1914 - Political Events
Political Events
A World War that will continue until 1918 begins in Europe July 28—one month after the assassination of the heir to the Austrian throne in Bosnia. Riding in a 1912 Graf und Stift motorcar at Sarajevo, the archduke Franz Ferdinand, 51, and his wife, Sophie, are killed with two Browning revolver shots fired by tubercular high school student Gavrilo Princip, 16, who has been hired by Serbian terrorists to kill the nephew of the emperor Franz Josef (the 3-year-old Black Hand Society is believed to have organized the assassination). Austrian militarists have been spoiling to enter the wars that have embroiled the Balkans since 1912, and they demand that Princip be turned over to them. Gen. Franz Conrad, Graf von Hötzendorf, was recalled to duty as Austrian chief of staff in December 1912 by his late friend and associate the archduke Ferdinand, and he has the support of Vienna-born foreign minister Leopold, Graf von Berchtold, 51, who presents an ultimatum to Serbia July 23. Part German, part French, part Czech, part Slovak, and part Hungarian, von Berchtold married an heiress, became one of the richest men in the country, entered the diplomatic service in 1893, and is best known as a breeder of race horses; the Serbians refuse his ultimatum, insisting that they are a sovereign nation, and Vienna uses the incident at Sarajevo as an excuse to declare war on Serbia. Graf von Berchtold has sent his Fiume-born chief adjutant Alexander Graf von Hoyos, 38, to Berlin with instructions to sound out German sentiment with regard to Vienna's intent to make war. Hoyos has met with Kaiser Wilhelm and others, he reports back that the Germans favor striking sooner rather than later, but Graf von Hötzendorf has mismanaged the mobilization of Austro-Hungarian forces, and his army is ill prepared to fight. Russia mobilizes in response to a plea from Serbia to help, Germany mobilizes in support of Austria, France mobilizes in response to German mobilization, and Britain mobilizes to support France (see Entente Cordiale, 1904) and Russia. A conflict thus begins that will ultimately involve 32 nations.
Socialist leader Jean Jaurès is assassinated at Paris July 31 at age 54 by a young fanatic who believes that Juarès's pacifism has been serving the interests of German imperialists.
The war quickly widens as Germany declares war on Russia August 1 and on France August 3. Berlin proceeds on the assumption that it will take 6 weeks for the Russians to mobilize an army and that France can be defeated in 6 weeks. Kaiser Wilhelm tells his troops, "You will be home before the leaves have fallen from the trees." German cavalry forces roll over Luxembourg and invade neutral Belgium August 4, flanking French forces intent on recovering Alsace and Lorraine; Britain declares war on Germany, honoring her pledge to support the Belgians, a promise made in an 1831 treaty that the Germans have dismissed as a worthless "scrap of paper." The British arrest 21 of 22 known German agents within hours of the war declaration (see communications [Official Secrets Act], 1911). French forces invade Lorraine, hoping to regain territory lost in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870 to 1871 but are driven out with heavy losses.
"The lamps are going out all over Europe; we shall not see them lit again in our lifetime," says British secretary of state for foreign affairs Sir Edward Grey. Lord Kitchener is home on leave from the Middle East and reluctantly accepts appointment as secretary of state for war; promoted to field marshal, he warns his fellow cabinet members that this will not be a short war and that it will be decided by the last 1 million men that Britain can send into battle. He quickly enlists volunteers on a massive scale and trains them as professional soldiers. Sir John French, 62, is chief of Britain's Imperial General Staff and takes command of the British Expeditionary Force in France. The Royal Navy has been mobilized in July on orders from first lord of the Admiralty Winston Churchill, who has charged Austrian-born first sea lord Louis Alexander Battenberg, 60, with the task of preparing the fleet. Britain has 49 battleships in service or under construction, the German Navy 29; eldest son of the late Prince Alexander of Hesse but a British subject since 1868, Battenberg married a granddaughter of the late Queen Victoria in 1884 but is forced to resign as first sea lord October 29 because of his German origin (see 1917); naval power will not, however, play a decisive role in the Great War that now begins.
German forces slip past Belgian fortifications at Liège in a night attack, and the Belgians fall back to Brussels.
