Gavrilo Princip and the Black Hand

informed of the Black Hand activities.  Friendly relations had fairly well cooled by 1914.  The Black Hand was displeased with Prime Minister Nikola Pasic.  They engaged in a bitter power struggle over several issues, such as who would control territories.  Serbia annexed in the Balkan Wars.  By this point, standing up and saying ‘no’ to the Black Hand was a dangerous act.  The Black Hand assassinated Archduke Franz Ferdinand.  Three young men were put on the job.  Gavrilo Princip succeeded in killing him.  He was born fourth of nine children.  His father worked as a postman.  Gavrilo Princip never in robust health attended high school in Sarajevo and Tuzla but in 1912 traveled to Belgrade for a more Serb-nationalist education.  There he became an active propagandist for the Greater Serbian cause.  He was admitted to the Black Hand academy in 1912, but his poor health rendered him unfit for active duty.  Two years later, Tankosic recruited Gavrilo Princip and two others for a plot to assassinate Archduke Franz Ferdinand.  Because of his earlier partisan training, Gavrilo Princip was the best shot of the three and showed leadership qualities.  Police rescued Gavrilo Princip from the mob, many of whom wanted to kill him.  Once in custody, Gavrilo Princip and Carinovic managed to confuse their amateurish interrogator, revealing nothing of the Black Hand organization and sponsorship of the plot.  Danilo Ilic’s confession early brought down their house of cards, but during the trial (in which all the defendants were present) Princip was quietly able to exercise his leadership.  The code of silence held.  Whilse some of the defendants expressed remorse over their crime; Princip maintained his silence about the Black Hand with a stoic detachment.  His final statement in court was short.  “In trying to insinuate that someone else has instigated the assassination, one strays from the truth.  The ideas arouse in our own minds, and we ourselves executed it.  We had loved the people.  I have nothing to say in my defense.”  Princip was found guilty.  Whether he would receive the death penalty or a prison term hinged on his exact birthday.  One account had him turn twenty days before the crime, another that he turned twenty a few days after.  The court gave Princip the benefit of the doubt, and sentenced him to twenty years in prison.  He died in the hospital of Theresienstadt prison on April of 1918, from tuberculosis.  In June 1917, the Black Hand was outlawed.  Intriguing and Insurrection, by their very nature, however, are not bothered by legalities.  A new organization – The White Hand – was formed from trustworthy men of Narodna Odbrana.  It continued the imperialistic work of the Black Hand, using the same techniques.  The death of Vojislav Petrovic, an ex-attaché to the Yugoslave Legation in London, was said to be the work of Narodna Odbrans.  Petrovic was preparing a book on the history of Sarajevo assassinations and the Black Hand, in what became Yugoslavia after the war, the White Hand grew into an essential piece of the state’s machinery.