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On the Trial of the Sarajevo Assassins. Is There an Authentic Text of the Trial Records?
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 10 February 2009
Extract
At first I was unable to obtain any information at all and then only extremely vague and uncertain indications which left the door wide open for every possible conjecture about where the repository of the records of the main process of the Sarajevo assassins is located. Some maintain that the trial records were sent away soon after the verdict was rendered on October 28, 1914, and that they were later torn apart and hopelessly mixed up—even more so than the records of the Maid of Orleans, whose trial, as is well known, took place over five centuries ago. Others believe that this is no misfortune, since an authentic translation of the records of the main trial from Serbo-Croatian into German was published in 1918 by the Berlin Archiv fur Strafrecht und Strafprozess in a treatise entitled Der Prozess gegen die Attentäter von Sarajevo. Nach amtlichen Stenogrammen des Gerichtsverfahrens aktenmässig dargestellt von Prof. Pharos.1
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- Copyright © Center for Austrian Studies, University of Minnesota 1966
References
1 See Table No. 11 of the chart entitled “The Protocol of the Main Trial,” which is appended to this article.
2 See his book on Der Ursprung des ersten Weltkrieges (2 vols., Berlin, 1930), Vol. II, p. 37, the first American edition of which was published in 1928. Fay was then professor of history at Smith College.Google Scholar
3 In his Istraga u Sarajevskom (Zagreb, 1938), p. 202. The name is also given as Pfefer.Google Scholar
4 Jesuiten Lexikon, edited by LudwigKoch, S. J. Koch, S. J. (Paderborn: Bonifacius Publishing and Printing House, 1934), p. 1486.Google Scholar
5 I found Father Puntigam's notes, which are entitled Wie Gott mich geführt—Erinnerungen und Erlebnisse, together with a draft of his article, in the Library of the Jesuit College in Vienna. The notes, which comprise a manuscript 472 pages in length, were written shortly after World War I.
6 As quoted in Vojislav, Bogićević, Sarajevski atentat (Sarajevo, 1954), pp. 39–40. See also No. 20 of the table in the appendix. In order to appreciate the full significance of this dialogue one should not forget that in Bosnia and Herzegovina political groups resembled confessional ones. The diet was divided on a religious basis: 33% Mohammedan, 43% Serbian Orthodox, and 22% Catholic. In some instances when the authorities asked common people to what religion they belonged they answered “Croatian.” By this they meant Catholic.Google Scholar
7 As recently as 1954, in the introduction to his book Bogićević uncritically cited authors who referred to Father Puntigam as Francis Ferdinand's “Jesuit Father Confessor.”
8 The Vienna residence of the successor to the throne and his family.
9 Anton, Puntigam, Unsere Zukunft in Bosnien (Graz, 1909). In this book he also writes that “the Bosnian and Herzegovinan Catholics are the most reliable permanent frontier soldiers of the church and state in the eastern part of the monarchy.”Google Scholar
10 See Father Puntigam's notes.
11 Father Puntigam's notes, and Stimmen aus Bosnien, April, 1914. Gavrilo Princip's assurances during the investigation that he had no intention of murdering the archduchess were believed only after searching questions were asked.
12 During his trial Čabrinović described himself as an “Anarcho-Socialist.”
13 See Father Puntigam's notes.
14 The new youth home which was being planned was to be called “Sophie Home.”
15 Is this true?!
16 See Table No. 11 of the chart in the appendix.
17 See Pfeffer, Istraga u Sarajevskom, passim.
18 The documents of the Serbian ministry of foreign affairs and those in the Bosnian archives (the documents of the joint imperial ministry of finances) were turned over to “Research Group 1941–45” for examination and study. An explanation of how these documents were moved around during the Second World War is given in Tables No. 14,17, 18, and 19 of the appendix. Before 1945 only part of the publications of the imperial archives in Vienna which had been planned had actually been printed, namely, Fritz, von Reinöhl's Grossserbische Umtriebe vor und nach dem Ausbruch des ersten Weltkrieges, Pt. I: Der Fall Jeftanović-Sola-Gavrila (1944), and a selection “from the comprehensive work on Serbische Aussenpolitik 1908–1918: diplomatische Akten des serbischen Ministeriums des Äussern in deutscher Übersetzung, selected by Hans Uebersberger and compiled by Ludwig Bittner and Hans Uebersberger, which deals with the period between May 26 and August 6, 1914, and which is already in press.” This selection contains only thirty-eight documents which, I admit, are very important. The work itself, which was to include “several hundred Serbian diplomatic documents dealing with the above-mentioned period of time,” was actually set up in type but was still not printed when the war ended. The shortage of type metal was supposedly responsible for the fact that soon after the war ended the type which had already been set was melted down without either the printer or publisher (Adolf Holzhausens Nachfolger in Vienna) retaining either the brush-proof or the matrixes of the work. The same fate overtook a work dealing with Sarajevo which included the already mentioned comparisons of various editions and copies of the protocol: “the official copy of 1914” (see Table No. 7 of the appendix); the “Belgrade copy (1925)” (see Table No. 16); the “Kesterčanek reconstruction” (see Table No. 6); the Pharos text (see Table No. 11); and the Mousset text (see Table No. 13). By April, 1945, at least 138 pages had been set of this comparison of texts. The manuscript and galley proof were delivered to the Yugoslavs in 1948. A few insignificant remnants of the editorial work done by the group are in the hands of a private owner in Vienna. I was able to use part of this material for this study. Since the individual contributors to this work are not indicated, I am citing it here under the collective reference of “Research Group 1941–45.”Google Scholar
19 Eugen, Lennhof and Oskar, Posner, Internationales Freimaurerlexikon (Zürich: Amalthea Verlag, 1923), p. 1263.Google Scholar
20 See Table No. 13 of the chart in the appendix.
21 See Tables No. 14 and 16.
22 Gemeinsames Finanzminiaterium, Präsidiale, Abt. Bosnien Hercegowina, No. 1655, Fos. 31–32, as cited in the records of “Research Group 1941–45.”
