this time, Europe was a continent of large empires and smaller nation-states engaged in a series of overlapping rivalries and alliances. Nationalism soared everywhere, not just in Hungary, and it drove Austria-Hungary and its neighbors to compete for resources, territory, and power.

The two German-speaking empires, Austria-Hungary and Germany, formed a tight alliance. On the other hand, Russia and Serbia, sharing a sense of Slavic brotherhood, vowed to protect one another. Were these competing powers inevitably destined to collide, or did an unintended chain of events lead to war?

Franz Ferdinand, an impetuous hothead who lacked in charm, was heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne. He wanted to restructure his uncle’s empire and give Slavs greater rights and autonomy. Both Emperor Franz Joseph and Maygar nationalists preferred that things stay the same.

By 1914, Austria Hungary had expanded its empire deeper into the Balkan Peninsula. Franz Ferdinand’s military tour of Sarajevo in June 1914 gave the angry Serbian nationalists an opportunity to retaliate.

Austria-Hungary, blaming the Serbian government for the assassination, delivered a ridiculously unreasonable 10-point ultimatum.

The Serbian government accepted some of the demands but politely rejected others—and these rejections were enough for Austria-Hungary to declare war against Serbia.

AUSTRIA-HUNGARYand Serbia started the conflict, but a month later, practically the entire European continent was at war because of various military alliances. Germany, Austria-Hungary, the Ottoman Empire, and Bulgaria made up the Central Powers. They opposed the Allied Powers of Russia, Great Britain, France, and Serbia (later including Italy and Romania as well).

With a war underway, Austria-Hungary needed soldiers. Since rural folks were easier to round up than urbanites, far more Hungarian men were drafted from villages than from cities.

People were told they needed to fight for their homeland and their freedom because France, England, and Russia had conspired to make them all slaves. They were also told that this war would be over in a snap. No one could prepare these poor peasant men for the massive, unnecessary bloodbath that lay ahead.

Any European military that did not adapt faced ruin. Austria-Hungary, under the elderly Franz Joseph, did not adapt, and sent men to war with horses and swords rather than airplanes and artillery.

The Austro-Hungarian army was also undersized, partly because the Hungarians were more concerned about building their own Honvédség than contributing to the common army.

Their principle mission was to fight against the Serbs, Russians, and after 1915, the Italians. They found themselves outgunned and outmaneuvered at nearly every turn.

WHEREASAustria-Hungary’s noblemen frequented the Italian Riviera on holidays, it was only in war (and with the possibility of death, disease, or disability) that peasants like István could travel the world.

THISseries of battles went on for two years, five months, and four days. The stalemate only ended when the German army, with its vastly superior military technology, took over the failing Austro-Hungarian war effort. They defeated the Italians through a combination of poison gas, mortars, mountain guns, flamethrowers, and hand grenades. The German soldiers annihilated the Italian troops in 15 days.

THINGS were awful at home as well. Nearly every rural and working class man had been called up to the front, so farm work was left to women and children. My great-grandmother, Regina, relied heavily on her two sons, József (14) and Pista (my grandfather, 13) to help run the farm, and faced the real possibility that her husband might never return.

Mrs. Böthi's husband never returned. She was Regina's neighbor. She wrote a letter to her husband on May 7, 1917 (he died before he received it). In it she described her almost impossible workload and explained her struggles with taking care of the cattle, the crops, and the children. Mrs. Böthi also shared the news of the most recent village calamities:

RUSSIApulled out of the war in 1917, ripped apart by peasant uprisings and a surging Bolshevik Revolution. But the Allied Powers were bolstered by the United State’ entry into the war the same year. Germany, the Ottoman Empire, and Austria-Hungary held out until mid-1918. None of these empires survived the four years of bloodshed.

This GREAT WAR was a catastrophic failure.

Of all the countries involved in World War I, Austria-Hungary’s forces suffered the most devastating losses per population: 90 percent of the 7.8 million soldiers were either killed, maimed, or made POWs.

Around the world, a new vocabulary developed to explain what he and millions of other soldiers were going through.

In German it looked like this:

My great-grandfather, István, had lost his Selbst-Kontrolle (self control) and was experiencing Sinnesverwirrung (confusion of the senses). He was alive, but like the rest of Hungary, he was a mess.