noon – and not a second longer. Stiff protocol would not permit Sophie's coffin to lie in state with a Habsburg in the chapel of a Royal Palace. Only the personal intervention of Emperor Franz Joseph allowed her coffin to lie beside her husband's. Protocol would not be completely denied, however. Some 50,000 people converged from every district onto the Innenstadt. Most were turned away because of the absurd briefness of the viewing period. Those who managed to pass the Chapel portals found something curious indeed. The two coffins stood side by side, yes – but not as equals. Franz Ferdinand's was larger, more ornate, and bore the many insignia of his rank: the Archducal crown, the General's plumed hat, the Admiral's hat, his ceremonial sword, and all his principal decorations including the Order of the Golden Fleece. And his coffin was placed twenty inches higher than Sophie's. Her coffin was bare except for a pair of white gloves and a black fan – the emblems of a lady-in-waiting. As Gräfin von Chotkowa und Wognin, Sophie Chotek had been lady-in-waiting to Archduchess Isabella before her marriage to Franz Ferdinand. Her subsequent elevations to Fürstin and Herzogin ... were now cancelled. Once again Sophie was to all present a lady-in-waiting.

There were many wreaths, sent to the Chapel from great notables like President Wilson of the United States of America down to humble folk like the Shoemakers' Guild of Lower Austria. But there was no wreath from the Emperor or any other Habsburg; the only wreath from the Imperial family came from Kronprinz Rudolf's widow, Stephanie of Belgium. At the stroke of noon the public were turned away. At 4pm Emperor Franz Josef appeared, accompanied by Archdukes and Archduchesses but not by any of Franz Ferdinand's children. Their mother was a morganatic corpse, they were morganatic orphans, ergo they were not members of the All-Highest Family. No foreign dignitaries attended. Every monarch and President in Europe had wired his intention to come to Vienna. By return cable Fürst Montenuovo had advised them to "kindly have your ambassador act as representative to avoid straining His Majesty's delicate health with the demands of protocol." The elderly King of Rumania and his consort were politely stopped at the border.

So only the ambassadors came. Vienna's Cardinal Piffl ran through the funeral services in less than fifteen minutes so that at 4:15pm the premises were vacated and the bodies already locked away again. No more mourning from the public or anybody else. They lay untouched until very late at night when, as they had arrived in Vienna the previous night, they would depart in the dark – per Montenuovo's machinations. No procession was planned between the Hofburg and the Westbahnhof, but as the remains of Franz Ferdinand and Sophie were wheeled out of the Hofburg Royal Chapel, a band of aristocrats pushed past the police. Led by Archduke Karl (now Thronfolger) and Graf Chotek, Sophie's brother, they made less lonely the scant cortège towards the station. Further degradations followed. The funeral car was coupled to ... a milk train heading sixty miles west along the Danube to the small town of Pöchlarn. There, in the tiny station's waiting-room, the farewell service was conducted by local priests; only a small delegation of local veterans saluted, in old uniforms drenched by a sudden but fitting rainstorm. Two plain black hearses of the Vienna Municipal Undertaking Service transported the coffins onto the ferry. In midstream a sudden clap of thunder panicked the horses – their startled rearing almost pitched the caskets into the Danube. At 1am on 4^th July, 1914, the ferry reached Klein-Pöchlarn on the northern bank. An hour later, following the steep climb up the moutainside to Artstetten, the bodies of Erzherzog Franz Ferdinand of Austria-Este and Sophie Herzogin von Hohenberg were finally laid to rest in identical plain white-marble sarcophagi in their purposely-built crypt under Schloß Artstetten.

When the Austrian public learned of these details and proceedings, they were appalled, horrified and resentful, deploring its meanness. However, the Court considered the funeral a fitting end to dissonance. Initially, Emperor Franz Josef was saddened by the news that yet another member of his family had come to a violent and untimely end. He was also saddened for the now-orphaned children Sophie, Maximilian and Ernst at Schloß Chlumetz. But ... "God will not be mocked" he had said candidly to an aide. "A higher power has put back the order [i.e. dynastic principle] I could not maintain." His obstinate nephew had had the audacity to bring disorder to the hierarchy by inflating his wife's place in it, and had forced concessions to do so. Concessions. Montenuovo made him pay for such impertinence. Franz Josef himself regarded the funeral a fitting "restoration of order." It was, perhaps, unbecoming of the venerable old boy – the very embodiment of Habsburg – to have exhibited such spite in defence of the dynasty ... but a new order was about to be ushered in. Violently.

On 9th June, 1999, the Austrian Mint in Vienna issued a new silver coin (limited-edition, 50,000 units) of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. It was the fifth coin in the six-coin series Royal Tragedies in the House of Habsburg.