A single bullet

One hundred years ago today, Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria, heir presumptive to the Austro-Hungarian throne, and his wife, Sophie, Duchess of Hohenberg, were shot dead in Sarajevo by Gavrilo Princip, one of a group of six assassins.

As a direct result of that single bullet, now a museum exhibit in the Konopiště Castle, Czech Republic, 37 million men, women and children were killed or maimed, and God only knows how many hearts were broken and lives were ruined, in what we call the Great War.

Princip used a Belgian-made 9×17mm semi-automatic pistol in the assassination; the photograph is of bullet from a second world war Thompson sub-machine gun.