Montenegro declares war on Austria August 5, Serbia on Germany August 6, Austria on Russia August 6, Montenegro on Germany August 8. Britain and France declare war on Austria August 12, the day "Big Bertha" arrives at Liège from the Krupp cannon works at Essen. Named for Bertha Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach, now 28, the 98-ton, 420-millimeter howitzer can fire a three-foot shell one mile, demolishing any fort. Gen. Erich (Friedrich Wilhelm) von Ludendorff, 49, rallies German forces after another general falls, and Liège surrenders August 16. French defensive strategy has ignored the possibility of a German invasion through Belgium and counted on a Russian advance in the East.
Belgian forces fall back on Antwerp and destroy the bridges over the Meuse as the Germans enter Brussels August 20. Burgomaster Adolphe Max, 44, refuses to perform his duties under the authority of the German-appointed governor, demands complete freedom of action, and works to reduce the taxes and requisitions imposed by the Germans. He will be arrested in September and imprisoned in the fortress of Namur before being sent to Germany for the duration.
The Battle of the Frontiers August 14 to August 25 costs 250,000 French lives; news of the staggering loss is censored and will not appear until after the war. The French government moves to Bordeaux, making it difficult for civilian ministers to control army generals.
The Battle of Mons in Belgium August 23 costs the British 1,600 casualties; the Germans sustain about 3,000 casualties and their advance is checked, but only temporarily. Gen. Alexander von Kluck, 68, masses about 140,000 men at Le Cateau August 26 and defeats a 40,000-man British army, taking heavy casualties. The British lose 7,812 men and 38 guns in the largest battle fought by British troops since Waterloo 99 years ago (it will be dwarfed by the horrific battles soon to come) but are even more successful than they were at Mons in stemming von Kluck's advance.
Aircraft engineer Geoffrey de Havilland quits government service in July and becomes chief designer at the Aircraft Manufacturing Co. (Airco) where he will remain through 1918 (see 1910; DH-4 bomber, 1916; transportation, 1921).
The Sopwith Camel goes into production for the 2-year-old Royal Flying Corps at the English factory opened 2 years ago by T. O. M. Sopwith (see Trenchard, 1913). Engineer and race-car driver W. O. (Walter Owen) Bentley, 26, has designed a rotary "Merlin" engine whose aluminum pistons provide tremendous torque to power the biplane; its engine, pilot, and guns are all located in the first seven feet of the wooden airframe, giving it great agility in combat, and the Flying Corps will use to fight German air aces until 1918, although the Germans in their Fokkers will be able to reach higher altitudes than the British in their Camels, who will have to use their superior maneuverability to escape attacks from above (see transportation [Bentley's motorcar], 1919).
French passions against "les Boche" eclipse the scandal of March 16, when (Geneviève Josephine) Henriette Caillaux (née Raynouard), 39, walked into the office of Figaro editor Gaston Calmette, 55, at Paris and shot him dead. Her husband, finance minister Joseph Caillaux, nearly 51, is a former premier and one of France's richest men; Calmette had been running articles depicting him as a liar, grafter, blackmailer, thief, and secret ally of the Germans, and had threatened to print private letters that Henriette exchanged with him several years ago when she was married to Leo Claretie, the paper's literary critic (they were divorced in the spring of 1908; she was awarded custody of their daughter, Germaine, now 19; and Caillaux divorced his wife to marry her). Taken to St. Lazare Prison, Mme. Caillaux was asked to explain herself and said she shot Calmette "because there is no more justice in France. There is only the revolver." Her roomy cell was close to the one where Marie-Antoinette awaited trial in 1793, and she was permitted to wear her own clothing and order meals sent in from good restaurants. Caillaux resigned from the cabinet March 17, Henriette's trial began June 20, and a claque hired by her husband hissed or applauded on signals from a man with long black hair seated near the witness box. One witness was a Hungarian named Lipscher, whose mistress, Thérèse Duverger, served as liaison between the German and Austrian spy systems, but Mme. Caillaux won acquittal July 28. She and her husband are riding in an open cab on the Boulevard des Capucines October 22 when a woman cries out, "Voilà, Caillaux, l'espion d'Allemand." A crowd surges toward the carriage, shouting, "A bas Caillaux" and "Mort pour le traitre." M. and Mme. Caillaux board the steamer Perou at Bordeaux November 14 and sail for Venezuela. Some observers claim that Mme. Caillaux has saved France, arguing that her husband was building a French socialist party, and had he remained in the cabinet he might have taken power as head of a commune and let Paris fall to the "Boche."
