Welcome to Interesting If True, the podcast that kills, poorly.

I’m your host this week, Shea, and with me are:

I’m Aaron, and this week I learned that I won’t be leaving here with you… Oh, I know, I won’t be leaving… here… with… you. </Shatner>

This is the story of the most botched successful assassination ever.

We’re gonna start with the most badass-sounding secret society ever, no not the Skull and Bones, the Black Hand!

The Black Hand, I’m a comic and superhero nerd so I get images of a clandestine cult of professional assassins and spies. According to the Elder Scrolls, they are the ruling party of the Dark Brotherhood, a group of elite assassins and spies, pretty much exactly as I picture them. In the real world though, the Black Hand was a Serbian secret terrorist organization that was formed days after Austria annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1908 when a group of Serbian ministers and officials met, angry with Austria and planned to win their country back. Well, I guess they started as Narodna Odbrana (National Defense) and a few years later 10 members made a super double secret organization within the National Defense called Ujedinjenje ili Smrt (Union or Death), also known as The Black Hand.

By 1914, there were several hundred members, perhaps as many as 2500. Many members were Serbian army officers. The professed goal of the group was the creation of a Greater Serbia, by use of violence, if necessary. The Black Hand trained guerillas and saboteurs and arranged political murders. The Black Hand was organized at the grassroots level in 3 to 5-member cells. Above them were district committees. Above them, was the Central committee in Belgrade. At the top was the ten-member Executive Committee led, more or less, by Colonial Dragutin Dimitrijevic, (also known as Apis ). Members rarely knew much more than the members of their own cell and one superior above them, to ensure that the group’s leaders would remain secret. New members swore “…before God, on my honor and my life, that I will execute all missions and commands without question. I swear before God, on my honor, and on my life, that I will take all the secrets of this organization into my grave with me.”

If you are as old as Steve, that date might stick out to you because you love watching old World War 1 documentaries. This is the year the first great war starts and if you pay attention to the documentaries you may also remember the Black Hand, the jackasses that started it. If you aren’t an old man really into war documentaries you will recall from high school history the name Franz Ferdinand and how his assassination was the shot heard around the world, you might not know how difficult the shot was to take.

A bit of back history in case you don’t remember anything from high school. Archduke Franz Ferdinand, the heir to the throne of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, visited Sarajevo to commemorate Bosnia’s induction into the empire on June 28th, 1914. A group of Serbian rebels learned of his plans and decided to assassinate the archduke to protest Bosnia’s inclusion in the empire, feeling Bosnia should be part of a unified Serbian federal nation instead. The Serbian rebels, of course, were the Black Hand.

The Black Hand, you’d think, would be a competent double super-secret society because they were made up of many Serbian military officers but you’d be wrong. It took 4 attempts and the final was pure luck. There were 7 assassins hired to kill Franz, all were amateurs and at least two had tuberculosis. Why they didn’t use a member with some military background is beyond me… The asses, sorry assassins were each given a gun or a bomb and a small vial of cyanide in case they got caught. Some were given a small amount of training in the month leading up to the visit but not really much more than that.

Franz Ferdinand accepted an invitation from Bosnia’s governor, General Oskar Potoirek, to inspect the army maneuvers being held outside Sarajevo. The Archduke’s role as Inspector General of the Army made the visit logical. It had also been four years since a prominent Hapsburg had made a goodwill visit to Bosnia. The visit would also roughly coincide with his 14th wedding anniversary. While his wife Sophie, not of royal blood, was not permitted to ride in the same car as her royal husband back in Vienna, such taboos did not apply to provincial cities like Sarajevo. During the visit, Sophie would be able to ride beside her husband — a thoughtful anniversary gift, this year I’m gonna just drive my wife around too. Security during the visit was not tight. Franz was a brave man and disliked the presence of secret servicemen. Nor did he like the idea of a cordon of soldiers between the crowd and himself. For the most part, Franz was welcomed warmly by the Bosnians. Sarajevo was not seen as hostile territory. Arrangements were not based on the assumption that the streets were lined with assassins. As it was, only Sarajevo’s hundred and twenty policemen were at work.

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At around 10:00 a.m, the royal party left the Philipovic army camp, where Franz had checked out the armies in his sleeves. The motorcade, consisting of six automobiles, was headed for City Hall for a reception. The chosen route was the wide avenue called Appel Quay, which followed the north bank of the River Miljacka. Franz was in the second automobile, it’s top folded down and flying the Hapsburg pennant, he rode with his wife Sophie and General Potoirek.

The morning was sunny and warm. Many of the houses and buildings lining the route were decorated with flags and flowers. Crowds lined the Appel Quay to cheer the imperial couple. Amid the festive crowd, seven young assassins lay in wait. They took up their assigned positions, all but one along the riverside of the Appel Quay.

As the motorcade approached the crowds began to cheer. Franz’s car passed Mehmedbasic, the first assassin; he did nothing. I don’t know why but yeah, the first guy was a big old bust. The next ass in line, Cabrinovic, had more resolve and TB. He took the bomb from his coat pocket, struck the bomb’s percussion cap against a lamppost, took aim, and threw the bomb directly at Franz’s car. In the short time, it took the bomb to sail through the air, many small events took place. The car’s owner, hearing the bomb being struck against the lamp post, though they had suffered a flat tire. “Bravo. Now we’ll have to stop.” The driver, who must have seen the black object flying, did just the opposite — he stepped on the accelerator. As a result, the bomb would not land where intended. Franz, also catching a glimpse of the hurtling package, raised his arm to deflect it away from Sophie.

The bomb glanced off Franz’s arm and bounced off the folded car top, and into the street behind them. The explosion injured about a dozen spectators. The third car was hit with fragments and stalled. Lieutenant Colonel Merizzi received a bad cut to the back of the head. Others in the party received minor cuts. The first and second cars continued on for a few moments then stopped while everyone assessed who was injured and who was not.

Cabrinovic, seeing that his bomb had failed, immediately swallowed his cyanide and jumped into the river. That would be the end of his story if the poison hadn’t been old and the river hadn’t been low… Instead of dying and escaping he mainly busted his ankles and flopped around like a fish while vomiting violently everywhere. He was quickly seized by the crowd and arrested. The motorcade continued on to City Hall, passing the other assassins. Maybe they thought the bomb had worked? I dunno, they dropped the ball as well.

The motorcade made it to city hall and, though upset with having a bomb thrown at him got over it quickly and had a lovely time with the Mayor. After meeting with the Mayor, discussions were held as to whether to change the rest of Franz’s schedule. He did not wish to cancel his visit to the museum and lunch at the Governor’s residence, but he wished to alter his plans to include a visit to Merizzi in the hospital.

The assassins, counting on the bomb to have worked were without a plan and guessed that the Archduke probably was going to change his plans now that his life had been threatened so they decided to take up various other positions along the Appel Quay in case he showed up.

One assassin, 19-year-old Gavrilo Princip, hungry from assassinating decides to hit up Moritz Schiller’s delicatessen for a sandwich on Franz Joseph Street which was a few yards from the busy Appel Quay. Gun still loaded in his pocket he decided to grab a seat outside and enjoy the weather with his sandwich.

Franz left City Hall following his change of plans to visit his injured Lieutenant. Only someone had forgotten to tell the driver, normally the injured Lieutenant would have taken care of it. Now on the way, the driver kept to the original plan and followed Appel Quay until he was informed of the change of plans. Not knowing the city ver