On May 7th1915, the reality of the war in Europe both horrified and astonished the world. That was the day that a German U-boat sunk the Lusitania, the pride of the British Cunard shipping lines, with the loss of 1189 lives.

The Lusitania carried a healthy complement of American passengers when she departed New York for Liverpool on May 1, 1915, despite a published warning from the German authorities that appeared in U.S. newspapers the morning of her departure. Although there was reason to believe that Germany would not attack a harmless luxury liner. By this time a number of British merchant ships had been sunk by German subs, but the famous liner's speed still seemed the best guarantee of safety. Certainly her captain and crew should have been on high alert.

As the Lusitania neared the end of her crossing, a German U-boat (U-20) sank three British ships in the waters south of Ireland through which she was about to sail and he received repeated warning that U-boats were active on his intended course. This prompted the crew to implement precautions and safety preparations on board in the event of a sighting. Yet on May 7, as the Lusitania entered the most dangerous part of her passage, Captain William Turner actually slowed down, apparently worried by patchy fog.

When U-20 under the command of Kapitänleutnant Walther Schwieger spotted the ship in its sights just south of Queenstown, Ireland, it was able to kill her with a single torpedo, penetrating the hull just below the waterline. The initial explosion set off a violent secondary blast. The ship sank in 18 minutes, with a lost of 1,195 of the 1,959 on board, including 123 Americans. Captain Turner was washed clear of the bridge as the ship sank, and survived after spending more than three hours in the water. The lost of the Lusitania provoked great outrage in the United States and helped create the climate of public opinion that would later allow America to join the war.

The Halifax Explosion occurred on Thursday, December 6, 1917, when the city of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, was devastated by the huge detonation of a French cargo ship, fully loaded with wartime explosives that had accidentally collided with a Norwegian ship in "The Narrows" section of the Halifax Harbour.

At 8:40 in the morning, Mont-Blanc, which was chartered by the French government to carry munitions, collided with the Norwegian ship Imo chartered by the Commission for Relief in Belgium to carry relief supplies. Mont-Blanc caught fire ten minutes after the collision and exploded about twenty-five minutes later at 9:04:35 AM. All buildings and structures covering nearly two square kilometres along the adjacent shore of the exploded ship were obliterated, including those in the neighbouring communities of Richmond and Dartmouth. The explosion caused a tsunami in the harbour, and a pressure wave of air that snapped trees, bent iron rails, demolished buildings, grounded vessels, and carried fragments of the Mont-Blanc for kilometres.

Approximately 2,000 people (mostly Canadians) were killed by debris, fires, or collapsed buildings and it is estimated that over 9,000 people were injured. The devastation left thousands of people homeless and the severed gas, electricity and telegraph lines crippled Halifax. This is still one of the world's largest man-made, conventional explosions to date.

Archduke Ferdinand, born December 18, 1863 was considered a prideful and mistrusting man, and not overly cultured with a short temper. He also lacked the necessary charisma to guarantee him popularity.

The primary source of Franz Ferdinand's unpopularity that related to the policies he intended to apply once he assumed the throne. He had proposed to replace Austro-Hungarian dualism with 'Trialism,' a triple monarchy in which the empire's Slavs would have an equal voice in government with the Germans and Magyars. Ferdinand was also considering the idea of federalism made up of 16 states; the aim being to avoid disintegration of the fading Austro-Hungarian Empire. However these ideas were not accepted amongst the ruling elite.

As Inspector General of the army, Franz Ferdinand accepted an invitation from General Oskar Potiorek to visit Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia, to inspect army manoeuvres. Bosnia - and Herzegovina - were provinces that had been under Austro-Hungarian administration since 1878, by international agreement. Austria annexed the provinces outright in 1908, a controversial move which upset governments in the west; however, Greater-Serbia proponents were outraged. They wanted the provinces to be part of a Serbian led Pan-Slav State, rather than part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

The Black Hand, a Serbian terrorist group, was determined to assassinate Franz Ferdinand during his visit to Sarajevo thereby stalling his proposed reforms. While riding in the motorcade through the streets of Sarajevo on 28 June, Franz Ferdinand and his wife Sophie were shot and killed by Gavrilo Princip, a Bosnian member of the Black Hand. A hand grenade had also fired at Ferdinand’s car earlier that same day causing him to complain angrily upon his arrival at the city hall. Franz Ferdinand was buried in a crypt beneath the chapel of his castle, Artstetten, instead of the customary burial place of the Hapsburgs, Capuchin Crypt, in Vienna.

November 11th 1918 at 11:00 A.M… the “war to end all wars” finally came to an end after four brutal years as an agreement in France was signed between the Germans and the Allies. Time passed in agonizing slowness, as the world was to stop all fire at exactly eleven o’clock and not a minute before. Leading up to eleven AM men were still fighting and dying.

November 11th marked the 1,559th day of the war for the British Army. With just minute’s left until the end of this four-year war, commanders allowed the men to attach ropes to the lanyards of the guns. An officer held a handkerchief over his head and with a watchful eye on his watch he would drop it as soon as eleven o’clock struck. At this point, the men were to yank the rope. This way every man could claim that he had fired the last shot of the Great War. The news that the war was over was greeted with some uncertainty since there had already been rumors before. Hearing the silence had been a bit frightening for the men in battle since they had become used to the noise of the war. Many of them still believed that the armistice was just a temporary plan.

When the battle officially ended, crowds of people poured onto the streets in celebration. Songs were played for people to enjoy and dance to, stores re-opened, and street and house lights could once again be turned on. Someone had remarked “each light reminded us that, for the first time, all along the front no one is trying to kill anybody.”