Japan declares war on Germany August 23 and on Austria August 25. The Japanese produce munitions for Russia and the other Allied powers, they begin to land forces in Shantung for an attack on the German position at Tsingtao, and a British detachment joins them (see 21 demands, 1915).
German Marxist Rosa Luxemburg cofounds (with Karl Liebknecht) the Spartacus League (Spartakusbund) and will be in prison for most of the war (see 1919).
The Battle of Tannenberg August 26 to 30 ends in crushing defeat for a large Russian army that has invaded east Prussia under the command of Gen. Aleksandr Vasilievich Samsonov, 55, to take pressure off the French on the Western Front. The German 8th Army's commander, Gen. Max von Prittwitz, has proposed falling back behind the Vistula and abandoning East Prussia to the Russians; he is recalled in disgrace; another Russian army under Gen. Paul Rennenkampf, 60, fails to support Samsonov, the Germans have broken the crude Russian code and take the enemy by surprise, German forces under Gen. Paul von Hindenburg, 66, and Gen. Ludendorff surround the Russians, executing a plan developed by Col. Max Hoffmann, 45, and taking 92,000 prisoners with help from Gen. Hermann von Francois, 48. The Germans capture 300 guns but sustain about 15,000 casualties, Russian casualties total about 28,000 in addition to those taken prisoner; Gen. Samsonov shoots himself after the battle, Gen. Rennenkampf will be executed in 1918.
The Russians rename their 211-year-old capital Petrograd because St. Petersburg sounds German (see Leningrad, 1924).
The Battle of Heligoland Bight August 28 results in a victory for the Royal Navy. Admiral David Beatty, 43, is in command of the battle-cruiser fleet that sinks three German cruisers and one destroyer without any loss. Indian-born commodore Roger J. B. Keyes, 41, joined the navy in his teens, served in the Boxer Rebellion, and commands the British submrines. The German submarine U-9 sinks three British cruisers in September to retaliate for the sinking of the three German cruisers, but Lieut. Commander Max Horton, 30, sinks the German battle cruiser Hela in the Heligoland Bight September 13 and 3 weeks later sinks the destoyer S116 off the River Emes estuary.
A British expeditionary force gains a brilliant victory over the invading German Army August 29 at Guise, east of Paris, with support from Gen. Charles (-Louis-Marie) Lanrezac, 62, who has acted on orders from Gen. Joseph (Jacques Césaire) Joffre, also 62, and swung his 5th Army northward to face the Germans as they advanced through Belgium (he had been expecting an advance through Alsace and Lorraine). The first German air raid strikes Paris August 30 as German aircraft drop small explosives on the city. French forces fall back to the Marne, pressed hard by the German 2nd Army under the command of Gen. Karl von Bülow, but Gen. Ferdinand Foch, 62, cables Gen. Joffre, "Mon centre cède, ma droite recule, situation excellente, j'attaque." Foch replaces Lanrezac and the Battle of the Marne September 5 to 10 ends the German advance as Gen. Joseph Galliéni orders the Paris police to requisition all the taxicabs that they can find (they round up 600, Galliéni packs 10 men into each, the taxis carry the soldiers 35 miles to the front, and they then return to Paris, where they are refueled and sent out again). Gen. von Kluck tries to swing his 1st Army around the French position and move on Paris, but French and British troops hold the line, forcing von Kluck to withdraw west of Verdun, but they are unable to dislodge his troops from north of the Aisne (the British are short of ammunition). Kaiser Wilhelm holds Gen. Helmuth von Moltke responsible for the failure to take Paris and appoints his minister of war Gen. Erich (Georg Anton Sebastian) von Falkenhayn, 52, to succeed von Moltke September 14 as the opposing armies settle for a stalemate. Each side has probably sustained at least 500,000 casualties in the first 3 weeks of combat, and much worse is to come (see Second Battle of the Marne, 1918).
The Battle of the Masurian Lakes September 6 to 15 brings further defeat to the Russians, this time at the hands of Field Marshal August von Mackensen, 65, and Gen. von Hindenburg, whose 8th Army has 13 divisions (the Russians have 12). The Germans capture 150 guns but suffer about 10,000 casualties; Russian casualties total 45,000, most of them taken prisoner, and the Germans advance to the lower Niemen River. Gen. Yakov Zhilinksky is blamed for the loss and dismissed. Mackensen proceeds to overrun Serbia in October and November.
