The First World War initially called “The Great War” was a European conflict fought between 1914-1918. The war started with the assassination of Austro-Hungarian Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie during a public visit to Sarajevo. The assassin, Gavrilo Princip was a Serbian insurgent who detested Austro-Hungarian rule. This assassination plunged the majority of Europe into conflict with one another due to a delicate system of alliances establish years earlier. While there is little doubt that Princip’s actions helped to initiate the conflict, growing tensions among European powers would have undoubtedly lead to war later on. As the war raged on over the years, America remained out of the conflict as a neutral party. While the …show more content…
Millions were conscripted into the armed forces through the draft while civilians were subjected to food and supply rationing. In turn, the federal government expanded and forced companies to make weapons of war and convinced many farmers to supply the military with a significant portion of their crops. The impact this mobilization had on society was drastic. With most of the men shipping off, women were encouraged to fill their occupations while they were away. In what is now referred to as the Great Migration, nearly half a million African Americans moved to northern cities in order to work in local factories. This drastically changed the composition of the country, since most blacks resided in southern states until this time. While the war shook up the United States during the period of American evolvement, it created effects that lasted long after the chaos of war …show more content…
Seemingly overnight after the American declaration of war, civilian industry was switched over to mass produce weapons of war. Families were subjected to the rationing of commodities. Companies that produced automobiles and tractors months earlier were now manufacturing cutting edge military technology. During this period, as many young men were sent off to battle, thousands of females entered the work force to meet the growing demand for laborers. These women worked long hours in a wide variety of positions ranging from welders to munitions workers. The implications of these decisions would have a lasting effect as women continued to fight for equality and modern consumerism was
World War I, otherwise known as the Great War, started in 1914 after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and lasted until 1918, forever changing the map of Europe and ending the lives of nearly 8 million young European men. The congress of Vienna had successfully created an atmosphere of peace that lasted for 100 years, however in the years leading up to 1915, rising tensions among European powers would create a “powder keg” that required only the slightest event to set off a world war. The assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand provided the spark need to destabilize Europe and send the nations of Europe into the first modern war, although conflict had been stirring for the past 50 years. In the end, systems of alliances, imperialism,
World War I was a devastating war in Europe between several countries and alliances that took place between 1914 CE - 1918 CE which utilized several modern industrialized weapons, took millions of lives and changed the course of history. World War I was sparked by the assassination of the Archduke of Austria-Hungary, but increased military spending, alliances treaties and colonization assisted the spark set by Gavrilo Princip(assassin of Archduke)to spread into a wildfire. Increasing military budget was one of the building blocks of World War I. In 1899 , In response to Great Britain's military spending German Chancellor calls upon the Reichstag (German Parliament) While Great Britain was increasing its colonial empire, German Chancellor calls
The most anticipated war in history, World War One, started off with the assassination of the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, Franz Ferdinand. As a result, Austria-Hungary gave the killer’s country, Serbia, an opportunity to take ownership and apologize to A/H’s government. Without a response from Serbia, A/H declares war, launching the July Crisis- one of many of Europe’s fighting frenzies. Countries were declaring war on each other, gathering secret alliances, and building their armies. The Crisis continuously built its longevity until declared as a Great War, a nickname for World War One. Knowing which event pushed the world to arm themselves, historians had asked what the underlying causes for the war were. Causes for the war were alliances, imperialism, nationalism, and most destructive, militarism.
On June 28th, 1914, Austria-Hungary’s Archduke “Francis Ferdinand, Austrian heir, and [his] wife [were] murdered (Doc 10)” in Sarajevo, Bosnia. His assassin was Gavrilo Princip, who was a Bosnian Serb and was in an organization that seeked to end Austro-Hungarian rule in his home of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Princip was said to have “fired the shot that started World War 1”, and the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand was considered one of the, if not THE, main cause(s) of The First World
World War I was one of the goriest wars the world has experienced, with a total mortality count of about 17 million people. The assassination of the Archduke Francis Ferdinand was believed to have triggered the war when a Serbian nationalist, Gavrilo Princip shot him and his wife in the capital of Bosnia on June 28, 1914. A month later the emperor of Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia and it wasn't long before France, Russia, Germany and Britain joined the war, turning what should have been a war between two countries into a total war. This caused a widespread war between the Allied and the Central Powers. The war was fought mostly in Europe, Middle East, and North Africa from 1914 through 1918. The most compelling cause of the Great
Despite being one of the largest and most detrimental wars in Europe’s history, World War I was started by the action of one single person. In June of 1914, the Archduke of Austria- Hungary was assassinated by a Serbian assassin while visiting Serbia. After this, there was tension when Serbia refused to Austria- Hungary apologize for the killing of their Archduke. This continued to escalate until Austria- Hungary declared war on Serbia. Following this, war broke out between countries all around Europe, leading to World War I. Although, the war would not have grown as large as it did if it weren’t for a few factors that allowed the spark of the assassination of the Archduke of Austria- Hungary- Hungary to ignite an entire fire. Many countries
On June 28, 1914, the Archduke of Austria-Hungary, Franz Ferdinand, was assassinated. That event marked the first phase of World War I (Grayzel 10). Soon afterward nations throughout Europe announced declarations of war. By the end of October countries as far away as Japan, China and Brazil had become involved (Grayzel 11). Susan R. Grayzel in the “Introduction: The First World War and the Making of a Modern, Global Conflict” from The First World War: A Brief History with Documents”, explores a variety of contributing reasons for the Great War (Grayzel 9). The causes most
On the home front, and important decision was made for factories to retool their machines. The making of airplanes, tanks, ships, ammunition and utensils took over the production line. The hiring of women to do men’s work on these machines was a big plus, as there were limited men available. The minimum time it took to turn the production of normal goods to the war effort was very impressive.
