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| Gräf & Stift Bois de Boulogne phaeton |
On June 28 1914 at 10:45 am Archduke Franz Ferdinand was shot and killed by Gavrilo Princip whilst riding in the back of this car with his wife Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg who was also killed.
The car is housed at the Heeresgeschichtliches Museum, Vienna, where I took this photograph on July 4, 2009.
Within a few weeks, a chain of events would precipitate the commencement of the Great War, 1914-18.
In the words of British Foreign secretary Sir Edward Gray on August 3, 2014 "The lamps are going out all over Europe, we shall not see them lit again in our life-time". The British Empire entered the War at 23:00 GMT August 4, 2014.
