Bibliotheken Online

The First World War and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918

Manfried Rauchensteiner

Buch

englisch

Rauchensteiner, Manfried (Verfasser/-in) DNB

Böhlau

Wien [u.a.]

2014

1188 p.

austria
monarchy
habsburg monarchy
world war <1914-1918>

Once the revolution had gradually spread to all the lands of the Habsburg Monarchy, many did not want to accept it, but one glance at the surging masses said everything. Vast crowds moved through the streets of Vienna, Prague, Budapest and other capital cities. They did not want to ‘watch the revolution’ but actually to be a part of it when in the centre of Europe nation states were founded and an affirmation of one of the new states was demanded of every single person. Whoever attempted to make it clear that they still felt obligated to the Imperial and Royal government ran the risk of being physically reminded of the new realities. The scenes differed only marginally from one another : in one city, it was the nationalist radicals and in another the political and ideological fanatics who set the tone. A not to be underestimated group was formed by all of those who had not been radicalised by ideologues and ideas of the nation state but simply no longer wanted the war. Into the midst of these came the soldiers returning from the fronts who multiplied the revolutionary potential. Let us once more single out the scene in Prague in the last days of October and the first days of November 1918, about which the now former station commander wrote : ‘There could be no talk any more of correction and discipline. […] No-one any longer gave the military salute ; jostling of all officers, whether white-red or black-yellow, was the order of the day. A wild band of soldiers emerged overnight. All factories were inactive. Everything was decked with flags ; in pan-Slav and red flags. Workers and soldiers carried little red flags. Young and old, men and women, rejoiced over the day of the long-awaited freedom, the day on which the hated yoke of the Habsburgs was cast off. If one had asked any of the red flag-carriers what this yoke had actually been, I am convinced that none of them would have been able to provide an accurate answer.’ It was not possible for everyone – in fact not for the majority – to be involved in the proclamations of new statehood. Hundreds of thousands of soldiers were still marching back from the fronts and sought to somehow find their way to their respective homelands. Non-compliance and veritable battles among the former comrades were such a daily occurrence that they actually hardly any longer aroused any attention. One group declared that they did not want anything to do with another group, and then it was the turn of the second group to do the same. Those who were on the return march from Ukraine, Romania and Serbia only learned several days late that the war was already over. Excesses occurred here and there. A few troop bodies returned home ‘en bloc’, as it was called, in spite of the capture of prisoners on a mass scale after the conclusion of the armistice in the Villa Giusti. At the railway stations the police attempted to maintain order. Protection forces, which had been formed ad hoc and were generally from the new states, supported the police. The situation in the large traffic centres was particularly dramatic. At Vienna’s Nordbahnhof, released Russian prisoners of war plundered, and shots were fired. At Ostbahnhof, in Klein Schwechat and in Stadlau there were gunfights between units of the people’s militia on the one hand and Czecho-Slovakian or Hungarian repatriates on the other. There were dead and wounded on both sides.2529 The guarding of depots was generally in vain : People plundered, ate and drank like there was no tomorrow. Anything available was stuffed into kit bags, rucksacks and pouches. There were also smaller engagements with the Allies, who were pressing forward, or some other troops for whom the advance was too slow. Occasionally, demands were made for weapons to be surrendered. Most refused to do so. Somewhere, the soldiers were then loaded into carriages. Trains were shelled. Officers, who were suddenly without a home and without prospects, committed suicide. The circle from Christalnigg via Paukert and Bolzano to Eduard von Böltz thus closed.
The dead lay at the railway stations. Then the military formations divided themselves up into larger and smaller groups. Some wanted to go one way, others in another direction. ‘A shake of hands and friendship, which had often lasted for years, was brought to an abrupt end.’ Generally, they did not even say ‘good bye’.

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