British troops search the streets of Dublin July 27 to disarm Irish rebels. An Irish Home Rule Law passed by the House of Commons April 7 becomes law September 18, but the demands of war effectively delay its enforcement. Irish-born Gen. Sir Hubert de la Poer Gough, 44, and 57 other British officers threaten to resign rather than take up arms in Ulster against the Irish Unionists of Baron Edward Henry Carson, 60, the Dublin-born member of Parliament for Dublin University who has violently opposed home rule (see 1916).
Romania's Carol I dies of a heart attack at Sinaia October 9 at age 75 after a 48-year reign that has inaugurated the nation's monarchy. His nephew Ferdinand, now 49, becomes king, beginning a 13-year reign that will be dominated by his British-born wife, Marie, now nearly 39.
Ghent falls to the Germans October 11 as they try to reach the Channel ports in a rush to the sea, but while Bruges falls October 14 and Ostend October 15, the Belgians flood the district of the Yser and the German push fails.
The (first) Battle of Ypres October 30 to November 24 pits German troops against French poilus and British Tommies in a final attempt by the Germans to break through the Allied lines and capture the Channel ports. Field Marshal Sir John French and Gen. Joffrey halt the drive but at a heavy cost: British casualties total 58,155, French about 50,000, and the Germans lose about 130,000. Both sides have dug trenches that extend from the English Channel to the Swiss Alps, and the conflict becomes a war of position in which trench warfare will consume huge numbers of soldiers on both sides in the next 4 years; the front line will not shift more than 10 miles.
A Turkish fleet that includes two German cruisers bombards Odessa, Sevastopol, and Theodosia on the Black Sea October 29. Russia declares war on the Ottoman Empire November 2, Britain and France follow suit November 5, and Britain proclaims the annexation of Cyprus, occupied by the British since 1878 (see 1923).
British forces occupy the Ottoman port of Basra at the head of the Persian Gulf in November; Whitehall justifies the move by citing Britain's need to protect the oil wells of southern Persia and the Abadan oil refinery, and the British advance 46 miles northward to al-Qurnah in December as they begin an occupation of Mesopotamia (see 1915).
Royal Navy submarines under the command of Admiral Beatty intercept a German squadron under Admiral von Hipper in November as it makes a third attempt on English coastal towns, engages the battle cruiser Blücher in the Battle of Dogger Bank, and sinks her.
German Vice-Admiral Maximilian, graf von Spee, 63, surprises a British squadron under Rear Admiral Sir Christopher George Francis Maurice Craddock, 62, off the Chilean coast November 1. German admiral and naval secretary Alfred P. F. von Tirpitz, now 65, has created a formidable High Seas Fleet and defeats the British off Coronel; Craddock loses H.M.S. Monmouth and goes down with his flagship H.M.S. Good Hope; H.M.S. Gloucester escapes. The Battle of the Falkland Islands December 8 ends in victory for a British squadron of battle cruisers under the command of Rear Admiral Sir Frederick Charles Doveton Sturdee, 65, who surprises Graf Spee as he prepares to attack the Falklands while en route home from his triumph over Admiral Craddock. Spee goes down with his flagship D.K.M. Scharnhorst; his two sons and 1,800 other men are also lost, D.K.M. Gneisenau, D.K.M. Leipzig, and D.K.M. Nürnberg are sunk, only D.K.M. Dresden escapes.
Former British statesman Joseph Chamberlain dies at his London home July 2 at age 77; Afghan and Boer War veteran Gen. Frederick Sleigh Roberts, Earl Roberts of Kandahar, Pretoria and Waterford, of pneumonia at Saint Omer, France, November 14 at age 82 while visiting British troops in the field. He retired 10 years ago and is buried in St. Paul's Cathedral, London.
Russian forces make Gen. von Mackensen fall back from Warsaw and the Austrians retreat to Kraków. The Battle of Kraków from November 16 to December 2 brings heavy casualties to both sides. New divisions diverted from the Western Front bolster German resistance in early December after Russian troops threaten to surround the Germans following the November battles of Lodz and Lowicz. Lodz falls to the Germans December 6, but the Austro-Hungarian chief of staff and commander in chief Franz Conrad, Graf von Hötzendorf, has been surprised by the rapidity of Russia's mobilization and forced to redirect forces from Serbia to Galicia. Many of his troops have been stranded in logistical chaos, Austrian forces fail to break through the Russian lines before Kraków, and the Russians will remain within 30 miles of the city through the winter. By year's end the Russian peasant army has lost more than 2 million men.