23 See the table about communiqués: No. 3 of the chart in the appendix.
24 Gemeinsames Finanzminiaterium, Präsidiale, Abt. Bosnien Hereegowina, No. 1655, Fos. 1–2. See also the draft by Beigel, after consultation with Baron Musolin, which was revised by Kuh and dispatched by Bilinski, and which is cited in the records of “Research Group 1941–45.”
25 Did Investigating Magistrate Pfeffer really exert himself to get on the track of the “other sinister forces?” In regard to his curious interro gation practices which made it impossible to attain such results, see Fritz, Würthle, “Die Schuldigen und Verantwortlichen,” Die Furche (Vienna), 1964, No. 24, p. 34.Google Scholar
26 Oberlandesgerichtsrat Alois von Curinaldi.
27 Ladislaus Ritter von Chmielewski.
28 See Pfeffer, Istraga u Sarajevskom, p. 140.
29 “National Defense”—the national Serbian organization which was charged by the court with fomenting the assassination.
30 “Der Sarajeyo-Prozess.” Deutsche Übersetzung der Anklageschrift nach dem kroatischen Originaltext und amtliche deutsche Übersetzung des Urteils, edited by Dr. Brandenburg (Berlin, 1933).
31 See Table No. 2 of the chart in the appendix.
32 See Tables No. 7,13,14,15, and 16 of the chart.
33 See Tables No. 2, 6,15,17,18, and 19.
34 The fact that it was a time of war explains why only two stenographers were entrusted with the work. Under normal conditions two working teams, each composed of three stenographers and a supervisor, would have been appointed for a highly important political trial against twenty-five defendants that lasted two weeks.
35 “Only two of us, Milan Prpić and I, came into the picture in writing the protocol. I was a docent at the commercial academy [According to the Amtskalendar, he was a teacher at the technical school in Sarajevo.] and worked as a stenographer at the sessions of the diet. I already had several years of practice as a stenographer at the diet … Milan Prpić was twenty years old and had practiced his profession two or three years at the diet.” DrVladimir, Kesterčanek (Zagreb), “Die stenographische Aufnahme des Prozesses gegen Gavrilo Princip und Genossen in Sarajevo,” in Neue stenographische Praxis (Bonn), 1959, No. 2.Google Scholar
36 Vladimir, Kesterčanek, “Autentični stenografski zapisnik sudbene rasprave protivu G. Princip i drugova,” Nova Europa (Zagreb), 1941, No. 3Google Scholar. See also Ibid., March 26, 1934; and Obzon (Zagreb), February 25, 1925.
37 Excerpts from the telegrams of December 12,1914, December 2, 1915, and December 19, 1915, which have been cited, are in the records of “Research Group 1941–45.”
38 Vojislav M. Jovanović took charge of the main archive in Belgrade in November, 1924, and was its director until 1930. In January, 1938, he assumed the directorship a second time and remained in this position until the Yugoslav state collapsed. His title was first chief archivist and then chief of the historical division.
39 There was no “joint ministry for Bosnia and Herzegovina.” It should have been referred to as the “Bosnian-Herzegovinan division of the joint imperial ministry of finances.”
40 The “Belgrade copy of 1925” is deposited in the Arhiv bosne i hercegovine (Sarajevo) (formerly known as Državni arhiv narodne republike boane i hercegovine u sarajevu).
41 See also Table No. 20 of the chart in the appendix. The note of authentication by V. M. Jovanović, the chief archivist of Belgrade, which is attached to the “Belgrade copy of 1925,” was confirmed both by Prof. Bogićević on p. 3 of his own publication and by notations made by “Research Group 1941–45.”
42 Not to be confused with Dr. Milan Bogićević, the Serbian chargé d'affaires in Berlin from 1908 to 1914 and later a political writer.
43 See Bogićevic, Sarajevski atentat, p. 291.
44 Kriegsarchiv (Vienna), Belobigungsantrag No. 1,567,581.
45 Between March 20 and June 5, 1914, Colonel General Dragutin Dimitrijević was tried by court-martial and the superior military court at Salonika. The Salonika process was reviewed at Belgrade in 1953. See Hans Uebersberger, Der Salonik-Prozesa (Berlin, 1933); and Hans, Uebersberger, Österreich zwischen Russland und Serbien (Graz: Böhlau, 1958).Google Scholar
46 Arhiv bosne i hercegovine (Sarajevo), Gemeinsames Finanzminiaterium, Präsidiale, Abt. Bosnien Hercegowina, No. 533–16.