Franz Joseph Departs
On this day ninety years ago, Emperor Franz Joseph I of Austria passed away. He had reigned for 68 years. As Miklos Banffy recalled:
'Everyone knew that it must be true, and yet it seemed almost impossible to believe that the man whom few living men could recall ascending the throne, who had himself enshrined the whole concept of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy.... and who, for most of those who trudged the streets that night, had been a disembodied symbol rather than a real man of flesh and blood, was now no more.'
Although he had died of natural causes, the Emperor had passed on in the midst of the First World War. The Austrian Empire would not reemerge after the conflict, and Franz Joseph's heir Karl I was compelled to flee the country in 1918. It was the end of Habsburg rule in Austria.
Franz Joseph was renowned as an intensely hardworking man. He retired to bed as normal on 21st November 1916. His last words were: "I am tired.'