Serbian troops drive out the Austrians in early December after winning the Battle of Kolubara, and on December 15 retake Belgrade, which has been in Austrian hands since December 2.
New Zealand forces occupy Western Samoa, held since 1899 by the Germans.
China's president Yuan Shikai dissolves the National Assembly January 10 and appoints a new body to prepare a constitution that will give him dictatorial powers (see 1913; 21 Demands, 1915).
Japan's prime minister Count Gonnohyoe Yamamoto and navy minister Viscount Makoto Saito, 56, resign under pressure; they are held "morally responsible" for having permitted high-ranking navy personnel to accept bribes for placing large orders with Germany's Siemens-Schuckertwerke AG and then with England's Vickers' Sons and Maxim for communications equipment. Several scapegoats go to jail but Yamamoto and Saito are merely retired to the naval reserve. Yamamoto's government has reformed the nation's civil-service system and begun Japanese involvement on the mainland by demanding and receiving railway rights in Manchuria. Former prime minister Shigenobu Okuma is elected to serve in that post once again; now 76, he will head the government until he retires in 1916 (but see 1915). Yamamoto will become prime minister again in 1923, Saito in 1932.
U.S. forces under the command of Gen. Frederick Funston occupy Veracruz April 21 following hostile acts by Mexicans (see 1913). President Wilson sends a fleet to Tampico, President Huerta resigns July 15 under pressure from Coahuila governor Venustiano Carranza, 54, a tall, bearded, bespectacled landowner's son who makes himself provisional president; he opposes U.S. interests, but his constitutionalist Army comes under attack from his erstwhile lieutenant Pancho Villa (see 1915).
Argentina's president Roque Sáenz Peña dies in office at his native Buenos Aires August 9 at age 63; former president José Evaristo Uriburu at Buenos Aires October 23 at age 82.
Former Confederate general Simon Bolivar Buckner dies at his Kentucky home January 8 at age 90. He served as governor of his state from 1887 to 1891; former Union Army general Daniel E. Sickles dies at his New York town house on Fifth Avenue May 3 at age 94; first lady Ellen (Louise Axson) Wilson of kidney tuberculosis at Washington, D.C., August 7 right after congressional passage of an alley-clearance bill that she has championed; former U.S. Army chief of staff Adna Romanza Chaffee dies at Los Angeles November 1 at age 72. He served in engagements from the Civil War to China's Boxer Rebellion, in which he commanded the American contingent that relieved the foreign colony at Beijing (Peking). His son and namesake, now 30, is a West Point graduate who has trained with the French Army's cavalry school; Rear Admiral Alfred T. Mahan, U.S. Navy (ret.) dies of a heart attack at Washington, D.C., December 1 at age 74, having insisted that war rather than peace was the normal historical condition of men and seen much of the world adopt the ideas of his 1890 book about the influence of sea power on history.
Northern and southern Nigeria are united.
German colonial forces in Togoland surrender August 26 to an Anglo-French force. Britain and France divide the German African colony between them.
South Africa's Parliament votes to enter the war in support of Britain, but some Afrikaners revolt and the National Party is founded by Afrikaner nationalist and Boer War veteran James (Barry Munnik) Hertzog, now 48, who has opposed British influence in the country since the Treaty of Vereeniging and now opposes participation on Britain's side (see 1924). Former Boer War commander Jacobus de la Rey plans an uprising in the western Transvaal but is shot dead by a police patrol at Johannesburg September 15 at age 67 while en route to Potchefstroom; a pro-German rebellion breaks out in October, but South Africa's prime minister Louis Botha suppresses it with help from Jan Christiaan Smuts, now 44, and takes command of troops that enter German South-West Africa.
Britain proclaims a protectorate over Egypt December 18. The khedive Abbas II, now 40, is deposed December 19 after a 22-year reign, martial law is declared, Abbas II succeeded by his uncle Hussein Kamil, 60, who will be nominal khedive until 1917, and Egyptians for the next 4 years will be subjected to conscription, inflation, and restrictions on personal freedom as the British make it clear that they want to make the protectorate into a permanent colony (see 1922).
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