World War I, also known as the First World War, the Great War and the War to End All Wars, was a global military conflict which took place primarily in Europe from 1914 to 1918.[2] Over 40 million casualties resulted, including approximately 20 million military and civilian deaths.[3] Over 60 million European soldiers were mobilized from 1914 1918.[4] The immediate cause of the war was the June 28, 1914 assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, by Gavril Principe, a Bosnian Serb citizen of Austria-Hungary and member of the Black Hand. The retaliation by Austria-Hungary against Serbia activated a series of alliances that set off a chain reaction of war declarations. Within a month, much of Europe was
Militarism, nationalism, and the start of the alliance system between the great powers of the world in the beginning of the 20th century caused an enormous conflict that shortly after turned to the First World War. In late June 1914, Gavrilo Princip a Serbian nationalist assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria which shortly after caused the beginning of the greatest and bloodiest war in history. The war was fought on different theaters by the world’s greatest empires at that time. The allies composed of the British and the French empires joined forces with mighty Russia against the Central powers composed of Germany, Austria-Hungary and the Ottoman Empire. In 1917, three years after the war broke out, the Allies were joined by the United States which forced a quick defeat of the Central Powers. The introduction of new weapon technology and trench warfare caused an unimaginable amounts of destruction and deaths all over the content of Europe where most of the fighting took place. By the time the Great War had ended in 1918, more than 9 million soldiers had been killed and 21 million more injured. Many historians of the 20th Century blame the generals of the Great War for the massive death toll, they lacked the ability to adapt to the new warfare tactics and the horrifying modern weaponry.
As the war dragged on, it affected American society at nearly every level. It shook up
As more men entered the armed forces, women needed to replace them. By the war's end, hundreds of thousands of women had entered the workforce, many of them in traditionally masculine occupations such as engineering, munitions, transport, business, and eventually even the military. The war produced a leap in women's employment from twenty-six percent in the workforce in 1914 to thirty-six percent by 1918. One million women worked in munition industries, forty-thousand served as nurses, and twenty-thousand joined the Women's Land Army as agricultural workers (Marwick, 1977). For the young and the middle-class, work outside their homes was indeed a new experience. On the other hand, working-class women were used to paid work, but the type of work was new. Many left low-skill, low-wage jobs, especially in domestic service, for better paying skilled labor in factories and workshops (Kent, 1993).
In The World in the Twentieth Century, War and Revolutions, Brower and Sanders began our literary journey through the beginnings of The Great War; in June, 1914 Gavrilo Princip, a Serbian Nationalist murdered the heir to the throne of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Archduke Franz Ferdinand. His killing quickly initiated a series of events that would soon lead to the start of the First World War (38). History.com says in the Outbreak of World War I, many believed that the Great War came out of nowhere. While the European continent was seemingly enjoying “a long stretch of unparalleled peace and prosperity,” many conflicts were unfolding long before this devastation took hold. The people of the world wanted more land and demanded more military power to obtain it; nationalism took the spotlight. Everyone felt a strong commitment to their country and wanted to see growth in its power. Allison Carabajal stated, the idea of “survival of the fittest” was underway.
It allowed black men and women to assert their citizenship, hold the government accountable, and protest racial injustice. Military service brought thousands of black men into the army, exposed them to new lands and new people, and allowed them to fight for their country. What began as a European conflict, irrelevant for Americans quickly became a time of progression for the social, economic, and political future of black people. African Americans were subjected to countless amounts of racism throughout the war, even when they were serving their country in the military. Over 260,000 blacks were volunteered or drafted in the war. While the navy assigned blacks only to low-rank positions, the marines excluded them
In the 1920s women became more independent and started to slowly gain rights (“Women of the Century”). Women’s suffrage was finally granted in 1920, which was a huge step towards equality for men and women. For the first time, women were able to vote on issues that mattered to them, which was extremely important in order to gain more rights. In 1923, the Equal Rights Amendment was first introduced, although it would not be passed in Congress until almost fifty years later. Despite these steps of progress, the Great Depression caused some setbacks. Due to the large numbers of unemployment, women were discouraged from “taking jobs” away from men (“Women of the Century). Some states even went so far as to pass laws prohibiting the hiring of women. World War II began quickly after this which greatly increased the number of women in the work force.