3rd August 1914: Sir Edward Grey, the British Foreign Secretary, remarked that “The lamps are going out all over Europe…”

**Scott Allsop** (0:00)
On the 3rd of August 1914, Sir Edward Grey, the British Foreign Secretary, remarked to a friend that the lamps are going out all over Europe. Welcome to HistoryPod.
A month after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia and triggered a network of military alliances that drew the major European powers into the conflict. Germany declared war on Russia on the 1st of August and on France on the 3rd of August, while German forces began implementing the Schlieffen Plan by advancing towards neutral Belgium. Although Britain did not immediately declare war, the government was facing increasing pressure to respond to the rapidly changing situation. As Foreign Secretary, Sir Edward Grey had attempted to prevent the crisis from developing into a general European war through diplomatic negotiations. However, with these efforts proving unsuccessful, during the evening of the 3rd of August he reportedly remarked to his friend John Alfred Spender, The lamps are going out all over Europe. We shall not see them lit again in our lifetime. Grey's remark came to represent the end of the comparatively stable international order that had existed in Europe before 1914, and the beginning of a conflict that transformed the continent. The following day, after Germany invaded Belgium in violation of the Treaty of London of 1839, Britain issued an ultimatum demanding the withdrawal of German forces. When this expired without response, Britain declared war on Germany on the evening of the 4th of August 1914
The First World War reshaped national boundaries, contributed to the collapse of several empires, and altered international politics for decades. Grey's reflection has therefore endured because it expressed the sense that an era was ending even before the full scale and consequences of the war had become apparent.