Franz Ferdinand assassination site & 1878-1918 Museum

More background info: Between 1878 and 1918, Bosnia and Herzegovina was part of (or rather: occupied and administered by) the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Towards the latter part of that period, tensions with neighbouring Serbia, then in one of its most nationalistic phases, had already mounted (and Serbia had annexed Montenegro and Kosovo and also laid claim to Bosnia), when Archduke Franz Ferdinand visited Sarajevo in late June 1914.

  

As the car then sped up and crowds gathered, there were no more chances for the assassins to strike – or so they thought … When later Franz Ferdinand, following a reception in the City Hall, decided to visit the victims of the earlier bombing in hospital, his car first took a wrong turn into Franz-Joseph-Street (today's Zelenih beretki) at the head of the Latin Bridge and then stalled when reversing – just in front of another one of the plotters, 19-year-old Gavrilo Princip, who, assuming the chances for the plan had passed, had just had a snack (allegedly, it's not proven, and the claim that it was a sandwich, as many sources say, is very dubious ... I find that particular sort of snack rather unlikely for the time, location and in this context). Anyway, seizing the moment he drew his pistol and fired two shots at the car. The first hit Franz Ferdinand in the neck, the other hit Sophie. Both died shortly afterwards.

The assassins were all arrested – some were later executed, but Princip was too young for the death penalty and was thus sentenced to 20 years’ imprisonment. He was incarcerated at the Theresienstadt prison (which later gained even more notoriety as a Nazi concentration camp) under harsh conditions – from which he died less than four years later (from tuberculosis, to be precise).

On an international scale, the assassination sparked off what was to become the First World War: when the Austro-Hungarians alleged some Serbian involvement in the assassination plot, this was used as the reason to declare war on Serbia. Alliances between various countries meant that soon after this much of Europe was plunged into the extensive bloodbath that the "Great War" of 1914 to 1918 turned into. Thus young Gavrilo Princip can be said to have shaped the course of history in the 20th century – although it is quite likely that war would have broken out anyway, given the political tensions and military mobilizations of the time.

The way the Sarajevo events of 1914, and the roles of Gavrilo Princip and Franz Ferdinand, were portrayed and commemorated afterwards bears witness to the changeability of attitudes towards and classifications of important historical events: first a pompously large monument/shrine to the Archduke was erected – while Princip was obviously denounced as nothing but a murderer. The Austro-Hungarian monument/shrine was later removed under Serbian/Croatian rule after World War One. Instead, the memory of the assassins was now celebrated and a memorial plaque erected that almost praised them – and the Latin Bridge was renamed after Princip. In other words, he was now rather regarded as a national hero (and Franz Ferdinand as a member of the former imperialist oppressors).

When the Nazis took Sarajevo during WWII, the memorial plaque for Princip was removed and he was even denounced as "Jewish" (in that typical Nazi reflex). The pendulum swung back yet again after the partisans under Tito liberated the country from the Nazis and formed communistYugoslavia – so Princip could once again be regarded as a national hero and pioneer of Yugoslavia's struggle for freedom. A museum about the event was set up, and another new plaque unveiled. Now even footprints were etched into the pavement to mark the spot where Princip had fired his fateful shots.

The war in Bosnia & Herzegovina in the 1990s brought change yet again: the footprint marker was removed or destroyed (there's conflicting information on this), the Bridge given back its old name Latinska ćuprija, and the museum, which suffered severe damage from shelling, wasn't restored for over a decade.

After the war, Princip went back to being regarded as a "terrorist", and the renovated former "Museum of the Sarajevo Assassination" was renamed "Museum of the Austro-Hungarian period (1878 – 1918)" when it opened in 2005, although outside on its walls it simply says "Muzej / Museum". Today its official name is “Sarajevo Museum 1878-1918”.
  
Incidentally, the actual car that Franz Ferdinand was travelling in that fateful day in Sarajevo, and his blood-stained uniform, are on display in Austria, namely in Vienna's Museum of Military History.

What there is to see: The assassination site itself is just a street corner, and a memorial plaque on the outer wall of the museum marks its historical significance. The text (in Serbo-Croat and English) on it is now a sober factual statement: "From this place on June 28 1914 Gavrilo Princip assassinated the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sofia [sic!]". It is mounted so low, close to ground level, that it is easily overlooked, though. On the pavement, two footprints supposedly mark the exact spot where Princip was standing when he fired his shots.
 

The Latin Bridge is across the road, and is a very pretty sight in itself – but it was not on that bridge that the assassination took place (as is often erroneously assumed). At its northern end, across the street from the museum, is a small memorial to a monument that is no more – the grand pompous memorial for Franz Ferdinand and Sophie that the Habsburgs had erected at this spot. It was unveiled on the third anniversary of the assassination, on 28 June 1917. Less than two years later, in February 1919, shortly after the end of WW1 and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the monument was dismantled. Today there’s a perspex panel with an image of the ex-monument and a brief explanatory text.

 

Further up the street, heading west, just beyond the Ćumurija Bridge is another stone plaque on the wall by the river spelling out that this was the spot where the initial assassination attempt by Nedeljko Čabrinović failed (see above).

 

The Sarajevo 1878-1918 Museum opposite the Latin Bridge is small, but has some noteworthy artefacts on display, including, allegedly the very pistol used by Princip (though I’ve read elsewhere that the original specimen is on display at the Military History Museum in Vienna too). Also displayed are Princip’s clothes, mugshots of all seven assassination plotters, various newspaper clippings (many in German), as well as photos of Franz Ferdinand’s visit to Sarajevo just before the assassination. The largest display is a life-size installation of a dummy Franz Ferdinand with dummy wife Sophie (neither especially well made) descending the stairs after their reception in the City Hall.

 

There are various objects and photos not related to the assassination itself but to the Habsburg period in Bosnia in general.

 

Just before the exit is a flat-screen monitor showing video clips from a period movie about the assassination. As my guide pointed out with great amusement, the scene of the first assassination attempt, in which the hand grenade lands in the car but is heroically picked up by Franz Ferdinand and hurled away, is of course historically totally incorrect.

 

Speaking of guides: while you can visit the museum and the original spots of the assassination plot independently by yourself, taking a guided tour on the theme is not a bad idea. When I returned to Sarajevo in April 2025, I went on a “Franz Ferdinand Tour” offered by Funky Tours (see their sponsored page here!). This included a walking tour of the the Old Town and the original assassination plotters’ spots (as specified above) as well as a visit to the museum, but it then continued by car. One stop was at the graves where the plotters were interred in Yugoslav times, namely at the Kapela Vidovdanskih heroja at the northern end of the Sveti Mihovil cemetery. That was a significant added bonus I found, although I am not entirely sure that these are the actual graves or just a memorial of sorts.

 

We also drove to the former Army Barracks, now mostly occupied by the University of Sarajevo (see also under Sarajevo war ruins!), but back in 1914 it was the main military installation that Franz Ferdinand went to inspect during his visit to Sarajevo. The same complex was also where the assassins and co-plotters were first incarcerated and tried in October 1914.

Location: The museum and assassination spot are located across the road (Obala Kulina bana) from the northern end of the Latin Bridge (Latinska ćuprija) over the Miljacka River right in the centre of old Sarajevo and on the edge of the Old Town. The spot of the first, failed assassination attempt is just a short distance further up the road, while the plotters’ graves are in a cemetery in the north of Sarajevo, not far from the main 1984 Olympic Park.